A Guide to Revolution

The last year brought winds of revolution to the countries around us: Tunisia, Egypt, Syria, Libya, Yemen and the list might not be final. For the first time, women take an active part in the rebellion; they initiate and are involved in the virtual and real space. The new media – social networks and video blogs – allow women who have so far been deterred from going out to the public space to connect with each other in vast numbers and to participate in the protest with a lower level of risk. The network’s role is so important that one of the regime's first steps against the protest in Egypt and Syria was to disconnect the internet. In July, rebellion was declared in Israel as well. It broke with an action of a young woman, was led by women, put values of social justice, equality and welfare state for all citizens at the front, and swept crowds of people.

In the first demonstration, the protest’s leadership decided with no apologetic tone and with great intuition that all speakers should be women. Thus, a civics teacher spoke plainly about democracy to thousands of listeners, and a social worker shared her frustration with the audience in face of distress and the helplessness of the system. A translator into sign language was on stage at all times, translating all speeches. It became clear that a new language was forming before our very eyes. For the first time in history, there were only women speakers at a demonstration that did not concern women's issues. Later on the spontaneous leadership demanded equal representation of men and women at the Trachtenberg committee. The protest which started as an authentic outbreak of a battle for our home, developed into collective passion in a moral revolution. Unintentionally, or is it?, the comparison made by Jean Paul Sartre in the beginning of the 20th century: Existentialism is Humanism, became in 21th century Israel: Feminism is Humanism.

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