A number of community leaders, reformers, directors of civil society and women’s organizations, school principals, and teachers have agreed to demand amendments to the Family Rights Law. They are urging decision-makers in the Sharia judiciary, the Legislative Council, and the executive authority to expedite a decision to amend the current legal texts and litigation procedures in Sharia courts. The aim is to guarantee the protection and preservation of girls’ rights when a marriage contract is terminated before consummation.
These calls were made during two workshops conducted by The Center for Women’s Legal Researches, Counselling and Protection (CWLRCP) in the Central Governorate. The first workshop took place in Deir al-Balah on Wednesday in cooperation with the “Makers of Will” association, and the second on Thursday in cooperation with the Maghazi Center for Community Rehabilitation Association.
It is worth mentioning that the CWLRCP is implementing a national campaign around a rights document entitled “Towards Justice and Equity for Women in Family Rights,” as part of the “Young Women’s Divorce: Causes and Effects” project, funded by the Heinrich Böll Foundation. This project aims to reduce legal and social discrimination against women, increase young women’s access to justice, and promote their rights and choices, with funding from the Heinrich Böll Foundation.
The director of the center, legal researcher Ms. Zeinab Al-Ghunaimi, explained that the purpose of marriage is to form a good family that enriches society with righteous offspring. Therefore, the foundation of forming a family must be based on the agreement and understanding of the parties to the marriage contract. If this agreement is not available, then terminating this contract before the wedding ceremony is less harmful to the parties. However, this contract must be terminated in a way that preserves the rights of both parties without prejudice.
She clarified that the proposal regarding the termination of a marriage contract before consummation stipulates that both parties to a valid marriage contract before consummation or valid seclusion have the right to terminate the contract if either of them does not wish to complete the marriage. The fiancé (husband) who wishes to terminate the contract bears the financial consequences of his desire by not recovering the dowry paid to the fiancée (wife) and the gifts. The fiancée (wife) who wishes to terminate the contract bears the responsibility of returning the funds received from the husband and the gifts. The fiancée’s (wife’s) request to terminate the contract is not considered a personal desire, and the man bears the financial burdens in the following cases:
She also demanded that the name of the engaged girl in the marriage contract not be changed on the identity card to the husband’s name until after the wedding ceremony is completed and the consummation has taken place, in order to avoid the emerging social problems that may arise in this regard.
The project coordinator, Ms. Wafaa Helles, pointed out that the center is also working through this project to issue a research paper on “Divorce of Young Women Before Consummation: Causes and Effects” to shed light on the phenomenon of divorce among young women before consummation in the Gaza Strip. The aim is to provide women’s and civil society organizations with qualitative information and statistics that enable them to develop their plans and programs to support young groups and advocate for women’s rights, in addition to stimulating research capabilities among civil society organizations, especially women’s organizations, to deepen their efforts towards advocating for women’s rights and eliminating legal discrimination against them.
