Resistance icon Ahed Tamimi highlights plight of Palestinian women

One of the Palestinian resistance figures, Ahed Tamimi, has called on human rights defenders to raise their voice against Israeli aggression toward Palestinian women.

Speaking to Anadolu Agency, the activist, who is best known for a viral video where she bravely confronted Israeli soldiers as a teenager, said Palestinian women have borne years of sufferings caused by Israeli soldiers.

Women, whose husbands were killed, had to be both mothers and fathers for their children, she said.

“If what happened here was in another country, they would look at it differently. Elsewhere, if women were subjected to violence, you see them react extraordinarily,” said Tamimi.

“I'm telling the whole world. We're human beings, just like everyone else. It's our right to live a normal life. We also have a right to live a nonviolent life,” she added.

"There are women in the Gaza Strip who are also under bombardment, whose bodies have been removed from under the rubble. In Palestine, we always experience this, we always live with pain. When a woman is beaten, I immediately see my mother in her."

She underlined that they need the support of the entire international community, including women's rights advocates.

- Women in Israeli prisons

"In Israeli prisons, many Palestinian women are deprived of even basic medical treatment,” she said, noting critically injured inmates are silenced with only a couple of pain killers.

She went on to say that women inmates face more problems than men, as when they menstruate, their needs are not met.

At least 212 people, including 61 children, 35 women, and 16 elderly people, have been killed in ongoing Israeli attacks on Gaza, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.

Some 1,400 people have also been injured in the attacks, the ministry said in a statement.

The Israeli military has staged airstrikes across the Gaza Strip since May 10, leaving behind a massive trail of destruction across the blockaded enclave.

Ten Israelis have also been killed in Palestinian rocket fire from the Gaza Strip into Israel.

The recent tensions that started in East Jerusalem during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan spread to Gaza as a result of Israeli assaults on worshippers in the flashpoint Al-Aqsa Mosque compound and Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.

Israel occupied East Jerusalem, where Al-Aqsa is located, during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. It annexed the entire city in 1980 in a move never recognized by the international community.

*Writing by Merve Berker