Rape as a Tool against Women in War: The Role of Spiritual Caregivers to Support the Survivors of an Ethnic Violence

Abstract

Rape as a Tool against Women in War: The Role of Spiritual Caregivers to Support the Survivors of an Ethnic Violence Nazila Isgandarova Rape in war constitutes one of the most common and the most severe forms of violence against women. The rape of women in war is used as “a deliberate strategy to undermine community bonds, weaken resistance to aggression.” Ethnic conflict theories help us understand this phenomenon, which can help us understand why rape against women and children became a war weapon. Ethnic conflicts are not new in history and “many powerful nations have attacked and chased off their lands less powerful nations and groups they deemed subordinate and alien.” Researchers have been trying to answer to questions such as: What is an ethnic conflict? What are the reasons for ethnic conflict? Why has rape become a tool in the war against the enemy? The literature review suggests that rape was and continues to be one of the severe forms of violence against women in war. Its massive application, especially in the twentieth century, raises many questions that will be analyzed in this article: What were and are the main reasons that kept the women who were abused during the Azerbaijani genocide and ethnic cleansing alive? What gave them hope to live? The empirical literature has two main approaches: the rational choice approach and emotion‐based approach, which help us to answer to the above‐cited questions. Rational choice approach emphasizes the actions of elites and political actors, the structural factors and territory. The second approach focuses on the emotions of people who actively engaged in the process. In light of these theories, I answer questions such as: Why the Armenian state organized expulsion, torture, rape, and murder against the members of Azerbaijanis? Why did individuals choose to sink to such savagery against their own lifelong neighbors? How do the female victims of war against Azerbaijan continue their lives with the trauma? What is the role of spirituality and religion? Was spirituality beneficial for the survivors of rape in war? How can the spiritual caregiver support the female survivors of Azerbaijani genocide and ethnic cleansing? Ethnic cleansing is an action “to remove a people and often all traces of them from a concrete territory” and genocide is “the intentional killing off of part or all of an ethnic, religious or national group.” One United Nations report indicates that the purpose of ethnic cleansing is “to instill terror in a civilian population, in order to cause them to flee and never return” as exemplified by Azerbaijanis in Armenia and Karabagh Azerbaijanis were the majority in Armenia and Karabagh until 1988. The purpose of ethnic cleansing by Armenians against them was to stop the increase in number among Azerbaijanis and force them to leave their homelands. Ethnic cleansing always involves violence because people do not leave their homelands willingly. They leave if they are forced out, sometimes in most brutal fashion using hunger, disease, and the pains of displacement. The method of ethnic cleansing includes coerced departure, harassment to induce departure, cultural cleansing, payment for expulsion, etc. Ethnic cleansing is closely related to war; many ethnic cleansing events have taken place during war or during the chaotic transition from war to peace. Another aspect of ethnic cleansing is the destruction of the historical monuments and traces of memory of the presence of the nation, which afflicted with the ethnic violence. The physical remnants of the nation are the first to be destroyed. There are numerous examples of the eradication of the Azerbaijanis's graveyards, the central architectural heritage, etc., in Armenia and the occupied regions of Azerbaijan. Ethnic cleansing also involves crimes of both the individuals and the state against property of the targeted group, including theft and stealing. According to the rational school, ethnic conflict is largely conceptualized as a matter of cynical politicians, who mobilize people by creating fear and greed for personal advantages. In many ethnic cleansing events, including the ethnic cleansing of Azerbaijanis in Karabagh and Armenia, the Russian and Armenian elites encouraged Armenian people to commit violence against Azerbaijanis. The political institutions and state, including but not limited to state officials, including police forces, militaries...