The Women and Memory Forum (WMF) in collaboration with the Heinrich Böll Foundation in Germany organized a two-day workshop on “Arab Women Between Religious Belief and Social Justice.” The workshop was held at Pyramisa Suites Hotel in Cairo in the period between 16­-17 May 2005, and was attended by activists and researchers from several Arab countries.

The workshop aimed to identify a women’s religious discourse that enables women to express a religious identity and adopt a religious value reference, which in turn brings Arab women together, Christians and Muslims, to overcome shared challenges. The workshop objectives are outlined as follows:

• To formulate a religious perspective that departs from discrimination against women
• To produce an emancipatory discourse founded on equality
• To raise awareness on the religious discourse on women’s issues
• To plan future communication strategies that facilitate discussions with religious figures and institutions on problems facing women in search of practical ways of tackling them

List of Workshop Participants

• Zeinab Afifi (Egypt) Chairwoman of the General Social Services Association.
• Mary Assad (Egypt) Former Professor of Anthropology at the American University in Cairo.
• Daad Mousa (Syria) Lawyer specialized in family law and personal status law.
• Nour al-Huda Saad (Egypt) Editor-in-chief of Al Zohour Magazine.
• Iyad Barghouti (Palestine) Director of the Ramallah Center for Human Rights Studies.
• Amal Mahmoud (Egypt) Chairwoman of the Women’s Development Forum.
• Ibtesam Al-Atiyat (Jordan) Program Manager at the Jordanian National Commission for Women.
• Nasser al-Din al-Shaer (Palestine) Dean of the Faculty of Sharia at Al-Najah University, Nablus, Palestine.
• Aamena Nussair (Egypt) Professor of Islamic Doctrine and Philosophy at Al-Azhar University, Egypt.
• Amani Saleh (Egypt) Researcher in women’s issues; holds a Ph.D. in political sciences.
• Neamat Koukou (Sudan), the Gender Center for Research in Khartoum, Sudan.
• Salah El-Din El-Gourshi (Tunisia) Head of al-Jahedh Forum; writer and journalist.
• Vira Haddad (Jordan), the Arab Women Organization of Jordan.
• Hadeel Qazzaz (Palestine) Program Coordinator at Heinrich Böll Foundation in Germany.