REFÎF ÎSLIM

Gaza- The Covid-19 and attacks on Gaza have increased violence against women rates. Heba Skaik decided to found Meryem Cultural Center in 2021 to prevent violence against women. She aims to reveal the cultural aspects of women, who are facing violence and do not know where to go and how to act.

She wrote stories to draw attention to violence

Heba Skaik is the director of the Meryem Cultural Center now. She began to work on the violence against women issue by writing the story of a woman, victim of violence, for local and international press outlets.

She joined all protests

Heba Skaik did researches on the reality of women and joined all protests in Gaza. After several years, she decided to found the cultural center for women and girls. “Lockdowns kept them away from schools and universities. The center focuses on families and women, the foundation of society,” Heba Skaik said that awareness, environmental culture, justice, and the demand for social justice are important for women. “I try to work on these and I want to introduce these to women because women’s stances and lives constitute the foundation of society.”

“We had many meetings to prevent femicide”

Drawing attention to the rising femicide in Gaza, Heba Skaik said, “The activities and events of the Meryem Cultural Center play an important role in reducing violence against women and femicide. We had many meetings with many centers working for women to prevent femicide. We did this during an extraordinary situation amid the pandemic and the attacks on Gaza. We took these steps to protect our society and cultural heritage.”

The Meryem Cultural Center carries out its works for 12-year-old girls, “This generation should be aware of everything around them, from women's causes to the Israeli occupation. Because these causes will affect literary works in the future.”

Effort to find a space for girls

The center members are working to have a space in the Jerusalem Poets' Camp in order to develop girls in literature. “This project is supported by the General Youth and Sports Committee,” Heba Skaik told us.

“The camp was founded for girls to write poems”

Poet Somaya Wadi is one of the teachers of the Jerusalem Poets' Camp. “Many girls want to write poems but they don’t know how to write and what they should do to write,” Somaya Wadi said the camp had been founded for girls to learn how to write poems.

Afnan Lafi, a medical student, is one of the people who registered for the Jerusalem Young Poets’ Camp. She told us that she had registered for the camp to learn how to write poems.