A series of intensive capacity-building training sessions were conducted under Terre des hommes (Tdh) Lausanne’s recently launched protection project for partners’ psychologists and Community-Based Organisations’ (CBOs) volunteers in Jerusalem and West Bank, in cooperation with Stars of Hope Society (SHS).
Twenty-four people from the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA) Jerusalem, Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA) Palestine and SHS attended 92 hours of face-to-face and online sessions for 23 days in June. The overall training equipped the attending partners’ staff and volunteers with knowledge and skills to work with children and women affected by violence, where different mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) and gender-based violence (GBV) participatory tools and methodologies were introduced and adapted to ensure disability inclusion.
Tdh staff facilitated the training on different topics, including psychological first aid (PFA), structured MHPSS sessions for children, support group sessions for GBV survivors, case management, safeguarding and protection from sexual exploitation and abuse (PSEA), monitoring and reporting, visibility and communication and others. Whereas SHS facilitated four days of training sessions on disability mainstreaming.
Psychologists and volunteers were equipped with necessary information; enabling them to differentiate between key terminologies related to mental health psychosocial and gender as well as identify behavioral indicators related to different forms of child abuse and GBV and create gender-inclusive safe spaces.
The ‘Sindyan’ project, which started in April 2022, has been generously funded through the oPt HF. It aims at strengthening community-based mechanisms in performing inclusive preventative and responsive child protection and GBV services for children and adults in nine communities located in East Jerusalem, areas ‘C’ in Ramallah and Tubas, especially for people with disabilities.
Tdh is the leading Swiss organization for children’s aid. In 2021, it supported two million children and members of their communities around the world with a focus on mother and child health, migration and access to justice for children. It trained people who in turn supported a further 3.1 million children and members of their communities.
Source: Palestine News & Info Agency