both high unemployment and severe restrictions on
movement. Palestine’s women’s labor force partici-
pation was 11.3 percent, with 4.2 percent of women
employed as technicians, experts, and clerks, and
3.3 percent in agricultural labor (UNDP 2000).
Even with the establishment of the Palestinian
National Authority (PNA) in 1996, different labor
laws govern Palestinians. The West Bank and Gaza
are governed by a combination of Jordanian law
and PNA decisions, while residents of Jerusalem
are subject to Israeli labor law. Palestine’s labor law
(2000) prohibits gender discrimination in the labor
market, stresses non-discrimination in wages, for-
bids women’s employment in risky and arduous
jobs, on night shifts and during pregnancy, and
grants maternity and lactation leaves. The PNA
civil service law also provides for women’s mater-
nity leave.
Even though Palestinian women compose about
7.6 percent of trade union membership, their activ-
ities indicate the limits military occupation imposes
on workers and union officers’ movement. The
General Federation of Palestinian Trade Unions
reported 100,000 members and the Gaza Federa-
tion of Trade Unions an additional 25,000 (1993).
Palestinians’ access to permits to work in Israel or
to travel remains a leading issue. According to the
BBC, Israeli authorities prevented activist Amìna
al-Rìmàwìfrom speaking on Palestinian working
women’s status at the 31st Arab Labor Conference
meeting in Damascus during February 2004.
Syria reports economic activity rates to the ILO,
and the International Confederation of Arab Trade
Unions (ICATU) has its headquarters in Damascus.
Women were 19.8 percent of Syria’s workforce in
2000: 58.7 percent of agricultural laborers, 22.2
percent of crafts persons/technicians, and 8.3 per-
cent of executives/clerks (SAR 2000a). Many Syrian
women find employment in state sponsored-educa-
tion, where they are 65.7 percent of primary teach-
ers, 48.2 percent of secondary school instructors,
and 23.1 percent of university faculty (SAR 2000b).
Syrian women are least represented in manufactur-
ing (5.7 percent) (SAR censuses, SAR 2000a, cited
in SAR unpublished).
Syria’s citizens are equal before the law, accord-
ing to the 1973 constitution (article 25). Syria’s
labor law grants women the right to employment in
both the private and public sectors. Even though
Syria has not ratified the CEDAW, the labor law
emphasizes that both sexes must receive equal
wages for equal work. Since 1968, the ministry
of social affairs and labor sets minimum wages,
establishes occupational safety specifications, pays
social security premiums, and controls the right of668 political-social movements: unions and workers’movements
association. Syria’s workers have been represented
by a single trade union structure, which restricts the
rights of foreign and non-Arab workers. State of
emergency legislation in force since 8 March 1963
constrains men and women from extending their
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SAR (Syrian Arab Republic), General Union of Women,
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Beijing activities in the Syrian Arab Republic, unpub-
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——, Central Bureau of Statistics, Internal migration
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——, Central Bureau of Statistics, Statistical abstract,
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UNDP, Palestine human development report 2000, New
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