Abstract In Israel, approximately 100,000 Israeli-Arab women are the victims of abuse and violence each year, constituting 50% of the national total, even though the Israeli-Arab community forms only 21% of Israel's population. Only 25% of the victims of abuse and violence turn to the authorities for help. This article examines the case of Dalal Daoud, an Israeli-Arab woman
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Tell us something about yourself.
I’m a social worker and I deal mostly with violent abuse of women, and women in prostitution. I’m a doctoral student at Tel Aviv University, and I also define myself as a feminist and an activist who’s trying to help women who have been convicted of putting their abusive spouses to death.
You say “putting to death” rather than “murdering.”
Yes, and I use that phrase intentionally.
We’ll talk about that. How did you get to this group of women?
For my master’s thesis, I wanted to deal with violence against women. I discovered that there are hardly any studies about women who were been convicted of putting their partners to death. I approached the Israel Prison Service, the Israel Police, the Central Bureau of Statistics, but couldn’t get even the most basic information from them: how many women fit into that group in Israel. I started conducting my own study. I plowed through archives and databases, and learned that sin