On the day I took this picture, two days ago, this 31-year old woman (M) finally found a way to flee her abusive husband in Jordan. She and I rode in the back seat of a minibus on the way from Jericho to Bethlehem, Palestine, where her younger brother met her with open arms. She left behind her clothes, jewelry, friends, home, and four children, including a five-year old boy (the youngest) with terminal brain cancer. She didn't have a phone, luggage, or even her handbag; she only had her passport, barely enough money to make the trip, and an old, raggedy handbag a woman gave her, out of pity, at the Jordan side of the border crossing.
After 14 years of physical and mental abuse, she finally found the courage and a way to leave. She was utterly devastated; she cried dearly over her kids, especially the youngest. But she was also certain that she had no choice but to leave and she said that she will find a way to get her children from their abusive and neglectful father. Against all odds in such a case, based on the prevailing local norms, I believe her. For me that was a very sad day.
I wish my older sister, a mother of four boys and four girls, could have done the same so many years ago. Her circumstances were different though, as she suffered on the hands of a more brutal and more cunning husband. She could have not tried to escape even if she wanted to, not only because of her eight children, but also because he cut up all her travel documents and forms of ID, sold most of her wedding clothes and all her jewelry (including rings). He did so a week after the wedding, the morning after they left the country, from Palestine to Jordan. He did so after he and his equally complicit father beat her till she was nearly lifeless. My sister, aged 15 then, could not escape but this woman, M, did. She is somewhat lucky, in a tragically perverted way.
The greatest irony in all of this is that M, turns out, was a lifelong friend of a cousin of mine, where they both grow up in Nahalin, a little village a few kilometers southwest of Bethlehem. My cousin herself divorced her bastard husband a few years ago, after 7 years of abuse. My cousin and M remained friends until M moved to Jordan with the man she has just escaped. M said that she can't wait to see my cousin and that she hopes to see me again, perhaps when I visit my cousin(s) and two aunts in Nahalin next week. Perhaps.
For me, the day I met M-the day she left her cage and almost everyone and everything she holds dear-was also a very good day.
Way to go, sister!
Dr. Azzam Elayan
July 21, 2014
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