Gisele Halimi

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Gisèle Halimi (2008)

Gisèle Halimi (born Zeiza Gisèle Élise Taïeb ; born July 27, 1927 in La Goulette , Tunisia ; † July 28, 2020 in Paris ) was a French lawyer , feminist and civil rights activist of Tunisian descent.

Life

Youth and education

Zeiza Gisèle Élise Taïeb - she took the name Gisèle Halimi only in 1949 - was born in 1927 in La Goulette, 10 km from Tunis, as the daughter of Fortunée ("Fritna") (née Metoudi) a Sephardi , daughter of a rabbi and Édouard Taïeb, a Berber , born. The father worked as an employee in a law firm.

In Halimi's family there was patriarchal order, the birth of a girl was viewed as a “malédiction”, a curse, and her birth was kept secret by her parents for several weeks because relatives and friends were ashamed of her not being a boy. And this continued uninterrupted:

«A chaque étape de ma vie, il y avait un jalonnement de handicaps qui venait du fait que j'étais une fille»

"At every stage of my life there have been a number of disabilities that stemmed from being a girl"

- Gisèle Halimi : France Culture

or

«… Ma mère et tout mon entourage depuis la prime enfance ne m'avait pas constamment rappelé que le fait d'être une fille impliquait un sort très différent de celui de mes frères. Un sort dans lequel le choix, le libre arbitre, la liberté n'avaient aucune place. Un sort uniquement déterminé par mon genre. »

“… My mother and everyone around me had reminded me from early childhood that being a girl meant having a very different fate than my brothers. A fate in which choice, free will, and freedom had no place. A fate that was only determined by my gender. "

- Gisèle Halimi : France Culture

Her mother had been married at the age of 16, according to the norms prevailing in Tunisia at the time, had a child every two years, and believed that her daughter would continue this tradition.

"'Ma grand-mère, ma mère et moi avons vécu comme ça; alors toi aussi!', Me disait ma mère, Fritna, faisant du mariage et de la sujétion à un homme mon horizon ultime. Cela impliquait de me mettre au service des hommes de la famille, de servir mes frères à table et de faire leur lit, le ménage et la vaisselle. Je trouvais cela stupéfiant. Pourquoi? Au nom de quoi? Avant même la révolte, je ressentais une immense perplexité. Pourquoi cette différence "Elle n'avait selon moi aucun fondement ni aucun sens." "'My grandmother, my mother and I [myself] lived like this; so you too [will] live like that, 'said my mother, Fritna, and made marriage and submission to a man my ultimate [life] horizon. It meant serving the men of the family, serving my brothers at the table and making their beds, doing the housework, washing the dishes. I found that astonishing. Why? In whose name? Even before I rebelled, I was at a loss. Why this difference? For me there was no reason for it, it didn't make sense. "

To see her mother's life - submissive, completely dependent on her father, whom she has to beg for money for even the smallest expenditure - scares her. And it was this difference in treatment of the sexes, which were supposed to exclusively establish marriage and motherhood and female subordination for girls, against which she rebelled at an early age and made her decide never to depend on a man. At the age of 10, she refused to serve her brothers and even went on a hunger strike until her parents gave in.

The family did not want to spend any money on the (training) education of girls, especially not on attending a high school. But encouraged by her teacher, Halimi took part in a competition in which she received a scholarship that exempted her from school fees. So she got into high school. Driven by the realization that knowledge and success in school were the only way for her to escape the traditional fate of women, her school achievements were so outstanding that the scholarship was extended year after year. At the age of 17 she passed her Abitur ( baccalauréat ) with distinction. Throughout her school career, she wondered why her brilliant achievements in school were met with indifference within the family, while her brothers, who were by no means so successful, were praised for their far inferior achievements.

"Ils n'étaient pas meilleurs que moi, ils ne m'étaient en rien supérieurs, il n'y avait aucune raison. Drink le fait qu'eux étaient du sexe masculin et moi du sexe féminin." "They were no better than me, were in no way superior to me, there was no reason at all [for this preferential treatment]. Except for the fact that they were male and I was female."

Logically, she also resisted a marriage that her parents, when she had just turned fourteen, wanted to arrange with a wealthy oil trader who was twice her age.

Since she was 14, she dreamed of going to France to study there. During her school days she had given private lessons to pupils, put the money she received aside and received a residence permit for France from the French authorities. There she started studying law , philosophy and political science at the Sorbonne and at the same time had to work as a telephone operator in order to finance her studies. In 1948 she graduated with a law degree ; a year later, in 1949, she was admitted to the bar in Tunis , and in 1956 also in Paris. In 1949, at the age of 22, she married Paul Halimi, a French civil servant, and moved to Paris with him. The couple had two children.

Engagements

Algerian war

When the Algerian war began, she supported the Front de Libération Nationale (FLN), the Algerian independence movement, and signed in 1960 as well as Jean-Paul Sartre , Simone de Beauvoir and many other French intellectuals, the " Manifesto of the 121 " that the refusal of French "To take up arms against the Algerian people" declared justified.

Trial of Djamila Boupacha

In the same year, she learns of the case of Djamila Boupacha , 22 , an FLN fighter accused of planting a bomb in Algiers who was subsequently raped and tortured by members of the French army for more than a month. Halimi decided to defend the young woman. The trial initially took place in an Algerian military court, but was then relocated to France through public pressure. Despite Halimi's brilliant plea, the Algerian was sentenced to death, but pardoned in 1962 according to the amnesty associated with the Évian treaties (but also her torturers). In the same year Gisèle Halimi and Simone de Beauvoir published a book with testimonies and statements on the Djamila Boupacha case.

Further ....

Halimi was also a member of the Russell Tribunal against suspected war crimes committed by the Americans in the 1967 Vietnam War . She also defended many Basque terror suspects and was best known for trials relevant to women's rights, such as that of an underage girl in the Paris suburb of Bobigny in 1972 who had an abortion after being raped (Procès de Bobigny) . In 1971 she founded the feminist group Choisir la cause des femmes with Simone de Beauvoir, Jean Rostand , Christiane Rochefort and Jacques Monod to defend women who had signed the “Manifesto of 343” in which they admitted to having an illegal abortion. Gisèle Halimi was chairman of the association until her death. Her campaign played a major role in the legislative reforms to legalize contraception and abortion that Simone Veil implemented as French Justice Minister in 1974 and 1975, respectively.

Halimi was elected to the French National Assembly in 1981 as a member of the Isère department , of which she was a member until 1984. She was non-party, but joined the socialist faction as a guest (apparenté) . 1985-1986 she was a French delegate to UNESCO (after the French President François Mitterrand had commissioned her in 1984 to examine its efficiency), in 1987 she was a French representative on the Executive Committee and in 1989 adviser to the French delegation to the UN . Halimi was one of the founders of the globalization-critical network Attac . In 1994 she supported Jean-Pierre Chevènement in the election to the European Parliament and was a candidate on the list of the Mouvement des citoyens (MDC), which did not win a seat. In 1995, President Jacques Chirac appointed her chairman of the Observatoire de la parité entre hommes et femmes (“Observatory for equality between men and women”). Until 1997 she led the preparation of a government report on the subject.

Halimi was u. a. the lawyer of Jean-Paul Sartre (with whom she was also friends), Simone de Beauvoir, Françoise Sagan, Henri Cartier-Bresson and Roberto Matta .

Private

Gisèle Halimi was married twice. In 1949, at the age of 22, she married Paul Halimi, a French civil servant, for the first time. The couple had two sons - Jean-Yves and Serge. In 1959 the marriage was divorced again. Halimi kept the name of her husband, by whom she was also known. In 1961 she married Claude Faux († 2017), secretary to Jean-Paul Sartre , for the second time . This marriage resulted in Halimi's third child, son Emmanuel. Her son Serge Halimi is the director of the monthly magazine Le Monde diplomatique .

Awards

Since 2013 she has been the commander of the Legion of Honor after becoming an officer in 2006 and a knight of the order in 1997. In 2008 she made a proposal for equality laws for Europe entitled The Most Favored Nation Clause - Best for Europe's Women .

She died in Paris on July 28, 2020, one day after her 93rd birthday.

Fonts

  • All I am - diary of an unloved daughter. Malik 2000, Piper 2002 ( Fritna in French , Plon 1999, Halimi's memories of her mother).
  • with Simone de Beauvoir: Djamila Boupacha. 1962, Gallimard 1991.
  • Le Procès de Burgos. 1971 (she took part in the trial in 1970).
  • Le lait de l'oranger. Autobiography. Gallimard 1988.
  • La Cause des Femmes. Grasset 1973, 1992.
  • Avortement, une lois en procès. 1973.
  • Co-author: Le program commun des femmes. Grasset 1978.
  • Une embellie perdue. Gallimard 1994.
  • La nouvelle cause des femmes. 1997.
  • Avocate irrespectueuse. Edition Plon, 2002.
  • La Kahina. 2006.
  • L'étrange Mr.K. Plon 2004.
  • Le Procès de Bobigny. Choisir la cause des femmes. Gallimard 2006 (preface by Beauvoir).

Web links

Commons : Gisèle Halimi  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Alexandre Frémont: L'avocate et du figure féminisme Gisèle Halimi est morte à 93 ans. In: francebleu.fr . July 28, 2020, accessed on July 3, 2020 (French).
  2. ↑ a b Fiona Moghaddam: Gisèle Halimi: "À 12 ans, j'ai fait une grève de la faim parce que les filles servaient les garçons". In: France Culture . July 28, 2020, accessed on August 30, 2020 (French).
  3. ↑ Le Monde July 28, 2020: Gisèle Halimi: "J'avais en moi une rage, une force sauvage, je voulais me sauver"
  4. ↑ Der Spiegel July 28, 2020: Remaining independent on the death of women's rights activist Gisèle Halimi! Be free! Never give up!
  5. ↑ Le Monde July 29, 2020: Gisèle Halimi, défenseuse passionnée de la cause des femmes, est morte
  6. ↑ france culture July 28, 2020: Gisèle Halimi: "À 12 ans, j'ai fait une grève de la faim parce que les filles servaient les garçons"
  7. ↑ Le Maitron: HALIMI Gisèle [née ZEIZA Gisèle, Élise, Taïeb]
  8. ↑ france culture July 28, 2020: Gisèle Halimi: "À 12 ans, j'ai fait une grève de la faim parce que les filles servaient les garçons" (Gisèle Halimi s'éduque elle-même)
  9. ↑ france culture July 28, 2020: Gisèle Halimi: "À 12 ans, j'ai fait une grève de la faim parce que les filles servaient les garçons"
  10. ↑ france culture July 28, 2020: Gisèle Halimi: "À 12 ans, j'ai fait une grève de la faim parce que les filles servaient les garçons" (Gisèle Halimi s'éduque elle-même)
  11. ↑ france culture July 28, 2020: Gisèle Halimi: "À 12 ans, j'ai fait une grève de la faim parce que les filles servaient les garçons" (Gisèle Halimi s'éduque elle-même)
  12. ↑ france culture November 8, 2011: Gisèle Halimi ou l'auto-éducation
  13. ↑ Le Maitron: HALIMI Gisèle [née ZEIZA Gisèle, Élise, Taïeb]
  14. ↑ Le Maitron: HALIMI Gisèle [née ZEIZA Gisèle, Élise, Taïeb]
  15. ^ Filmed in 2006 by François Luciani for French television with Sandrine Bonnaire
  16. ↑ choisirlacausedesfemmes.org (the year 1977 was incorrectly stated there)
  17. ↑ including Halimi herself, Simone de Beauvoir, Christine Delphy, Catherine Deneuve , Marguerite Duras , Brigitte Fontaine, Bernadette Lafont , Violette Leduc, Ariane Mnouchkine , Jeanne Moreau , Marie Pillet (the mother of Julie Delpy ), Marie-France Pisier , Yvette Roudy , Françoise Sagan , Delphine Seyrig , Nadine Trintignant , Agnès Varda , Marina Vlady , Monique Wittig
  18. ↑ Le Maitron: HALIMI Gisèle [née ZEIZA Gisèle, Élise, Taïeb ]
  19. ↑ Liberation July 28, 2020: Gisèle Halimi, dame de parité
  20. ↑ Le Monde July 29, 2020: Gisèle Halimi, défenseuse passionnée de la cause des femmes, est morte
  21. ↑ Gala July 28, 2020: Mort de Gisèle Halimi: son 2e mari Claude Faux, sa grande histoire d'amour
  22. ↑ Gala: Gisèle Halimi - biography
  23. ↑ Stefan Simons: Women's rights: Equal rights through legal artifice. In: Spiegel Online . November 27, 2008, accessed July 30, 2020 .
personal data
SURNAME Halimi, Gisèle
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Taïeb, Zeiza Gisèle Élise (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French lawyer and politician, member of the National Assembly
DATE OF BIRTH July 27, 1927
PLACE OF BIRTH La Goulette
DATE OF DEATH July 28, 2020
Place of death Paris