ARABIC

4. Acceptance of LGBTQ in these cultures

5. Issues concerning gender and development.

ANSWERS:

4. It is rare that an openly LGBTQ Muslim feels fully welcome because people would experience and
suffer from verbal and physical violence until the person does not relocate to another country.
LGBTQs generally have limited or highly restrictive rights in most parts of the Middle East and are open
to hostility in others. Sex between men is illegal in 10 of the 18 countries that make up the region. It is
punishable by death in six of these 18 countries. The rights and freedoms of LGBT citizens are strongly
influenced by the prevailing cultural traditions and religious mores of people living in the region –
particularly Islam.

- Even though laws against female same-sex activity are less strict, few of these countries recognize
legal rights and provisions. Male same-sex activity is illegal and punishable by imprisonment in Kuwait,
Egypt, Oman, Qatar, and Syria. It is punishable by death in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE. In Yemen or
Palestine (Gaza Strip) the punishment might differ between death and imprisonment depending on the
act committed.

-In 2013, the Islamic Society of North America—the largest Muslim organization in the United States—
declared its approval of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), adding its name to an
interfaith coalition and calling ENDA a “measured, common sense solution that will ensure workers are
judged on their merits, not on their personal characteristics like sexual orientation or gender
identity.” Since then, U.S.-based Islamic institutions have not taken a formal stance on non-
discrimination protections for LGBTQ people.

5. One in three women worldwide has experienced some form of gender-based violence in their
lifetime. For many Arab countries, instability is becoming the norm. In the Arab world, violence against
women takes many forms, with intimate partner violence being the most common (affecting
approximately 30% of women in the region) and the least reported. Here, intimate partner violence is
often not labelled as such. When it is, social stigma and family and community pressures keep women
from reporting it.

 The Arab region has the world’s lowest rate of female labor force participation - 18.4 percent
compared to the global average of 48 per cent. By contrast, male labor force participation
rates, at 77 per cent, are above the global average of 75 percent.
 Female unemployment in the Arab states is at 15.6 percent – three times higher than the world
average.
 Women in managerial positions are low in the region, with only 11 percent of women holding
managerial positions as compared to the world average of 27.1 percent.
 Unpaid childcare work result in women spending almost five times more hours than men on
unpaid care work