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forumZFD [dot] de Palestine: Conflict sensitive capacity building in Jericho and the Jordan Valley
Enhancement of the role of civil society actors
The situation:
The town of Jericho is located in the Jordan Valley, which makes up the fertile Eastern strip of the West Bank. Out of strategic and economic considerations Israel limits or forbids Palestinian access to more than 90% of the land in the valley. This threatens the original agricultural and semi nomadic based livelihood of the local Palestinian population.
Most of the villages in the valley are situated in Area-C (completely controlled by the Israeli military administration) and suffer from limited access to governmental services as electricity, running water or educational institutions. At the same time building permits are extremely rare, which has a devastating effect on the housing situation and the general infrastructure.
The Palestinian National Authority is prevented to provide such services outside the small areas designated as Area-A and B. These extreme conditions combined create a situation of instability and tension in the valley as a whole. Even though the density of foreign NGOs per capita in the Westbank is one of the highest in the world, parts of the valley are completely void of international presence and even in the parts which are Area-A like Jericho, just a few international organisations work on a daily basis.
What we are doing:
The forumZFD Jericho team trains NGOs and local authorities in Jericho and the Jordan Valley in a conflict sensitive project design (Do No Harm). The goal is to reduce social friction and to ease latent internal conflicts within the Palestinian community. This contributes to a stronger Palestinian civil society in the structurally deprived Jordan Valley.
Putting the results of a need analysis in Jericho and the Jordan Valley into context, the forumZFD decided to enhance awareness for the negative and positive effects projects might have on their surrounding and to aim for a redesign.
While a project often reaches it's specific goals and thus manages to create the envisioned change, the same project might have unintended negative side effects. To avoid these possible negative impacts for the project's surrounding and the people living within, representatives from the civil society and local administration will be trained in the Do No Harm-Approach (see www.donoharm.info). By using this simple yet effective framework the persons commissioned with the planning of projects in the community are enabled to organise the existing information in a transparent and systemic way and thus can detect side effects more easily from the start.
In Jericho city different parts of Palestinian society, for example refugees, Bedouins, newcomers and original residents, live together. One example of a local conflict situation which could be mitigated by Do No Harm is the following: A local NGO offers afternoon homeworkassistance and extra-curriculum services for free to pupils from Jericho. The main assumption of their work is that “education reduces poverty” and increases opportunities for future generation. Due to their cooperation with teachers only from certain schools in Jericho, kids from the nearby two refugee camps as well the adjacent Bedouin communities are unintentionally excluded from all the activities. This keeps existing frictions alive and might increase future tensions between different groups. A proper Do No Harm check could include other groups in the offered activities and could try to overcome latent conflict lines.
How we work:
In tailored training workshops for conflict sensitive project design the representatives from the civil society and local administration will be equipped with the understanding and the methods of the framework. During a follow-up period they are coached to use it's methods during their planning and monitoring and to pass on their knowledge inside their organisations, to reach a higher degree of effectiveness in their work.
Project Goals:
One central aim is to consider all possible actors influenced by a project. Through this step existing or possible future tension between groups in the vicinity of the project might be identified and through a redesign of the project avoided. To reduce inner-Palestinian tension and to avoid internal conflicts bears specific validity in the Jordan Valley, which suffers greatly under the current political situation. To spread inclusive concepts as the Do No Harm-Framework might also foster the communication in between different Palestinian groups as refugees, Bedouins, newcomers and original residents. Herewith the forumZFD contributes to empower society in Jericho and the Jordan Valley.
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