Building Resilience: The Story of OWFI

Subversion Diaries
Written By The Gender Security Project

By Kirthi Jayakumar

The Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq (OWFI), founded in 2003, campaigns for women's rights and against political Islam in Iraq. When it was founded by Yanar Mohammed in 2003, it was a movement in resistance to the occupation of Iraq by the US and UK (Kofoed 2004). In more recent times, OWFI offered direct support to women who were isolated by their families or who had faced harm owing to the ISIS’ conduct (OWFI 2017).

Resisting colonialism 

Aside from militarization and violence, as part of its occupation of Iraq, the US also operated a divide-and-rule approach (a tactic common among colonial powers in the colonies they occupied), where it provided political power based on religious sect (Susskind 2014). In the process, they turned theological differences into sites of deep political divisiveness (Susskind 2014). Women faced the brunt of the sectarian divisions, as well, as they were targeted with honour killings.

With the invasion of the US in 2003, the already shrinking space for women in civil society took an additional beating (Mohammed 2023). Women and children constituted 80% of the Iraqis who had lost their homes and/or financial resources owing to the war. Coupled with the lack of access to job opportunities – particularly among women who were widowed during the war – there was a high number of women facing the brunt of poverty and homelessness (Ismael 2019; Al-Ali 2009). The breakdown of health and public institutions, lack of access to clean water and electricity and medical care, and the ceaseless bombing all produced significant gendered impacts (Al-Ali 2009). Women began to turn to sex work to sustain themselves and their families, suffering heavy setbacks to their sexual and reproductive health in the process (Chynoweth 2008). According to the OWFI, as many as 4000 women disappeared since the war – likely having been sex-trafficked into other countries. Women who remained were often faced with honour killings and increased suicides owing to the stigma of facing sexual abuse during the invasion and occupation (Al-Ali 2009; Chynoweth 2008).

OWFI emerged in 2003, as part of a statewide women's rights movement in which women's groups do not rely on American or British intervention to liberate them or to fight for their rights (Al-Ali 2009). In support of women affected by the invasion and occupation, OWFI set up shelters, starting first in Baghdad, and following up with four other shelters shortly after. In the first years after its founding, the OWFI set saved as many as thirty women from honor killings (Fantappie 2010). At first, there were three women in their shelters in 2014; by 2022, this number reached about 150 (Mohammed 2023). With time, OWFI recognized the absence of women in politics, and began to advocate for the greater representation of women in these spaces.

Between 2008 and 2018, however, OWFI’s shelters were targeted by members of the police and intelligence agencies, who intimidated them vis-à-vis the young women and girls in their care, particularly those who had no official identification. “Because we were housing women without male guardians, the authorities accused us of running brothels. Despite our efforts to protect and empower victimized women, the newly formed state and its advisers from the US and the UK showed no interest in jeopardizing relations with the Islamist and tribal leaders in order to save these women” (Mohammed 2023).

Recognizing the impact of the occupation on women’s rights, OWFI’s creation was inherently rooted in resisting colonization. The safe houses they created worked as a powerful support for women in a time where they had very little else to turn to or rely on. The women of OWFI also called out policies that facilitated sectarian divisions and fuelled gender-based violence, all the while labouring under "conditions of military occupation, civil war, and fundamentalist witch-hunts" (Susskind 2014). In her ethnographic study, Sheri Gibbings noted that Iraqi women activists, invited to speak to a group of gender experts at the UN, were called by the latter as “angry” for not speaking “positively about women’s efforts in the reconstruction of Iraq and the role the UN could play” (Gibbings 2011:525); instead, the women “condemned the invasion by the USA and UK as imperialist and critiqued the UN for its lack of support” (Gibbings 2011:524). 

Support for and by Civil Society

In more recent times, OWFI began providing shelter for women who were alienated by their families or who had been affected by the ISIS and its activities (OWFI 2017). By providing them with food, shelter, clothing, and shelter, the OWFI ensured that these women continued to have access to all that they need for survival. With sectarian violence on the rise and family dynamics changing, women began to bear the brunt of an increased domestic workload and care-work, while also working hard to keep themselves safe. ISIS-occupied areas became sites where women were targeted by militants through kidnapping and abduction, and sex slavery (Susskind 2014).

OWFI recognized that women were not able to access their rights or even report sexual violence, given that ISIS ruled the north of the country and the rest of the territory was in the hands of a government that vehemently denied women’s rights (Susskind 2016). They worked hard to keep their shelters running, identified appropriate strategies and methodologies to support the psychosocial health of women who had been enslaved by the ISIS and had been abused in forcible marriages. Building a powerful network across the country, they became something of a safety net for women in dangerous situations (Susskind 2016).

Even as they were seemingly “service providers,” as Susskind (2016) notes, they were much, much more. They handled policy, they were advocates, and they were activists. They ran these shelters illegally because the government had legislated against their operation. In their resistance, OWFI ensured that the Iraqi government came under enough pressure to change the law that banned shelters.

OWFI has successfully shifted public opinion and raised awareness on the harmful nature of honour killings, and has had tremendous success in fighting for stronger protection for women (Mohammed 2023). In January 2020, during the crackdown on civil society that emerged after the Tishreen uprising and assassination of the head of the Quds Force of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps by US drones, in Baghdad, a case was filed against OWFI to dissolve it. After a year, the case was dismissed (Mohammed 2023). However, in 2023, OWFI has been at the receiving end of a notification from the NGO Directorate to cease all its operations immediately.

References

The Gender Security Project
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