Story Box: Hala Ahed
Jordanian lawyer and human rights defender Hala Ahed was subjected to a fierce
online harassment campaign after inviting women to a series of sessions on learning
about feminism. Critics widely accused her of promoting "Western feminism," which
they equated with heresy and atheism, and charged her with attempting to distort
Islam by calling for the reinterpretation of some Quranic texts. The attacks escalated to
the extreme of accusing her of apostasy and spread severe defamation and
assassination of character. The harassment further included accusations that she was
an "agent of foreign funding," with some calls for her to be put on trial and stripped of
her Jordanian citizenship, illustrating the intense backlash she faced for her perceived
controversial stances.
From Existing Measures to Future Solutions: A
Comprehensive Approach
What has been Done so Far: Successful Initiatives to combat TFGBV.
On the governmental level, the Independent Election Commission is developing
a pioneering platform named E-monitor+36 to monitor gender-based and
electoral violence targeting female candidates. While still in its early stages, the
potential of such a tool is vast. If invested in, the platform could become a
cornerstone for safeguarding women for future elections or even be adapted
across other state protection institutions.
In addition to the independent election commission, the cybercrime unit has made
significant efforts not only in helping victims of online violence but also raise
awareness about preventive measures that everyone can follow to avoid falling for
extortion, scams, and violence.
As for civil society, they also developed their own tools for detecting hate speech,
for instance Jordan Open-Source Association (JOSA) have developed a tool called
“Nuha” which is an open-source AI-enabled tool to assist researcher in discovering
online gender-based hate speech in the Jordanian dialect. On a less technical level,
JOSA published a comprehensive glossary for terms related to TFGBV translated
to Arabic37 which could assist in making knowledge more accessible to non-
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التقرير التفصيلي- 2024 االنتخابات النيابية،الهيئة المستقلة لالنتخاب.
37
https://josa.ngo/publications/66
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