The Center for Women’s Legal Researches, Counselling and Protection (CWLRCP) – the “Hayat Center Project for the Protection and Empowerment of Women and Families” – held a meeting today entitled “Strengthening Community Partnership and Activating Referral Services,” with the aim of providing integrated services to women in need of additional assistance that can be provided by specialized institutions. This meeting is part of the activities of the project “Improving Comprehensive Protection Services for Women and Girls in Conflict-Affected Areas in the Gaza Strip,” implemented in partnership with UN Women and funded by the Government of Japan.
The meeting was opened by Ms. Zeinab Al-Ghoneimi, who welcomed the attendees, including directors and representatives of partner institutions. She spoke about the importance of this meeting, emphasizing that the referral system between institutions with different specializations helps to provide integrated services to women survivors of violence. She stated: “Although there is a partnership between institutions, the referral system is beyond the existing coordination work between partner institutions to provide services. In the referral system, each institution complements the role of other institutions to provide the services that women need (legal, social, psychological, health, and economic).”
She explained that the referral system benefits the partner institutions in the system, as it ensures the continuity of services provided by the institutions after the end of the funded project. She praised the role of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) in activating referral services and considered that it would help to strengthen the partnership between institutions.
Ms. Mariam Zaqout, Director General of the Culture and Free Thought Association, spoke about the importance of partnership between institutions, due to the inability of a single institution to provide specialized services to women in light of these difficult social, political, and economic conditions. She affirmed that, as an institution, they still aspire to achieve the highest level of partnership with the Hayat Center Project, which provides quality services to women. She also said that all institutions should push to activate the shelter section within the Center.
In a speech on behalf of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), Ms. Amira Muhanna spoke about the NRC’s experience with the referral and case management system, and the evaluation of case management and referral systems in the Gaza Strip. She explained that the Council is working to reach an approved model for referral and registration of cases in partner institutions, which will subsequently be followed, and will benefit these institutions in their work and specialization.
In their interventions, the institutions emphasized the importance of the partnership experience with the Center for Women’s Legal Researches, Counselling and Protection (CWLRCP), and that it is a positive experience that needs to be developed and generalized among all institutions.
At the end of the meeting, certificates of cooperation agreements were distributed to the partner institutions.
