Troubling Similarities: Reflections on Muslim Efforts against Sexual Violence and on Palestine Solidarity Work

---

Juliane Hammer

---

There is an obvious connection between efforts against sexual violence (within and beyond Muslim communities) and Palestine solidarity work as intersectional justice work. As a scholar and activist who has worked in both areas, I have reflected on the similarities and differences in my own experiences, especially since the genocidal Israeli campaign in Gaza and the West Bank in response to October 7, 2023. In this chapter, I explore and critique three dimensions of similarities that I find especially troubling: the enforced silence, the demand for perfect victims, and the focus on perpetrators at the expense of victims and for the purpose of explaining and excusing their violent actions. I show these troubling similarities not only for the purpose of critique and analysis but also to convince those who care about Palestine and Palestinians but do not see sexual violence as an urgent issue, and vice versa, that issues of violence, abuse, and injustice are interconnected and demand that we attend to them simultaneously.