Annual Report: Activity Summary of Coalition of Women for Peace,2005

Militarization in Israel and the use of military force by the Israeli state continue largely unchecked. Despite a widely heralded “disengagement” from Gaza, 2005 provided no respite in Israel's repression of Palestinians through direct military and other means. And yet, within Israel itself there are some hopeful, if limited and inconsistent, signs of increased reception of a feminist critique of Israeli militarization. One of the main instances in which this was manifested in the past year was the surprising responsiveness to the New Profile “Feminist Conscience Campaign” However, the results of the type of grassroots advocacy work carried out by New Profile can very rarely be measured in terms of country-wide social processes. The achievements are more easily measured in limited concrete terms such as new projects, and steady, sustained activity. Seven years after foundation of the movement in October 1998, New Profile, Movement for the Civil-ization of Israeli Society, has broken new ground in several areas which are not necessarily visible to the general public. The incremental change driven by such grassroots level actions is diffuse, difficult to follow and often isn't attributable to New Profile's work alone.