LGBT rights in the Palestinian territories
| LGBT rights in the Palestinian territories | |
|---|---|
|
|
| Same-sex sexual activity legal? |
Legal for women since 1951, with an equal age of consent Gaza: Male illegal |
| Family rights | |
| Recognition of relationships |
No recognition of same-sex couples |
Legal for women since 1951, with an equal age of consent
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) rights in the Palestinian territories are often spoken of in the geopolitical and cultural context of the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It remains one of the most taboo human rights issues in the region. Homosexuality is illegal in the Gaza Strip but not in the West Bank, although LGBT rights are not protected in either.
The Palestinian territories have no specific, stand alone civil rights legislation that protects LGBT people from discrimination or harassment. While hundreds of gay Palestinians are reported to have fled to Israel because of the hostility they face in the Palestinian territories, they have also been subject to house arrest or deportation by Israeli authorities, on account of the inapplicability of the law of asylum to areas or nations in which Israel is in conflict. According to a 2010 compendium of laws against homosexuality produced by the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transsexual and Intersex Association (ILGA), the decriminalization of homosexuality in the Palestinian territories is patchwork. On the one hand, same-sex acts were decriminalized in the Jordanian-controlled West Bank in 1951 and remain so to this day. On the other hand, in the Gaza Strip, the British Mandate Criminal Code Ordinance, No. 74 of 1936 remains in force and continues to outlaw same-sex acts between men, although lesbian women are not subjects of the code and their relations are thus, technically, not unlawful. The Palestinian Authority has not legislated either for or against homosexuality, though "on the legal level, the President of the Palestinian Authority issued his first decision on 20 May 1994 which provided that legislation and laws that were effective before 5 June 1967 in the West Bank and Gaza Strip would remain effective" – and, in line with almost all other Palestinian laws, the confused legal legacy of foreign occupation – Ottoman, British, Jordanian, Egyptian and Israeli – continues to determine the erratic application or non-application of the criminal law of homosexuality in each of the territories.
A gay Palestinian man called Saif said that "...local Palestinian Authority police are aware and keep files on him and other homosexuals, blackmailing them into working as spies and informants." He reports stories “of guys being called at random and told to come into [Palestinian Authority] police stations, with threats their families would be told about their sexuality if they didn't show up.”
The same report noted that Israeli intelligence offered another gay Palestinian man free entry into Israel on an ongoing basis to visit his Israeli boyfriend if he provided "the names of the organisers (sic), the religious people in the villages and names of children throwing stones at Israeli military jeeps". The report notes that the Israeli Intelligence had been tracking his location through his cell phone. The man did not cooperate, despite fear that the Israelis would reveal his sexuality to his family and community, who would reject him. It is not reported if anything subsequently was disclosed.
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Wikipedia