As feminists of conscience we cannot and will not remain silent.
Reports of sexual violence and rape being used as weapons against Palestinian and Israeli women and girls have been made throughout the renewed crisis in Gaza and Israel, continuing the grave violations of human rights and international law that have consistently taken place in the region since 1948. As feminists of conscience we cannot and will not remain silent.
We also call attention to the fact that gender-based violence and femicide is being perpetrated against our sisters in Congo, Sudan and Tigray and other parts of the world that the white, eurocentric media ignores.
Imkaan strongly condemns all forms of sexual violence and the use of rape as a weapon of war. We also deplore the increase in antisemitism, Islamophobia and right wing extremism, and insist on justice for all those affected.
As Black feminists, we pledge solidarity with Palestinian women and girls through our shared experiences of the violent removal of our homelands in our lifetimes by settlers, and we rage against state-sponsored genocide against Gazans, as we rage against all acts of past and present genocide.
Imkaan calls upon all feminists to recognise and confront the structural forms of gendered and sexual violence perpetrated by capitalism, greed, colonialism and global white supremacy.
