By Karen Attwood

Women are the greatest victims of fundamentalism but they are also the ones leading the fight against it.

When the Islamic regime came to power in Iran following the revolution in 1979, it marked a return to the Dark Ages. The legal age of marriage was reduced to 9, women were barred from becoming judges, unrelated men and women could no longer walk together in the street and the wearing of the hijab became compulsory.

Immediately, women protested. On International Women’s Day, March 8, 1979, more than 100,000 gathered on the streets of Tehran, the Iranian capital, to demonstrate against the enforced hijab carrying banners stating: ‘We didn’t have a revolution to go backwards!’ and ‘Women’s rights are not eastern or western, they are universal!’

But punishment for any dissent against the regime was harsh with thousands of men and women, arrested, tortured and executed, many of them teenagers. Women prisoners were often raped before execution as it was believed by the Islamic guards that only a virgin could get to heaven.

The fight-back against the Islamic Republic and the key part played by women, is the subject of Girl With A Gun, a book I’ve been working on for four years with co-author Diana Nammi, the founder of IKWRO, a women’s rights organisation based in London, and a former Peshmerga  (Kurdish freedom fighter), in Iran.

While still a teenager, Diana became involved in politics in the Kurdish region of Iran where she grew up. Along with her younger sister, Shaesta, she took part in the protests against Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, the ruler of Iran from 1949 until the revolution.

When Ruhollah Khomeini seized power and the Islamic Republic was born, the Kurdish people didn’t accept it and for several heady months, local councils governed in the region. The new regime launched two ferocious assaults on the Kurds and Diana worked as an activist against the regime. When the region fell, guards came to arrest her seven times and both she and her sister felt they had no choice but to become Peshmerga fighters with Komala. 

“I couldn’t remain silent in the face of such injustice,” Diana says. “I felt I was born to fight for our rights. To become a Peshmerga means that we will sacrifice ourselves for others. I was ready to give up my life for my beliefs and our people.”

Girl With A Gun, is the first account from one of the original Kurdish female fighters to go into battle alongside the men. First, the women were expected to have supporting roles but gradually, they were armed and Diana rose to become a commander.

One of her key roles in the Peshmerga was to champion women’s rights and she was a well-known speaker in the region, talking against the system of ‘honour’ whereby women are shamed and punished for not marrying who their family wishes or for doing anything against the strict cultural code policing women’s behaviour.

Diana has continued her fight since coming to the UK in the 1990s, founding IKWRO after she discovered her translator had been murdered in an honour-crime. Ten per cent of all authors’ proceeds from Girl With A Gun will be donated to IKWRO.

Given that many authors who have their books out during the lockdown have had to miss their all-important launches and speaking engagements, Diana and I feel incredibly thankful that we were managed to have two events just before London shut down.

The first was hosted to celebrate International Women’s Day at Garden Court Chambers, the renowned human rights barristers’ chambers and a second at Waterstones Islington. It was wonderful to see the fruits of our labour, (if only too briefly) in the front window of the book shop.

If you would like to order an e-book version you can do so from publisher Unbound’s website or from Amazon or Kobo. You can get a copy of the hardback from online shops WHSmith, Foyles and Waterstones. Or you call your local independent book shop. Many local stores are doing mailouts during this time which is helping them to keep afloat.