Iraqi News coverage on women involved in violence is marked by two tendencies. First, there is an explicit portrayal of women as victims of violence: with the keywords “violent women”, all the results were related to violence against women, enhancing the victim narrative. This is not a trend particular to this newspaper; as Gámez Fuentes and Núñez Puente express, the victim of gender violence appears as an image of consumerism in most media nowadays (2013, 148). Second, and representative of the armed conflict context, Iraqi News focuses largely on female suicide bombers (FSB): there was only one descriptive article related to a woman teacher that caused the death of a student (Amin, 2010).

The keyword search of FSB gave us six pages of results, which means much more than usual for this website while with “male suicide bombers” we obtained merely one page of results. This might signify, on the one hand, that there is a need to “name” women's violence and deviance or, on the other hand that men's violence has been normalized through long-term socially internalized patterns while women's violence is seen as an aberration, as a sign that war has come to its paroxysm.

Even though Sjoberg and Gentry (2007) are mostly focusing on the representation of “deviant” women in Western media, their analyses are substantial for the depiction of FSB in Iraqi News. These two authors expose how women's violence attracts more attention than men's violence and how we usually resort to all sorts of narratives in order to explain women's violence as it does not fit into any of our gender conceptions of what a woman should and should not do (Sjoberg & Gentry, 2007, pp. 2-5). In an attempt to explain female terrorism, Iraqi News also reproduces these gender stereotypes and, does not investigate the root causes of women's violence, merely repeating the information provided by generals or officials, generally over quoting them.

While not limited to Iraqi News, we found a tendency of reifying Iraqi women under the banner of victims. As Gentry maintains, the common perception of Iraqi women is one of “apolitical victims of exploitation and manipulation” (2011, p. 187) and Iraqi News presents some examples of these misconceptions on women agency. The article by Layla Mohammed is an example: she interviewed a FSB called Rania, presenting one of the most complete texts on the topic. She portrays Rania as a victim of patriarchy, and more specifically a victim of her 10-year senior husband. While Mohammed is the only author trying to portray women's violence, she does it in a way the reader can only deduce that Rania is a mere victim of a society that produces violent and controlling men: “a 20-yearold dark-skinned woman, has always dreamed of becoming a physician, but instead she ended up as the first female suicide bomber in Diala […]” (2008). Another article follows the widow narrative elaborated by Sjoberg and Gentry (2007) and victimises women as it assumes that there is an eminent danger for widows to become terrorists or prostitutes, once more reiterating victimhood and gender stereotypes.

We also found the motherhood narrative identified by Ahall (2011, p. 42): as motherhood is “something we do not question” as we conceive the female body as the bearer of life, it is difficult to conceive it as a life taker as is the case with FSB. Iraqi News makes no exception within the global media and frequently associated the horror of suicide attacks with the incoherence of a mother committing the deed. In one particular article, the reference to motherhood is connected to what is socially accepted for a woman in Iraq (and globally): “She wore a black abaya and, like many of the other women, was walking with a child, in her case a young girl […]” (Hussein, 2009). In this quote, the normalcy for women is to bear children, which is incompatible with the perpetration of violent action. However, there is no explanation of the deed and no contextualization, which results in misperception with regards to political agency while not analysing correctly the conditions under which a woman may take or be forced to take the decision to commit suicide bombing.

The easiest way to explain women's violence is also to categorise them as absolutely “deviant” from the norm, as psychologically inapt and therefore, easy to manipulate. This has been used a lot by the Western media, and later disclaimed, as was the case in 2008 when a woman who blew herself up was considered to have Down syndrome (Howard, 2008; Bloom, 2011, p. 219). Iraqi News reporters cover FSB events with the same kind of affirmations: “A mentally-retarded female suicide bomber” (Berwani, 2008) or “[m]ost of these female suicide bombers are either mentally-disabled or bereaved women who have lost their loved ones” (Mohammed, 2008). The problem of female terrorism is associated to emotions and irrationality as it is easier to assume that the woman is “deviant” from her gender than to suppose any agency or resilience in political actions. While emotions are important factors in the war context, it is dangerous to reduce FSB acts to irrationality without taking the whole socio-political context into account.

Arab News does not address the problematic of women involved in violence as Iraqi News: there was only one short report about a female bomber in Pakistan, and a few other articles depicting the phenomenon in Afghanistan and Iraq. Only two articles in the entire online version of Arab News focus on women's participation in the Al-Qaeda organization. The first article published in 2003 is based on an email interview with Um Osama, the leader of the women Mujahedeen of AlQaeda. In this article, Um Osama indicates the role of women in Al-Qaeda as bombers and fighters. She mentions: “Besides martyr operations, our mission is to provide logistical support to the Mujahedeen and intelligence on the hypocrites wanted by the Mujahedeen” (AN, 2003). The second article, titled “Saudi women played a marginal role in deviant group's activities” (Al-Sulami, 2010), and highlights the women doing marginal tasks, such as logistical matters, helping wanted militants, travelling with militants, fundraising for Al-Qaeda's widows and media relations officers.

Even in AJE, the keywords “violent women” did not explicitly give us many results: the problem of domestic violence and above all rape in India was monopolising the media attention on this topic. This confirms that there is a saturation of news portraying women as victims of gender violence (Gámez Fuentes & Núñez Puente, 2013, p. 148), while less is done to comprehend their active role in society. However, it is worth mentioning that AJE, compared to the two other media outlets, is publicly taking part in promoting the campaigns against gender-based violence, as was the case for India and Saudi Arabia.

With that being said, since the events of 9/11, AJE has been creating more and more assertive views on women's political actions in armed resistance. Contrary to what was expected, we got only 4 pages of results on the topic of FSB, which is low for AJE. When we searched for “women terrorists” and “women in terrorism” we both obtained 25 pages of results but very few were really depicting women's political violence. Since most of the articles on FSB come from international news agencies, the narratives that were identified by Sjoberg and Gentry (2007) as well as Brunner (2007) in Western Media are repeated in AJE. It was the case on the coverage of Chechen and Dagestani FSB with the recurrent use of the expression “Black Widow” to categorise them (AJE,2010).

Such labelling only portrays these women as monstrous and abject, “othering” North Caucasus women, demonisingand dehumanising Muslim women (Sjoberg y Gentry, 2007, p. 103). However, AJE has sought to give another portrayal of FSB, especially Palestinian ones, by promoting programmes like “Everywoman” or “Riz Khan” where the analysis goes in depth, and experts are invited in order to understand the political reasons behind women's actuation, while deconstructing the myths behind their violence (AJE, 2008). “Everywoman”⁴ offered a more comprehensive approach to women's suicidal violence by insisting on the necessity of involving them in peace processes and by interviewing directly some of the women willing to commit the deed and: “[…] there is something special about sacrificing yourself [...] by blowing yourself up you become one with the land [...] building a bridge with the future generation which will liberate Jerusalem” (AJE, 2008).

AJE also addresses controversial themes on female combatants, as is the case with American women who got their right to fight in ground combat or with the reclamation of selfdefence combat for women. On the topic, AJE shows high abilities in describing women political/military agency while also representing the victims by demonstrating women's resilience in conflicts times. Nevertheless, most of the time, women are portrayed as masculinised because they are deviating from the gender norms (Sjoberg y Gentry, 2008, p. 14), and AJE even proves that women are characterising themselves as such quoting a Syrian female combatant: “I do not feel like a woman whatsoever when I am here” (Atassi, 2013). AJE also makes a relevant portrayal of political engagement of female fighters in Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger (Grey, 2007), even if the aberration of the journalist covering the topic evidenced the general difficulty of understanding why a woman would decide to sacrifice herself, largely due to our understanding of women as intrinsically peaceful.

The approach of AJE with relation to combat and fighting is comprehensive, mostly portraying women as political agents and resilient in the face of violence. However, the question of female combatants in the Arab world is not clearly addressed, apart from some articles on Syria where the violence of women is presented as a civil war effect: “mothers, wives and daughters are increasingly becoming weapons of war on the frontline of the battle between government forces and the opposition” (AJE, 2013). The strength of this article, and the video related, is that is makes one of the rare portrayals within the mainstream media of women implicated in the Syrian conflict and the battle engaged on their bodies. The video is quite polarised on the topic of women engagement, offering a fervent debate between three women experts and activists of the Syrian conflicts, showing the intention of AJE to expose marginalised points of view.

Generally, the language of AJE is appropriate regarding the coverage of politically and military engaged women, even if sometimes the newspaper employs terminology as “mother of revolution” or “peace mom” to explain women's political engagement, which tends to reduce women agency to their role as mothers. Fortunately, these discourses are balanced with many reports on the implication of women in Arab Revolts, including interviews with women on the street to see how they struggle for their rights.

Iraqi News gives a voice to women that are actively defending a non-conventional position in society, above all, to human rights activists. There is a firm difference between the articles redacted by Mohammed as she tries to give voice to feminist activists and female politicians. In general, the articles are mostly quoting women activists, not really deeply analysing their political acts per se. Most of the articles seem to argue that we should “not limit the image of women in typical roles” (Mohammed, 2012) and that the role of women in politics should be promoted. However, lots of articles are using the expression “female elements” (Mohammed, 2012a) to portray women in some of the roles considered “deviant”, suggesting a certain objectification of women. It confirms the complexity of perceptions on women's insertion in “men's business” showing that the women entering politics or armed forces are still considered to be the “other”, the “strange elements” within a dominated masculine world.

One recurrent element in various articles was that women that “deviate” from their gender roles in Iraqi society are associated with land and national pride. As we argued regarding FSB, motherhood functions as a “symbol of heteronormativity”, and therefore, represents the “natural femininity” (Ahall, 2011, p. 29), most of the narratives on women are based on a direct association between women, politics and the land. The feminine body is directly associated to the nation and nationalism because the mother's body is connected to the perpetuation of the nation (Qazi, 2011, p. 32; Agra Romero, 2012, p. 66). The woman is therefore not fully recognised for her achievements, but for what she can provide for the nation: quoting the Women Committee supervisor, one article stresses the necessity of supporting women to “highlight the Iraqi artistic, cultural heritage and civilization” (Mohammed, 2012b).

Equally, articles assume that women should be given a space in politics because of their “sacrifices for Iraq” (Hussein, 2013) or because “women's honor is the honor of all Iraqis” (Hussein, 2012). As Banner argues, women's bodies are often territories of battle during war and this leads to national efforts in promoting women's emancipation in post-war society as proof of a nation's progress (2009). Consequently, women are accepted in certain jobs as “Iraqi women proved to be trustworthy” (Amin, 2009): their femininity is an obstacle to their role in society, but since they have “proved” themselves in a male world, they have been accorded some public space.

Iraqi News raises a number of alarming issues such as honour killings (Amin, 2010a) which seems to be a preoccupying question for the newspaper, the dilemma of polygamy (Hussein, 2012a) and the compelling problem of women prisoner abuses (Hussein, 2012). However, these topics are superficially addressed while it would have been interesting to investigate Iraqi women's resilience and agency on the matter.

Iraqi News tries to give voice to women in Iraq, although in a very embryonic manner to perceive it as a changing force, especially considering that the general public might not read in English and does not necessarily have Internet access on a regular basis. It surely confronts at some point the notion of women normalcy for Iraqi society, denouncing the inaction of the government on topics like women prisoners abuses. However, Iraqi News does not present itself as an emerging force for Iraqi women: the online newspaper largely sticks to the facts and does not provide a space for women and men to discuss gender issues. The portrayal of “deviant” women would be more accurate if the newspaper would hire more female journalists: although it is still difficult in post-war Iraq for them, “they have managed to get new opportunities and enjoy new freedoms of speech” (Al-Rawi, 2010, p. 223).

The conceptualisation of “sociallyinvolved” women is relative following the country and the normativity with regards to femininity. Arab News shows that politics, driving cars and working in the media are “deviant” work for Saudi women because, despite their activism, they are still denied a social space. Several articles have been published in Arab News on the topic of driving women in Saudi Arabia. The newspaper tries to give voice to both sides: the ones who support lifting the ban on women driving, and the “activists” who are “opposed to women getting behind the wheel” (Khan, 2013). Arab News is not officially against women's driving, however in the reports they published, the Saudi women's efforts to lift the ban on driving are portrayed as very pale. These three articles' titles express this trend: “Driving alone can't define Saudi women's progress” (Al-Mulhim, 2013), “Activists oppose women's getting behind the wheel” (Khan, 2013), “Women driving campaign fizzles out” (Al-Bargi y Ali, 2013). In the first article, Al-Mulhim (2013) indicates many women's achievements in the Kingdom and adds that: “Yes, women in the Kingdom are not allowed to drive. I have a gut feeling that it is just a matter of time when the world will witness women drivers wading through traffic jams in the Kingdom”.

In the second article, Arab News reported on several “activists” going against the recommendation of three women members of the Shoura Council over the lifting of the ban on driving for women. Furthermore, one day after the campaign launched by Saudi women that drove on the streets near their houses on October 26, 2013, Arab News used the expression “fizzles out” and reported on only a few women's initiatives.

It seems that Arab News is a liberal newspaper in Saudi Arabia playing a positive role in women's participation in the media; some of the articles we analysed in our investigation had been written by women and some women also commented on the articles even though it is reserved to English speakers. Women's rights are discussed even by male journalists, as is the case with Ghafour when addressing the use of social media, particularly Twitter. He notes that thousands of Saudi women use social media and fight for their rights. He gives an example of the part-time female teachers' campaign to get fulltime jobs, resulting in the government giving permanent jobs to 10,000 teachers (2013).

After 9/11, there was strong criticism toward the Saudi Arabian government, one of the USA's closest allies in the Middle East, because fifteen of nineteen hijackers had Saudi nationality. Thus, the improvement of women's status and creating democratic societies in the Middle East and Islamic countries was put on the agenda of their governments. The Saudi government is also working on reforms, including women's issues. Arab News is a voice of the Saudi government, especially when it publishes in English and targets foreign readers, highlighting the government's reformation proposals and achievements: it warily talks about women's issues and still has a conservative and prudent approach toward “deviant” women.

AJE is definitely transcending the typical “victimisation” of women: compared to Arab News and Iraqi News, it presents women as much more resilient and proactive in social change, giving voice to women that are breaking the typical role associated with their gender. AJE offers multiple and diverse critiques, and censorship is not really felt, mostly due to its international reach, allowing a certain “defiance” on women's issues.

As women activists are affected by different constraints concerning their gender roles following their cultures, it must be recognised that AJE tries to portray their diverse points of view, but above all, the context of emergence of such activism. For instance, “Witness Al-Jazeera” published a video reporting on Maryam Bibi, a Pakistani woman engaged in girls' right to education in Tribal areas, depicting her as a strong communitarian leader daring social norms. AJE also discusses women occupying uncommon jobs and defying traditional views on women's social participation. As a matter of example, we can quote the reporting of a woman wedding videographer in Morocco who is fighting against her conservative family that prohibits her from working (AJE, 2013a). This article challenges the gender dynamics in Morocco, showing the social barriers to her career development while affirming her struggles in the midst of conservatism.

Equally, AJE does not fear addressing uncommon roles for women, even if considered “deviant”. It goes as far as criticising some Arab regimes, taking a strong position against their legislation, as is the case of the ban on driving in Saudi Arabia. It explicitly appeals to other governments to stop supporting the Saudi regime as a means of pressure (Naar, 2013). These tensions between Qatar and Saudi Arabia are currently deteriorating which is partially due to the polemical coverage of AJE (Gresh, 2014).

Interestingly, there were not many results with regards to Qatari women except from some news on the insertion of Qatari women in sports. The only divergent voice of Qatari women is a video on the Qatari author Al-Malki where she is interviewed in April 2012 regarding women's place in the public arena and the necessity to institutionalise women's rights. The almost absence of Qatari women in the newspaper is revealing as it seems that the debates on “deviant” women are only concerning other countries and not the host country of AJE, which can signify that it does not want to risk entering the slippery field of criticising the country's policies.

In sum, various articles are presenting women in different social roles, more often than not prohibited or frowned upon by their societies, as is the case with the testimony attacking the common understanding of Yemeni women as victims of child marriage and in “necessity to be saved”. This depiction victimises Yemeni women and limits the possibility to have any form of agency and control over their life. AJE breaks down these stereotypes, affirming a more complex portrayal of Muslim women and feminism: “Instead, we hold tight to an orientalist vision of the Middle East that makes women into oversexed and illiterate haram maidens” (Fawcett, 2013).

Arab News was the first liberal initiative of the Saudi government “because it was issued by a company with limited liability outside the framework of the Publications Regulations which governed all local newspapers at the time” (Al-Faisal, 2010); however, we found double standards regarding “deviant” women. For example, it is rare to find any article about Saudi or Arab lesbian women in Arab News: only one article was identified on April 2011, titled “Student appeals expulsion over deviant relationship”. It is the story of a sexual relationship between a female student, Sarah, at the King Abdulaziz University, and a supervisor. Arab News identified a lesbian relationship as a “sexual identity crisis” (Humaidan, 2011) and, in all online issues brings up this one case repeatedly, while university administrations and psychologists say they have observed many cases in universities and schools in Saudi Arabia. It is interesting to note that Abdul Qader Tankal, the supervisor of safety and security of Abdulaziz University contends that: “Lesbian relationships are quite common among girls in recent years because of satellite channels and the internet” (Humaidan, 2011). The newspaper promulgates numbers of reports about homosexual rights movements in other countries such as India, UK, USA and some other European and African countries. It shows the double standards of the paper regarding the issue of considered sexually “deviant” women; the approach of Arab News regarding lesbianism is generally a reflection of Saudi Arabia's Islamic attitudes about this issue.

The status of women in Saudi Arabia always has been a controversial issue between the Saudi government and the international community. A Human Rights Watch report (2008) discusses male guardianship and sex segregation in Saudi Arabia. This report highlighted that every Saudi woman, regardless of their economic and social status, must obtain permission from their guardian (a male relative) to work, study or marry. Sex segregation puts Saudi women in a category in which they are treated differently to their male counterparts. General Presidency of Girls Education (GPGE) has a specific curriculum for girls that teach them housewife skills and motherhood practices. Even though the Kingdom created some reforms in women's education, invested millions of dollars in universities and King Abduallah has encouraged girls to continue their education at higher levels, culture and tradition still create barriers that confine women's study within the county.

Meanwhile, Arab News rarely ever mentions these discriminatory situations for Saudi women and their political resistance. It is true that it often presents achievements of a certain fringe of Saudi women as, for instance, was the case with the two Saudi women who were selected to be among 20 top Muslim scientists by Muslim Science, a UK-based online magazine. However, in some articles Arab News “slams” the int e rnational approach towards the “oppression” status of Saudi women, thus exposing Saudi government policy towards women's rights. One article published in September 2013 strongly disclaims the World Bank report “[…] saying that Saudi Arabia tops the list of countries for laws that limit women's economic potential” (Jiffry, 2013). Another article, “Activists slam UN rights report” was posted in October 2013, quoted the argument of Suhaila Zain Al-Arideen, a women's rights activist, wherein she argues that Saudi women are allowed to participate in municipal elections and that are acting as senior officials and others that manage their own businesses (Jiffry, 2013).

While Iraqi News did not present any concrete analysis of the heteronormative society or question sites of contestation with regards to feminism, AJE is clearly positioning itself on the matter. When we searched for lesbian representations in AJE, most of the results were in relation with Sochi Olympic Games of 2014, as the debate was virulent on the topic. Nevertheless, the coverage of lesbians' rights in the Arab world was low: instead, the focus is on other countries mostly in Asia, Russia and the USA, suggesting that the problem is addressed from an international perspective while almost nothing is said on Arab lesbians. The keywords “Arab lesbians” presented only 2 results and the most relevant reportage on the subject was an article of photojournalism on the Mumbai gay pride parade, which included lesbian women in the pictures and their social demands.

Considering our topic, AJE's strength resides in its power to discuss gender and feminism, mostly because of the technology and budget it relies on: the coverage of what are considered “hot” topics in the Arab world is thus facilitated by the dynamism of its platform and its worldwide access.

In the post-9/11 political landscape, feminist ideals have been used to justify foreign intervention to “save” Muslim women behind rhetoric of a civilising mission presenting Islam as abject (Butler, 2009, pp. 129-30). AJE advocates for a revision of this perception with a critical confrontation between Western feminism and the representatives of a feminism that better encompasses the Muslim precepts and social realities of Arab countries. For instance, articles are focused on criticising the justification of war relying on women's rights in Afghanistan trying to portray women's participation in combating gender inequalities in their country: “[…] Afghan women also have been activists on their own behalf long before the US invaded […] determined to fight for their rights […]” (Eisenshtein, 2013).

Within this scenario, Al-Jazeera also challenges typical views on women liberation as is the case of one article questioning why “women are 'free' to undress, but not to dress up” (Petkova, 2013), calling for a more comprehensive approach to Muslim women's fight for their rights. Criticising FEMEN activists, this article refuses the idea of social confinement of Muslim women and affirms that they are socially engaged, having a long history of activism. These positions are “deviant” compared to Arab News for example, however, there is currently no investigation reporting the real access of Arab women to these challenging debates.

In the end, “it is hard to say that Al-Jazeera has a policy on representing women” as it definitely provokes massive debates but still “like many other broadcasters worldwide, is said to select female presenters on visual rather than intellectual criteria” (Sakr, 2002, p. 836). AJE is promoting a space for feminists confrontation contrarily to the other newspapers analysed where the debates on the topic are still embryonic. There are various articles in AJE discussing Arab women and Islamic Feminisms, mostly developed by the numerous newspaper columnists with the intention of restoring Muslim women's image and their longstanding social involvement, despite the overall submissive image in the media.