So to recap the events of a couple of weeks ago:
- One Hamas fighter called a group of female captives sabaya
- The IDF translated that as “women who can get pregnant”
- Basically the whole world got up in arms about the translation, and rightly so
What was missing from the discourse IMO was the procession on to step 4: Someone comes in and explains exactly what the word actually does mean, and why even just bringing it up in this context was an important thing, neither of which are trivial questions.
This article does a pretty good job of that, hitting the high points of:
- IDF’s wildly inflammatory translation aside, it is a word with explicit associations to sexual slavery, which has been resurrected in the last 10 years after it had basically disappeared as the common practice of slavery had waned, and its use in this context is an important window onto Hamas’s rank and file’s mindset
- While of course bearing in mind that one random soldier saying one fucked-up thing isn’t indicative of anything other than that soldiers (especially ones deployed against civilian populations) sometimes do and say real fucked up things
Obviously the full article has lots more detail, but that’s the TL;DR
Arabic is my first language and I studied it formally for years.
Sabaya means captives nothing more and nothing less. It is plural, genderless and used for men and women.
What’s this say about the definition for سبايا? Do you have an Arabic dictionary somewhere that says something different?
Yes, here’s a dictionary: https://www.maajim.com/dictionary/سباية
I سَبْي [مفرد]: الجمع: سُبِيّ (لغير المصدر): 1- مصدر سبَى. 2- مأسور “رجلٌ سَبْيٌ”. • السَّبْي: النِّساءُ؛ لأنهنّ يأسرن القلوب، أو لأنهنّ يُسْبَين. II سَبِيّ [مفرد]: الجمع: سَبايا، مؤنث: سَبِيّة وسَبِيّ، جمع مؤنث سَبايا: صفة ثابتة للمفعول من سبَى: مأسور، أسير “أُخذت نساءُ الأعداء سَبايا”.
The definition applies to men and women clearly.
Literally the word means taking something from a place to another, the below example shows how “wine” can be a sabyyah (feminine singular of sabaya) if it is carried from one country to another
السَّبْيُ: أَخْذُ شَيْءٍ مِنْ بَلَدٍ إلى بَلَدٍ آخَرَ قَهْراً، يُقال: سَبَى الخَمْرَ، يَسْبِيها، سَبْياً، أيْ: حَمَلَها مِنْ بَلَدٍ إلى بَلَدٍ. ويأْتي السَّبْيُ بِـمعنى الأسْرِ، يُقالُ: سَبَى العَدُوَّ سَبْياً وسِباءً: إذا أَسَرَهُ وأَخَذَهُ قَهْراً، فهو سَبِيٌّ، والأُنْثَى سَبِيَّةٌ ومَسْبِيَّةٌ، والنِّسْوَةُ سَبايا. ومِن مَعانيهِ أيضاً: الإِبْعادُ، ومِنْهُ قَوْلُهُم: سَباكَ اللهُ، أيْ: أَبْعَدَكَ.
The Israeli female captives themselves have noted that they have not been raped or subjected to sexual violence. If anything they were forced to cover up. So I am not even sure why you want to argue over the meaning of the word insisting that it means what it doesn’t. You are not even Arab or speak Arabic, you are just lying to demonize Palestinians.
The book you are citing is a book titled النهاية في غريب الحديث والأثر لأبي السعادات ابن الأثير الجزري “The End of the Strange Hadith and Trace by Abu Al-Sa’adat Ibn Al-Athir Al-Jazari”, a collection of strange Hadiths and traditional sayings. Anyone who studied Hadith formally knows that not all are valid or trusted, and not every collection is authoritative. It is known that many Hadiths are fabricated or have poor attestation and narration chains. Only six books are considered canonical and authoritative: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kutub_al-Sittah
I’m Arab يا حمار stop lying about my language. The Arabic words for female slave are amat أمة and jariyat جارية, plural إماء Imaa’ and جواري Jawari. Nice try though, you know just enough superficial Arabic to fool ignorant people. Nice try though, you know just enough superficial Arabic to fool ignorant people.
You’re sending me this link as an argument for why سبايا applies to men and women clearly? You skipped over some stuff before the excerpts you sent me.
I think I am finished with this conversation. I was curious if I was missing something somehow and all of these different Western news sources were lying to me; I am now confident that that wasn’t what was up. You didn’t answer my first question, only the second, and your answer to the second question definitely wasn’t convincing. Have a good one.