Jane Gabriel is Programme Director of openDemocracy's 50.50 editorial project. She is an independent television producer and has directed more than thirty social, historical and international current affairs films for Channel Four Television and the BBC Series "Correspondent". She has won the Royal Television Society and One World Media Awards for International Journalism. Jane was a member of Britain's first all women television production company, Broadside.

Jane's contributions to openDemocracy include a series of podcasts including interviews with the UN's John Holmes, Hibaaq Osman, and a package on women's rights in Jordan . She has also produced podcasts on the Pathways of Women's Empowerment research programme. Elswhere, she has contributed blog reportage from the Commission on the Status of Women 2008, the Nobel Women's Initiative conference in June 2007 and the Marie Stopes Global Safe Abortion conference in October 2007, plus the UN Commission on the Status of Women and the annual 16 Days Against Gender Violence.

Recent articles

A new report produced by the Karama network ‘Refugee and Stateless Women across the Arab Region: stories of the dream of return, the fear of trafficking and the discriminatory laws' (pdf) is a ground breaking work written collaboratively by women from Syria, Palestine, Sudan, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, Somalia and Morocco. It combines original research and personal testimony with historical and political analysis, to call for a response to refugees that moves beyond relief services to the promotion of rights. The authors address in detail the particular problems faced by Iraqi women living in Syria, Egypt and Jordan, Palestinian women living in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria, Sudanese women living in Egypt and Somalian women living in ‘a nation without a state'.

As George Bush leaves Israel and the West Bank and heads for Gulf states talks, Robi Damelin, a member of Parents Circle Families Forum, laments the failure of leaders to understand that the same pain is shared by all.

Robi Damelin writes: Roll up roll up and join the queue to receive your certificate for missed opportunities. Spread the red carpet from Ben Gurion to Har Herzl or Kiriat Shaul and let them pontificate over open graves. Play the National Anthem and let's listen to all the voices of doom and gloom. Fly the flag and stay glued to your identity. (more...)