We are looking for initiatives that strengthen Palestinian resilience and dialogue in political, economic and social sectors.

Introduction

The Resilience Challenge encourages people to develop and share their ideas on how to strengthen Palestinian resilience in the political, social and economic sectors. The Challenge aims to inspire new approaches to strengthen the resilience of different Palestinian communities and to provide a platform for cooperation.

Through the Challenge, and together with the participants, we want to:

• Stimulate innovative, locally-driven, concrete ideas to strengthen Palestinian resilience;
• Build new partnerships, bring in new actors, and nurture a new, more unified generation of Palestinians.
• Support unity by challenging the prolonged internal division and the unrepresentative political structures, the isolation of the Gaza Strip and the fragmentation of Palestinian communities.

Our definition of resilience is decent life in context of struggle for freedom and independence. With this we refer to the Palestinians' ability to develop long-term strategies that would ensure better ability to withstand internal and external shocks and to improve their future.

The Resilience Challenge offers the following:

• Develops participants' skills to increase impact.
• Makes their work visible.
• Supports collaboration and networking with peers and experts.

The qualified teams with most potential ideas will be selected to receive support and mentoring to further develop their idea. An online training camp will be organized at the national level, and three most potential ideas will receive a budget to implement the initiatives.

A total amount of 15,000 euros will be shared to support the implementation of the three most promising initiatives.

                                                           Timeline:

Eligibility criteria for participation:

• The team should consist of 3-6 individuals, who represent more than one of the Palestinian communities (West Bank, Gaza Strip, Diaspora, and 1948).
• Teams should include both male and female participants.
• The idea takes into account the criteria for innovation, inclusiveness, collaboration, scalability and potential for impact.
• The submission can be an idea that you would like to implement, or an initiative that you have already tested in practice but would like to improve.
• The teams must identify a contact person from within the team, whose email address is to be used for all notifications and announcements related to the Challenge.
• Youth’s participation is highly encouraged.
• Participation in the Challenge implies that the team, including every team member, fully accepts the terms of the challenge.

Applications will be evaluated by a panel of experts.

Initiatives’ Topics:

We are looking for initiatives that aim to strengthen Palestinian resilience in political, social and economic sectors. Your idea can address the challenge in any way you want. It can aim to tackle for example one of the following challenges:

Political:

• Achieving free elections that enhance national resilience.
• Contributing to the development of national unity, to prevent the division from turning into secession.
• Functioning political institutions; representativeness of political process
• Supporting national, regional and/or international efforts to combat settler colonialism and protecting Palestinian rights.
• Defending the rights of Palestinian refugees.
• Support the Palestinian people in the 48 lands.

Social:

• Strengthening the inclusive identity of all Palestinians and protecting it from fragmentation.
• Protecting grassroots institutions and promoting their democratization.
• Strengthening communication and joint action between the different Palestinian communities.
• Enhancing the historical narrative and protecting it from fading and distortion.

Economic:

• Initiatives that enhance economic resilience and self-reliance.
• Economic empowerment of the citizens and the society.
• Enhancing the response to the ongoing economic emergency.
• Activating the role of the private sector to play a role in economic development.

Other ideas within the political, economic and social sectors can also be suggested.
Terms of the Resilience Challenge, and more information on entering the Challenge can be found here: https://somoud.ps/post/RESILIENCE-CHALLENGE