Why are women being killed for saying no, for saying yes, or for merely being?
What exactly goes through a person’s mind when they kill someone they love?

One of the most extreme manifestations of gender based violence is when women and girls are killed at the hands of their partners or other family members. This can be seen in honor killings, which have been prevalent for years both in Jordan and abroad. However, another form that’s taken up residence in the pile of femicides this year, is women who were killed for either wanting a divorce or for rejecting unwanted advances from a colleague.

In 2020, approximately 47,000 women and girls were killed worldwide by their intimate partners or other family members. This means that, on average, a woman or a girl is killed by someone in her own family every 11 minutes.

Before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, violence affected 1 in 3 women and girls worldwide. Since the virus’ spread, that percentage has become 1 in 2 as coronavirus managed to magnify the underlying realities of sexism and gender-based violence.

Isolation and social distancing measures, which were enacted to contain the spread of COVID, placed many victims in lockdown with their own abusers. And even after those measures were lifted, violence still increased.

In Jordan alone, a total of 20 murders occurred in 2020 and in 2021 at least 14 women were killed in domestic homicide incidents.

The video below tackles this issue in a more in-depth way.