Samira Bellil

Samira Bellil (November 24, 1972 - September 7, 2004) was a French feminist activist and a campaigner for the rights of girls and women.

Bellil became famous in France with the publication of her autobiographical book "Dans l'enfer des tournantes" (translated as "In the hell of the tournantes (gang-rapes)") (2002). The book discusses the violence she and other young women endured in the predominantly Muslim immigrant outskirts of Paris, where she was repeatedly gang-raped as a teenager by gangs led by people she knew, and then abandoned by her family and friends. Her book is a portrayal of the predicament of young girls in the poor, outlying suburbs ("banlieue") of French cities.

Life

Bellil was born to Algerian parents in Algiers, but her family migrated to France and settled in the Parisian suburb of Seine-Saint-Denis. Her father was jailed almost immediately and she was fostered by a family in Belgium for five years, before being called back to her parents .

As a teenager Bellil rebelled against the traditional constraints of her community and wanted to live freely as a young French woman.

Samira was first gang-raped when she was 14, by a gang led by someone she knew . They beat her viciously and raped her all night. A month later, one of the most violent attackers in the gang followed her and dragged her off a train by her hair, while other passengers looked the other way. She was then brutally gang-raped by the gang members again.

She did not report her rapes until two friends told her that the same gang had raped them too. Samira decided to appeal to the French legal system to prosecute her attackers. In the end, the gang members were sentenced to eight years in prison.

Bellil's parents, who believed they were shamed by her presence, expelled her from her house. "People outside the community don't know," Bellil has written. "And everyone in the community knows, but they won't say anything." Fact|date=February 2007

Eventually, she found a psychologist who helped her. She had years of therapy, and describes how she decided to write her book to show other young women gang-rape victims that there was a way out. "It's long and it's difficult, but it's possible," she wrote in the dedication - to "my sisters in trouble". She used her real name and put her photo on the cover.

She died on 7 September 2004 of stomach cancer in Paris. She was 31.

Activism

Soon after publishing her book, her parents threw her out in shame, and her neighbourhood rejected her [http://books.guardian.co.uk/obituaries/story/0,11617,1303227,00.html] . Her book put the light on the difficulties girls face in the heavily immigrant and mainly Muslim "cités". She wrote how, in the neighborhoods she came from, She underwent a course of psychotherapy.

Bellil became close to the movement "Ni putes ni soumises" (Neither whores nor submissives) and wrote her testimony in her book. She denounced the gang-rapes ("tournantes") and described how she overcame both her traumatic experiences and the need for revenge. She dedicated the book to her "girlfriends, so that they realize that one can overcome the traumatic" and to Boris Cyrulnik, her therapist.

She later became a youth worker.

The phenomena of the "tournantes"

The word "tournante" is a French adjective meaning "turning". It is used as a slang term to mean a gang rape.

The typical scenario that takes place is that the targeted young woman is drawn or lured into a secluded area where she is brutalized and repeatedly raped by groups of men who take turns raping her. The victim is usually insulted for behaving in a Westernized manner. Typically the girls are often released afterwards, but rapes are often unreported for fear of reprisals against their families. In nearly every case on record the young victim who does report the crimes committed on them says that days later they would again be caught by the gang and gang-raped again.

"Ni Putes Ni Soumises"

Bellil helped found a young Muslim women's activist group called Ni Putes Ni Soumises ("neither whores nor submissives") which has publicly addressed the issue of violence against young Muslim women in France. The group drew the attention of the French and European press as they organized marches and press conferences to bring attention to the tragic events happening to young women in the Islamic neighborhoods of France.

In part due to Bellil's book and the activism of Ni Putes Ni Soumises, the French government and the mayor's office in Paris began investigating the problem of violence against young Muslim women in French immigrant communities.

Official recognitions

[
Mariannes representing the face of France]

She was chosen as one of the new Mariannes, the new faces of France. Her portrait has hung outside the French National Assembly.

In 2005 a French school in l’Île-Saint-Denis was named in her honor: [http://idf.lesverts.fr/article.php3?id_article=167 Ecole Samira Bellil.]

Additional sources

* [http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/05/13/60minutes/main617270.shtml CBS News: Article on Samira Bellil]
* [http://www.time.com/time/europe/magazine/2002/1202/crime/bellil.htm Time Magazine: Sisters In Hell]
* [http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,482120,00.html The Guardian: Gang rape on rise among French youth]

* [http://www.hvk.org/articles/0303/115.html Reuters:Girls terrorized in France’s macho ghettos]
* [http://books.guardian.co.uk/obituaries/story/0,11617,1303227,00.html The Guardian: Article on Samira Bellil]
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/audiovideo/programmes/crossing_continents/europe/1456204.stm BBC News: France in shock over gang rape]
* [http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,4718201%255E21207,00.html The Australian: Tournantes in Australia]

* [http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/07/13/1026185124700.html Sydney Morning Herald: Muslim gang rapes in Sydney Australia]

* [http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0405/24/i_ins.00.html CNN Transcript: Muslim Women Rebel In France]

* [http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200209/s677752.htm ABC News: Paris gang rape trial begins]

* [http://print.signandsight.com/features/288.html Book review Neither whores nor submissives and In gang-rape hell]

* [http://www.mariebrenner.com/articles/daughters/daughters.html Vanity Fair:Daughters of France, Daughters of Allah]

* [http://menewsie.3.forumer.com/index.php?act=ST&f=2&t=151 Newsweek: Sexism in the cites]
* [http://jarrarsupariver.blogspot.com/2006/09/remembering-samira-bellil.html IBC: Remembering Samira Bellil]

Studies on the Phenomena of Tournantes

* [http://www.racismeantiblanc.bizland.com/silenceselectif/bid18.htm Tournantes Documented cases in Paris In French]
* [http://racismeantiblanc.bizland.com/trntalb.zip "Tournantes : un phénomène international" French study on the tournante phenomenon in several countries, zipped pdf file]
* [http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?channel_id=1&story_id=14870 'No surprise' over group rape findings]