Advertisements recommending polygamy to single women over 30 have begun appearing in Bedouin newspapers across Israel’s Negev desert.
The ads ask “What is the solution for 7,514 women in the Negev who are over 30 and still single?” underneath a picture of a distraught single Bedouin woman. The answer? “Polygamy, the Sharia solution,” read the ads.
Polygamy is illegal in Israel, but the law is very rarely enforced within Bedouin tribes. The anonymous “Negev Committee for Women’s Rights” produces the advertisements, which are themselves prohibited under Israeli law because they promote illegal activity.
Israeli police say they are aware of widespread polygamy among the tribes, but also note it is very hard to prove a crime has taken place in most cases. Speaking to Israel’s Ynet newspaper, prosecutors in the Negev region call the apparent increase in polygamy “a social trend, which needs to be dealt with in a systematic and comprehensive manner.”
The Bedouin people, an Arab minority, are thought to number around 170,000 people within Israel.