Women This Week: UN Expert Reports on Israel’s Targeted Violence Against Women and Girls in Gaza

Women and Girls are the Majority of Casualties 

This week, the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, Reem Alsalem, described the violence against women and girls in Gaza as an unfolding “femi-genocide.” Amid the overall worsening conditions, women and girls make up 67 percent of reported fatalities, according to estimates from early July. There are around 55,000 women in Gaza who are pregnant, with at least 20 percent at risk of famine and acute malnutrition. Israel recently imposed customs duties on aid purchased outside of Israel to be sent to Gaza, which has hampered the entry of aid, including baby formula. According to the World Food Program, starvation in Gaza has reached “new and astonishing levels of desperation” as distribution sites have seen increasing rates of violence against aid seekers. Citing her recent report to the Human Rights Council, Alsalem told Al Jazeera that “Palestinian women and girls carry the promise of the continuity of Palestinian life, and therefore they are being deliberately killed, and they’re being deliberately exterminated.” Her report also raised alarm over reports of sexual violence, including rape, committed by Israeli forces.  

In Bid for Closer Ties, Iceland and EU Commission President Talk Security 

Last week, Prime Minister Kristrún Frostadóttir and Foreign Minister Þorgerður Katrín Gunnarsdóttir launched talks with European Union (EU) President von der Leyen to enhance collaboration between the EU and Iceland on security and defense. Gunnarsdóttir also announced that Iceland has enough public support to hold a referendum on reopening EU accession talks after negotiations were closed in 2013. The meeting came as Iceland navigates frictions between the United States and the EU—its two largest trading partners. Iceland is currently the only NATO member without an army, but it plays a critical role in its geopolitical position within NATO’s Arctic and North Atlantic defense posture. The government has pledged to meet the NATO target for 1.5 percent of GDP to be allocated to defense-related initiatives, such as cyber defense, coast guard expansion, and support for allies. On both trade and defense, Gunnarsdóttir said Iceland is “strengthening our discussion and relationship to the U.S. as well to the EU.” She emphasized that beefed up ties with the EU are not at the expense of U.S. ties, which she termed vital “for our security, for the security in the North Atlantic and for Greenland as well.”  

Olympics to Ban Transgender Women from Competition 

This week, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) banned transgender women from competing in women’s sports. The committee changed eligibility rules to comply with the Trump administration’s executive order on “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.” The USOPC added that it would work with sports federations to implement the new criteria, but some states, such as California and Minnesota, have opposed the executive order. USA Fencing has already changed its policy to allow only athletes of the biological female sex to compete in women’s categories, and “all athletes not eligible for the women’s category, including transgender women, transgender men, non-binary and intersex athletes and cisgender male athletes” will compete in the men’s category. Due to recently increased control over the USOPC, Congress has the power to decertify and could rescind funds from sports federations that fail to comply with the order.