Women in the Algerian War
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Women fulfilled a number of different functions during the Algerian War (1954–1962). The majority of Muslim women who became active participants did so on the side of the National Liberation Front (FLN). The French included some women, both Muslim and French, in their war effort, but they were not as fully integrated, nor were they charged with the same breadth of tasks as their Algerian sisters. The total number of women involved in the conflict, as determined by post-war veteran registration, is numbered at 11,000, but it is possible that this number was significantly higher due to underreporting.[1]
There exists a distinction between two different types of women who became involved: urban and rural. Urban women, who constituted about twenty percent of the overall force, had received some kind of education and usually chose to enter on the side of the FLN of their own accord. Largely illiterate rural women, on the other hand (the remaining eighty percent), became involved due to geographical proximity to FLN operations paired with force, although some of them did join out of compassion.[2]
The rural women combatants in the Algerian War were referred to as the mujahidat and "left their homes and families to join the FLN armed guerrilla bands, the Armée Libération Nationale (ALN)".[3] They tended to be young, unmarried, and prepared to join the resistance "with or without the approval of their families".[3] The mujahidat also were "social assistants to the rural population in the zones in which they were posted and would give local female peasants advice on topics such as hygiene and education".[3] They also had important political responsibilities as many of these female combatants promoted the FLN by "organizing political meetings with local women".[3]
The urban women combatants were referred to as the fidayat and largely "engaged in paramilitary activities in the urban centres".[3]