Where we work

Barbed wire on the beach in Rafah, Gaza strip. Photo: Aida Alibegovic

Occupied Palestinian Territory (oPt)

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been at the centre of world politics for over 60 years. The 1967 war marked the beginning of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Since then life in the occupied Palestinian territory has been disrupted by Israeli military measures such as closures, road blocks, settlements and its related infrastructure, isolation of Palestinian areas and continued construction of the Separation Wall.

The economic volatility and dependence of Palestinians on international aid have grown rapidly bringing the Palestinian society to the brink of collapse. More than two thirds of the whole Palestinian population is unemployed and almost the same amount lives below the poverty line. Some of the most vulnerable parts of the society include children/youth, women, people with disabilities and refugees. Diakonia’s work in the occupied Palestinian territory therefore concentrates on addressing the lack of peace and security, increasing respect of human rights and eradicating the multidimensional aspects of poverty.

How we work in occupied Palestinian territory

Palestinian civil society is amongst the most developed in the Middle East region. Public institutions have only existed for about a decade, while the civil society has during many years fulfilled the role of a social services provider. In Palestine, Diakonia has been a donor and a partner for more than two decades gradually building up its role to an organizational developer, network creator and facilitator. Diakonia supports work carried out by local civil society organisations on three levels: on grass-roots level within local communities, on national level by publicly advocating for policy change and on regional level by facilitating networking amongst our partners. We have established partnerships with roughly 40 Palestinian and Israeli non-governmental organizations. Diakonia uses strategies of networking, promoting education and awareness raising on democratic values and human rights, self organisation and participation of marginalised groups in decision making.

What we and our partners do

Diakonia’s work in the occupied Palestinian territory (East Jerusalem, West Bank and Gaza strip) covers five thematic areas: gender, democracy, human rights, social and economic justice and peace and conflict transformation. The implementation of the five thematic areas is achieved through our country strategy which is divided into four sub programmes: the Rehabilitation Programme (RP), the Children’s Literature Programme (CL), the International Humanitarian Law Programme (IHL) and a programme supporting local civil society actors in their work in democracy and human rights. The RP programme is a national programme that uses a community based, rights based approach to support the disabled to change the structures in order to empower them to be integrated in their community. The CL programme started with distribution of children’s books translated from Swedish to Arabic and is now a national programme that includes partnerships with the ministries of culture and of education as well as civil society organization and promotion and training of local writers/illustrators, teachers and librarians. The aim of the IHL programme is to, through information spreading, education, monitoring and advocating for IHL, increase respect and further implement international humanitarian law in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory. Diakonia also supports local civil society organizations focusing on Palestinian children and youth in areas such as gender equality, non-violent conflict resolution, religious dialogue, human rights, and social and economic justice.