Syria Today | Dialing a Lifeline

Dialing a Lifeline

Words Dalia Haidar
Photos Fadi al-Hamwi

Somewhere in Damascus, a group of young women is spearheading a unique new project: the first hotline for victims of domestic violence in Syria. Staffed by social workers and lawyers, the hotline provides abused women with psychological and legal support, as well as a place where they can speak up without fear. “As we are constantly in touch with different levels of society, we realised many women need someone to listen to them, understand their problems and feel their pain,” the hotline’s supervisor, who asked to remain anonymous and not publish the location of the hotline’s office, said. “This is why we felt there was a basic need for a hotline.”

The Trust Hotline, launched last November on the United Nation’s International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, provides women with social, legal and psychological support. It is run by the Good Shepherd Sisters, a non-governmental organisation which also operates one of the oldest shelters for abused women in the country.

“We want to help these women feel better so they can take the right decisions,” the supervisor said. “The hotline centre doesn’t provide solutions to their problems; it helps them find one themselves.”

As the hotline often deals with sensitive family issues, the staff upholds strict privacy and confidentiality rules. “We respect callers’ privacy and don’t ask for any personal details such as name, age or profession,” she said.

Growing demand

Preparations for the hotline started in 2005 with staff selection and training sessions. “We organised several field visits and workshops in countries like Morocco, Jordan, Lebanon, Sweden and Turkey,” the supervisor said.

While the first few months of operations were relatively quiet, things picked up in June: not only did the centre receive more calls, but staff also found women gradually opened up and started talking more freely about their problems and fears.

In August, 32 women phoned the centre – half of them requesting social and legal consultations, and the other half asking for psychological support. “Most consultations are legal or psychological,” the centre’s social worker said. “It is clear that women in general need to be more aware of their rights.” According to the centre’s volunteer lawyer, most of the legal consultations involve questions of inheritance, child custody and other family problems.

“If a woman decides to sue an abusive family member we offer to handle her case for free,” the lawyer said, adding that the centre has provided legal support to two cases so far, one related to child support and one divorce case.

The centre’s in-house therapist said many of the women who called in have similar backgrounds of violent abuse. “In many cases, society contributes to the problems these women face as they often come from very traditional backgrounds,” she said. She told the story of a woman who phoned the hotline after having been physically abused by her husband who was of a different faith. As she had married without her family’s approval, she now felt completely alone and didn’t know where to turn for help. “The violent behaviour these women are subjected to leads to constant worrying, depression and shock-related stress.”

Identifying types of abuse

While the hotline is working to increase its visibility and ensure more women know of its existence and the services it offers, the women who turn to it for help are just a small percentage of the total number of women who face domestic violence in Syria.

In 2005, the semi-governmental Women’s Union, in conjunction with the Central Bureau of Statistics, conducted a groundbreaking study which found that 25 percent of Syrian women are subjected to some form of domestic violence.

Funded by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), the study was based on a survey of 1,891 Syrian families from a range of socio-economic backgrounds across the country’s 14 governorates.

It found that 79 percent of abused women surveyed had been punched and sworn at by a male family member, while 65 percent had also been sexually abused and 63 percent had been the victim of theft by a family member. Half of the women surveyed believed they had been abused because they had done something wrong.

As for the events leading up to the abuse, the study found 56 percent of abused women were accused of swearing at male relatives, 14 percent had “neglected household duties”, and 11.5 percent had “neglected their children’s education”. Conversely, 11 percent of men who swore at women said they had used knives, rocks or guns to threaten them. “Some of the women who phone us have been in life-threatening situations,” the Trust social worker said. “But the only help we can offer is to direct them to a women’s shelter.”

First licenced shelter

There are only a few shelters for abused women in Syria, most of them unlicenced and run by Christian organisations. The first shelter to receive a full licence is a semi-independent organisation that operates under the umbrella of the Ministry of Social Affairs. Opened in June 2008, Hope Oasis is a safe haven for abused women.

“The fact that the Syrian government licenced this shelter is considered a public acknowledgement of the existence of violence in the home environment, something that was denied for a long time,” Yomen Abulhoson, a women’s rights activist and board member of the Association for Women’s Role Development which runs the new shelter, said.

Funded by the Japanese Embassy in Syria, the shelter plans to open a psychological clinic for female victims of violence in Damascus. The clinic will operate along international standards and is expected to treat 1,000 victims a year.

Abulhoson said international organisations had shown a tangible interest in the projects. “UNIFEM has provided the necessary professional staff training, while the United Nations Development Programme agreed to train volunteers so they can receive cases,” she said.

Besides Hope Oasis, Abulhoson’s group also supervises the government-run Social Education Centre for Girls, an educational rehabilitation centre for girls, and recently signed an agreement with the International Organisation for Migration to open a shelter for foreign trafficked women.

While initiatives like the new hotline and shelter show abused women have more options today, Abulhoson says there is still a long way to go. “The greatest challenge is that we still don’t have a law to prevent domestic violence,” she said. “As a civil society group, one of our first priorities is to urge the government to issue a new law on domestic violence. Otherwise nothing will change.”