by ARWA ABURAWA
When I first heard about the murder of Nancy Zaboun in Bethlehem on Monday, July 30, all I could think about was that another woman had been let down by the system. A weak and underfunded protection system, which fails to support Palestinian women dealing with domestic violence and abuse in the West Bank, makes women choose between living with their abuser and being trapped in a women’s shelter where there is limited education, freedom of movement, or prospects of a better future. And, as a woman of Palestinian heritage, Nancy Zaboun’s murder makes me angry. I am angry that more was not done to protect her from years of abuse and finally murder. I am angry that resources are so poor that women often choose to risk their lives rather than enter a shelter.
It also makes me ponder what my life would have been like if the Nakba* hadn’t expelled my family to the UK. What if I still lived in the West Bank and my friends, my sisters, had to deal with domestic abuse? What if they needed real protection? Would they have found the right places, the right people, and the right resources, or would they have had to pay the ultimate price like Nancy Zaboun?