BEIRUT — Nada Sabbagh received a brief, chilling telephone call from her son-in-law last month telling her: ‘‘Come to your daughter. I am going to kill her.’’
Sabbagh said by the time she arrived to her daughter’s home in Beirut, her husband had kicked, punched, and beaten her with a pressure cooker, leaving her mortally wounded and bleeding on the floor.
‘‘I walked in and started jumping in shock then begged him to let me take her out,’’ Sabbagh later recounted. She said he responded by saying: ‘‘I will not let her out. I want her to die in front of you.’’
Manal Assi’s husband, Mohammed Nuheili, was detained shortly afterward and is still being questioned by authorities. It remains unclear if he has a lawyer and he could not be reached for comment.
The killing of Sabbagh’s daughter is one of three domestic violence slayings in Lebanon in recent months, drawing new attention to women’s rights in this country of 4 million people.
Although Lebanon appears very progressive on women’s rights compared with other countries in the Middle East, domestic violence remains an unspoken problem and the nation’s Parliament has yet to vote on a bill protecting women’s rights nearly three years after it was approved by the Cabinet.
Activists are urging Parliament to pass the bill at its first meeting, now that a legislative subcommittee has approved it. The measure is opposed by some Muslim clerics, but backers expect it to pass.
On Saturday, about 5,000 people marched in Beirut to demand protection for women and urged Parliament to approve the bill.
‘‘If a woman does not have authority in her house, how can she take an authoritative post (in government)? It starts here,’’ said Maya al-Ammar, an official with a Lebanese women’s rights group Kafa, which means “Enough” in Arabic. ‘‘If you don’t remove (domestic) violence and the woman can’t become the ruler of herself, she will not be able to be able to take a decision-making post.’’
Civil rights activists say that, on average, murders in which a woman is killed by her husband occur once a month in Lebanon, while thousands of women are subjected to physical or verbal abuse every year.
In the past, it used to be taboo to openly speak about such family issues. Some used to claim that their daughters died after they fell in order to avoid what could be seen as ‘‘shameful.’’ Today, however, the death of a woman at the hands of her husband gets extensive coverage by local media and has sparked widespread awareness campaigns online.
Many Lebanese women also see the laws in this Arab country as discriminating against them. Lebanese women married to foreigners cannot pass their citizenship to their children and husbands.
The country’s personal status law, which deals with cases involving divorce or inheritance, is implemented according to the person’s religion. Some females under 18 are kidnapped by their future husbands and get married with the help of religious clerics against the will of their parents.