Colonel al-Shishakli leafs through The Woman's Voice

her rights, though its reference to this subject lacks clarity and detail. In Syria today there is a new national movement around which we wish to gather all the good elements in our country: the "Arab Liberation Movement." In the program of this movement there is a clause devoted to woman, providing that the state shall work to raise her level and prepare her to perform her national duties within the sphere of the family and of society alike. This, in fact, is our point of view on the question of woman. We believe that the basis of this question is culture and awareness: the aware and cultured woman has the right to exercise her rights on a wide scale. As for the ignorant woman — and this holds true of men also — she has not reached the level that qualifies her to share in deciding her country's destiny and directing its policy. That is why we see certain electoral systems give the cultured man two votes while giving the ignorant man one vote.

Q — Does the program of the Syrian army provide room for the formation of women's reserve units?

A — We have begun, in relative measure, to include woman in the military service that suits her particular aptitude. In the military medical service we have women doctors and nurses, and we have sent some of them to Europe to specialize. General mobilization ordinarily conscripts a tenth of the population, but the figures published on conscription in Israel show that mobilization there has risen from a tenth to a fifth, and there is no doubt that this

The Colonel comments on some of the contents of The Woman's Voice...