Rauda Morcos (; ) is a Palestinian–Israeli

lesbian A lesbian is a homosexual woman or girl. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with female homosexu ...

poet and

LGBTQ LGBTQ people are individuals who are lesbian, Gay men, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning (sexuality and gender), questioning. Many variants of the initialism are used; LGBTQIA+ people incorporates intersex, Asexuality, asexual, ...

activist, whose hometown is in

Northern Israel The Northern District (; ) is one of Israel's six administrative districts. The Northern District has a land area of 4,473 km2, making it the second largest district in Israel. The Golan Heights has been run as a sub-district of the North ...

, living in

Haifa Haifa ( ; , ; ) is the List of cities in Israel, third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropolitan area i ...

in Israel. In 2003, she was outed as a lesbian by a national newspaper, leading to dismissal from her job, physical assaults, and her car being damaged. She then helped other women in setting up Aswat, the first Palestinian group dedicated to supporting lesbians, which she initially led.

Career

In 2003, Morcos was interviewed for ''

Yedioth Ahronoth (, ; lit. "Latest News") is an Israeli daily mass market newspaper published in Tel Aviv. Founded in 1939, is Israel's largest paid newspaper by sales and circulation and has been described as "undoubtedly the country's number-one paper."

'' (an Israeli tabloid newspaper) about her poetry, and lost her job as a youth educator. During the interview, in passing she mentioned her sexuality. She said the journalist promised not to reveal her sexual orientation but then outed her as a

, which led to her being assaulted and her car being damaged many times. She received anonymous threats and was concerned for her life. Morcos then joined other women in 2000 in an online forum that started the regular meetings in 2001 and set up Aswat ("Voices"; which she has formerly led) in 2003 as an organisation supporting lesbians and

bisexual Bisexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior toward both males and females. It may also be defined as the attraction to more than one gender, to people of both the same and different gender, or the attraction t ...

, inter-sex,

queer ''Queer'' is an umbrella term for people who are non-heterosexual or non- cisgender. Originally meaning or , ''queer'' came to be used pejoratively against LGBTQ people in the late 19th century. From the late 1980s, queer activists began to ...

transsexual A transsexual person is someone who experiences a gender identity that is inconsistent with their assigned sex, and desires to permanently transition to the sex or gender with which they identify, usually seeking medical assistance (incl ...

transgender A transgender (often shortened to trans) person has a gender identity different from that typically associated with the sex they were sex assignment, assigned at birth. The opposite of ''transgender'' is ''cisgender'', which describes perso ...

, and questioning women, the only group for Arab lesbians in the Arab region. It was based in

, and was the first regional group to offer support to lesbian Palestinians. Morcos said that: "When we started Aswat, I remember the Islamic Movement issued a boycott against us as well as a ''

fatwa A fatwa (; ; ; ) is a legal ruling on a point of Islamic law (sharia) given by a qualified Islamic jurist ('' faqih'') in response to a question posed by a private individual, judge or government. A jurist issuing fatwas is called a ''mufti'', ...

'' n Islamic religious legal orderagainst me personally, because according to them I was ‘the snake’s head.’" In 2004 the group had 14 members. In 2007, when Aswat had about 30 members and held its first conference, the Islamic Movement in Israel (a grouping of Arab Muslims) publicly called for the meeting to be cancelled and urged its community "to stand against the campaign to market sexual deviance among our daughters and our women." Sheikh Ibrahim Sarsur, head of the Islamic Movement in Israel, said: "Our community does not tolerate this kind of behaviour. The consensus feels it is kind of a disease that must be healed ..." The

International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission Outright International (Outright) is an LGBTIQ human rights non-governmental organization that addresses human rights violations and abuses against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people. OutRight International documents human ...

(now OutRight Action International) presented its

Felipa de Souza Award Outright International (Outright) is an LGBTIQ human rights non-governmental organization that addresses human rights violations and abuses against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people. OutRight International documents human ri ...

to Morcos in 2006, recognising her work with Aswat. She was the first Arab person to receive the award. Aswat held its first conference in Haifa in 2007, with 350 attendees. Taking a

post-colonial Postcolonialism (also post-colonial theory) is the critical academic study of the cultural, political and economic consequences of colonialism and imperialism, focusing on the impact of human control and exploitation of colonized people and thei ...

stance, Morcos has argued that human rights aid organisations from the United States and Western Europe can be patronising to Arab communities. She has also spoken of links between Israeli repression of Palestinians and gay people, criticising the Israeli LGBT rights movement for not focusing more upon it. She commented that "I think the Palestinian identity and the Queer identity converge in being both marginalized and they are both about resisting oppression". Morcos also said "I know that the

Israeli law Israeli law is based mostly on a common law legal system, though it also reflects the diverse history of the territory of the State of Israel throughout the last hundred years (which was at various times prior to independence under Ottoman, t ...

is among the most developed in the world, but this doesn’t mean that it is applied in reality." She added: "I know it’s not easy to be gay in the West Bank, but it’s not easy being gay in ... the U.S.A. And it’s not easy to be gay in Israel (except in

Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...

)." Morcos has worked as a regional advisor for organisations including the

Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice The Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice is an international charitable foundation based in the United States focused on human rights of LGBT people, intersex people, and people of color. The organization provide grants to individuals and org ...

, the

Coalition of Women for Peace The Coalition of Women for Peace () is an umbrella organization of women's groups in Israel, established in November 2000. It describes itself as "a feminist organization against the occupation of Palestine and for a just peace.". CWP says that ...

, the

Global Fund for Women The Global Fund for Women is a non-profit foundation funding women's human rights initiatives. It was founded in 1987 by New Zealander Anne Firth Murray, and co-founded by Frances Kissling and Laura Lederer to fund women's initiatives aroun ...

Human Rights Watch Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Headquartered in New York City, the group investigates and reports on issues including War crime, war crimes, crim ...

and

Mama Cash Mama Cash is the oldest international women's fund in the world, founded in the Netherlands in 1983. In 2013, Mama Cash supported 118 women's, girls and trans rights organisations with 4.3 million euros. History Mama Cash was founded in the Nethe ...

. As of 2012, she was working freelance for

Hivos Hivos (, Humanist Institute for Development Cooperation) is an international cooperation organization, with its global office in The Hague, The Netherlands. Hivos provides support to civil society organizations working in Africa, Latin America, th ...

, a Dutch

development aid Development aid (or development cooperation) is a type of aid given by governments and other agencies to support the economic, environmental, social, and political International development, development of developing countries. It is distinguishe ...

organisation, and pursuing a law degree at the Carmel Academic Center in Haifa.

Activism

Morcos said in 2008 that gay Palestinians are sometimes blackmailed by Israeli intelligence into outing them if they do not collaborate. In August 2020, Morcos spoke about a positive change in the Palestinian community's treatment of LBGTQ members after the funeral of Ayman Safieh, who was a leading member of the Palestinian queer community.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Morcos, Rauda Felipa de Souza Award Israeli Arab feminists Israeli feminists Israeli lesbian writers Israeli LGBTQ poets Israeli LGBTQ rights activists Israeli Arab LGBTQ people Lesbian feminists Lesbian poets Human Rights Watch people Living people Palestinian feminists 21st-century Palestinian LGBTQ people 21st-century Palestinian poets Palestinian women poets People from Haifa Year of birth missing (living people) Palestinian LGBTQ rights activists 21st-century Israeli LGBTQ people 21st-century Palestinian women writers 21st-century Israeli women writers 21st-century Israeli poets

Career

Activism

See also

References