No ceasefire without her: Why Gaza’s peace talks must include women

While bombs pound Gaza and families are ripped apart, amidst the rubble, there is a haunting question: Where are the women at the negotiating table? More than 60,000 people — mostly civilians — have been killed since the October 2023 escalation.

There are women behind these numbers, with losses no words can capture. And still in the stage of global diplomacy, their voices cannot be heard — silenced, erased and ignored.

In Gaza, women are not merely survivors; they are guardians, first responders, they are lifelines. Rania Abu Suraka, a midwife in Khan Younis, kept delivering babies amidst Israeli bombing. "If I don't help, who will?" she said as her clinic was bombed to rubble. Women like Rania keep the fabric of life intact, even as it is burning down around them.

No Palestinian women are there when ceasefires are brokered; in Geneva, in Cairo or in Doha. No mothers of prisoners. No widows of the slain. No community leaders. Ceasefires are brokered in backroom deals by men in suits while women on the outside are burying their children and sewing their neighbours back together.

Research has shown that when women participate in peace processes, peace agreements are 35% more likely to last for over 15 years. Women bring priorities of inclusiveness: education, food security, and psychological healing, which have long been neglected in masculine peace negotiations. And these same issues mark Gaza's daily tragedy.

Fatima Shbair, a Palestinian photographer, took photos of maternity wards in ruins and grieving mothers. "There is no safe space for us, not even in wombs," she conveyed through her photography. Her camera was a witness to a hidden truth: warfare encroaches not only on territory, but also on women's physical integrity, their future and their hopes.

Bangladesh knows this pain. Our own history has taught us how women pay the highest cost in wars; more than 200,000 women were victims of sexual violence during our Liberation War. Gaza's daughters are enduring the same fate today — raped, disappeared, silenced. But where are their advocates in the global security debate?

Here is where the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda needs to come in — not as a favour, but as a requirement. Codified in UN Security Council Resolution 1325, WPS calls for women's inclusion in all peace processes. Still, from 2000 to 2023, fewer than 13% of peace negotiators globally have been women. Gaza is no different.

In March 2024, amidst tenuous Egyptian-facilitated ceasefire negotiations, no woman from Palestinian civil society was present. This silence is not neutrality — it is complicity. Omitting women is a political decision, and one that detracts from the sustainability and the humanity of any peace.

Both Israeli and Palestinian women have attempted to shatter this deadly cycle. Organisations such as Women Wage Peace (Israel) and Women of the Sun (Palestine) jointly protested in October 2023, calling for an end to the violence. Their placards stated, "No more mothers in mourning". Their voice, however, was drowned out by gunfire and disregarded by peace negotiators.

In Gaza, women's community organisations have provided emergency shelters, food rations, and operated trauma centres, despite ongoing shelling. Refaqat, a network of women teachers, set up WhatsApp hotlines to access orphaned children and widows in Rafah. But who funds them? Who hears them?

Whereas Bangladesh is taking the lead for a ceasefire in international forums, it must also promote a feminist foreign policy. We do have moral legitimacy. We have sent women peacekeepers to UN peacekeeping missions. Conflict prevention and humanitarian action are a part of our own National Action Plan on WPS. We must speak out for women of Gaza as well.

Imagine a negotiating table where Fatima the photographer, Maha the teacher, and Rania the midwife are seated with diplomats. They would not talk just about borders or rocket ranges. They would talk about water, schools, safety nets, and healing. That is peace. That is what lasts.

Critics say, "It's not the time to talk about gender." But if not now — while bombs are still falling on babies — then when? Gender is no sideshow; it is the missing piece. War is not gender-neutral. So why is peace?

Gaza's women still lead today. Dr Ghada Al Jadba, UNRWA Gaza's sole woman director, directs health services under siege. She stated after her clinic was struck, "Every life counts. Every woman counts." Her strength is not uncommon — it is rampant, unacknowledged.

The international response needs to change. Humanitarian assistance needs to prioritise women's needs — maternal and newborn health, menstrual hygiene, GBV shelters, psychosocial support. And negotiating teams need to have women from the country affected, not just token foreign ministry women.

Bangladesh must also ask itself: Where are the women in our own peacebuilding plans? While negotiating with the OIC and UN on Gaza's behalf, we have to present to them what an inclusive peace would be. We need to empower, resource, involve, and listen to women's peace groups in Gaza.

In October 2023, Hiba Abu Nada, a 32-year-old Palestinian nutritionist and poet, was killed by Israeli bombardment of her family home in Gaza. Just days before, she wrote these words on social media, "Gaza's night is dark except for the light of rockets, silent except for the noise of the bombs, frightening except for the solace of prayer. Good night, Gaza." 

Her words, expressed as a parting thought, have since become a constant cry for dignity and peace. Hiba did not fight; she was a healer, a writer and a voice for her people. Her death amounted to more than just a tragedy — it was an extinguishing of peace itself.

In her memory, and in honour of all women who have lived through war with dignity and courage, we have to demand that women's voices drive the agenda of peace, not as an afterthought, but as a point of departure.

May the future peace in Gaza not only be signed into being. But rather, may it be crafted by those who never lost faith in life: Gaza women.

Sketch: TBS

Major Shajeda Akter Moni is an officer in the Bangladesh Army with over 22 years of service and currently serves as Deputy Director at the Research Centre, Bangladesh University of Professionals (BUP).

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and views of The Business Standard.