Negotiating gender under occupation : A study of womanhood in Dheisheh refugee camp, Bethlehem.

Patriarchal power structures and oppression from the occupation are two major influences in how women in Dheisheh refugee camp can live their lives. Gender roles are strict and traditional and women are homebound and generally marginalized in the community. Daily life is made difficult by the occupation making violence, fear and loss a plainness. However, the occupation has caused traditional gender roles to sway, in terms of women having to work outside the home in order to support the family, because husbands and fathers either being killed or imprisoned by the Israeli Occupation Forces, IOF. Women are also given higher education in a larger scale than before because education has become both a form of resistance but also a way and a hope for the younger generation to build a better future for themselves and the community. Making work and education tools and strategies for women to gain more independence. Strength is the outcome of living under dual oppression. Women are forced to be strong by the harshness of living under occupation and are made strong by constantly negotiating their roles as women within the stern framework of a patriarchal society under a violent occupation