In Society – Women's Week

Women's Week

... It was the finest opening of a year of good things, God willing. Our elegant friend Mrs. Laure Tabet inaugurated it with an address from the broadcasting station in delightful French; then the Arabic broadcast was opened by that mistress of graceful eloquence, Mrs. Ellen Rihan, and dignified talks followed from the ladies Salwa Mahmasani Moumina, Salma Sayegh, and Dr. Zahia Kaddoura.

The Memorable Day

The week closed with a finale whose organization was the care of the members of the Executive Committee for Women's Rights. Sunday, January 13, was the ornament of days, and the gathering held at the Roxy Cinema was among the most joyous and splendid the capital has witnessed.

The great hall and its balcony were packed with hundreds of supporters, men and women, and squads of young women helped keep order, giving up their places to newcomers and sitting or standing however they could manage.

The Opening Address

The gathering was opened by Miss Ibtihaj Kaddoura, president of the General Arab Women's Union, and her address was what her conversation always is: eloquent and adroit. She announced that the capital was witnessing for the first time a gathering of Lebanon's women and men — among them a prime minister, a deputy, and a judge — for the defense of the trampled rights of half the homeland. And when she gave the floor to His Excellency the Prime Minister, Mr. al-Yafi, she described him as he is in fact — and as this magazine has declared more than once — the first premier in the Arab East to adopt the woman's cause and to lay before the Chamber of Deputies a complete bill restoring these rights.

The Address of His Excellency the Prime Minister

Woman's champion No. 1 rose and, with his well-known gravity, declared his faith in this Lebanese woman — in her fitness, her gifts, and her patriotism; nor did he surprise those women who from the first hour had seen in him a champion who pushed the cause forward and clothed it in official, governmental form. His Excellency wished to offer a word of advice, and so counseled the Lebanese woman to demand these rights with mildness and gentleness, and to strive at the same time to spread the spirit of culture.

The Plea of the Lawyer Laure Nasr

The lawyer Miss Laure Nasr, of the women's branch of the Kataeb organization, delivered a profound plea in which she proved how a woman can become a brilliant lawyer and yet remain fully aware of the extent of her responsibilities, remain a lady in the absolute sense of the word, and stand on one platform with the great lawyers while every ear inclines toward her.

The Islamic Religion and Woman

Mr. Subhi Mahmasani undertook the defense of woman from the standpoint of the Islamic religion. He refuted the arguments of all the opponents and proved with historical and legal evidence "that religion gave woman all her rights, but man usurped those rights in injustice and aggression," and that in the first age of Islam women held the offices of the judiciary — and the judgeship is the second station after the caliphate.

The Woman's Cause Is Not a Matter of Mood and Whim

The atmosphere had come to a boil with enthusiasm when Miss Ibtihaj introduced "the great woman of letters and silver-tongued orator," Mrs. Emily Fares Ibrahim — the member who has spent herself for the success of the woman's cause ever since the Executive Committee came into being; the lady who has spared neither time nor effort to wrest this cause from the hands of opponents who remain strong to this day — and she launched forth with the logic and the ardor of a believing, devoted woman.

The Finest of Mr. Abu Shahla's Pleas

.... It was as though everything that had been said, and the audience's continuous applause, had honed in the Ustad all his eloquence and all his fluency. He proceeded to divulge the secrets of the opponents on the Administration and Justice Committee with wit and courtesy; then he flared up in a defense into which he mustered all the eloquence and rhetoric for which he is known, proving once again that he is still — when he chooses — a lord among the lords of the platform. He convinced his hearers that the Lebanese constitution gave woman all her rights on an equal footing with man, but that man, when he cooked up the electoral law, kept it to himself. He then went on to appeal to man — who has filled the world with misery and wretchedness and poverty and disease — calling on him to seek the aid of woman's tenderness, her compassion, and her love, that the affairs of this miserable, ailing world might be set right; and he called on the Lebanese to hasten this awaited golden age, that Lebanon might take the leap which would make it, in truth and in fact, the country of beauty, of right, and of radiance.

The Woman's Voice: it remains, after all this, for the deputies, seeing the opinion of the chosen élite, to approve the ministry's bill, that they may deserve praise and thanks.