A reflection on gender and radical Islam

In the grand theater of war that is the Middle East, Hamas recently delivered a macabre punch line, swapping an anonymous Palestinian woman's body for that of Shiri Bibas, may she rest in peace.

How thoughtful to ensure that women remain interchangeable props even in death. This month already marked International Women's Day and is Women's History Month in the US, and as the West debates the finer points of gender equality, radical Islam has perfected gender equality of a different sort, ensuring that all women are equally disposable.

Both Shiri and her anonymous Palestinian counterpart had their bodies transformed into battlefields, showing that Hamas, while claiming to be freedom fighters or to fight for justice, dehumanized women on both sides, treating them as disposable objects rather than human beings.

We need to remember that societies that erase women's humanity at home will inevitably extend that dehumanization abroad.

So perhaps before celebrating progressive achievements this March, we might just consider that in some corners of the world a woman having a name remains a revolutionary concept and that in itself should terrify us all, especially those who have not yet condemned what was done to women on October 7 or what happened to Shiri Bibas and her two babies.