CV Manal Tamimi ENG

In 2009 Israeli colons form a nearby settlement took control of one of the main water sources in the village. When that happened, Tamimi tells us, “two thirds of the lands of the villages had already been confiscated for some reason”.

On December 9, 2009 the inhabitants of Nabi Saleh organised the first of the weekly demonstrations that, to this day, they hold every Friday. “The Israeli response is always brutal”, states Tamimi. In these protests women play a central role. “We participate in the decision making process for the protests, the topics and activities in and outside the village”, the activist explains, complaining about the “wrong idea” that the West has about Muslim women “especially if they wear the hijab”.

Tamimi studied a master on International Law in the Al-Quds University. She is a member of the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee (PSCC) an organisation that brings together the Popular Resistance Committees of the West Bank. She has travelled all over the world (Lebanon, Italy, France, Spain and the US) to denounce the violation of the rights of the Palestinian people.

She has known repression herself. She has been arrested four times and been inured several times, one of them by a sniper’s bullet. Even her sons Osama and Muhammad have been imprisoned many times.

Manal Tamimi has written, together with other authors the book Ahed Tamimi: A Girl who Fought Back which tells the story of the detention of his niece by the Israeli army. From her sayings: We may be moving at a snail’s pace towards liberation, but we have the determination and will to move forward until liberation, no matter how long it takes.