Introduction
In February 2015, The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) field office in Lebanon conducted a rapid needs assessment with Women Program Centers (WPCs) and Palestine refugee women in eight Palestinian refugee camps to identify capacity-building needs of community based organizations (CBOs) working with Palestine refugee communities in Lebanon. The needs assessment indicated the need to enhance the skills and knowledge of community workers and volunteers on gender-based violence (GBV) basic concepts and guiding principles for working with survivors and individuals at risk.
As identified in the needs assessment, key priorities for both the community-based organizations and community members were to improve understanding of gender-based violence and child protection issues and the need to increase knowledge for how to respond to those protection concerns in the community.
Heartland Alliance International (HAI) proposed the Developing Capacities, Strengthening Communities project, a nine-month initiative which seeks to strategically address the capacity and knowledge gaps among community workers and volunteers in community centres across eight Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon:
With this initiative, HAI and UNRWA aims to decrease the vulnerabilities of Palestine refugees living in refugee camps in Lebanon by improving community-based responses to better understand and address refugees’ protection needs. The manual is designed to strengthen key skills in safe identification and referral of GBV survivors and child protection as well as basic skills and core guiding principles for primary psychosocial support.
Furthermore, given the role of the community centres in delivering awareness activities and given their importance as advocates and agents for change in their communities, the manual includes specific components on communitybased GBV and child protection awareness and prevention programming in non-specialized settings, including the setup of community-based support groups for women at risk.
Who should use this manual?
This manual can be used by all individuals and organizations who are interested to learn about genderbased violence. It provides basic guidelines and support to non-specialized service providers, community workers and other frontline workers enabling them to understand signs and symptoms of GBV, safe and ethical referrals as well as basic principles for working with survivors that should be adhered to by all humanitarian workers.
When should this manual be used?
This manual was developed after a series of training and individual coaching sessions targeting community workers and volunteers and is intended to be used as a complimentary tool in supporting them in their day to day work with women and children in their community. This manual is best used as a reference point for non specialized community workers and volunteers seeking to understand and apply minimum standards for responding to and working with gender-based violence survivors.
How is this handbook organized?
The training manual is composed of four learning modules:
Chapter 1 sets the basic terminologies and definitions related to gender based violence
Chapter 2 highlights main issues of child protection with a particular focus on child survivors
Chapter 3 discusses psychosocial support and self-care for survivors and service providers
Chapter 4 defines methods and techniques for acquiring skills in facilitating GBV awareness activities.
In each chapter, examples, comparisons and important notes are provided to help readers better understand the concepts and ideas that are being presented.