The COVID-19 crisis is particularly challenging for Palestinian women. Kayan is empowering grassroots Palestinian women leaders to respond to community needs. In a full needs assessment, the grassroots leaders decided it was critical to support women, especially single mothers and domestic, informal workers, with basic supplies (food, medicine, and hygienic products), emotional support, and connections to critical resources like domestic violence protection, and economic support services.
The economic uncertainty and home confinement due to the crisis are leading to more violence and disproportionate financial problems for Palestinian women, as they already suffer from systemic inequalities both as women and a minority. Palestinian women, especially domestic workers and single mothers who were already operating on tight budgets, are struggling to take care of their households with fewer resources. Please support these grassroots women leaders as they rise to meet the challenge.
Kayan's network of women leaders is mobilizing around the crisis. They worked intensively to develop this project to meet the needs of 10 Palestinian localities in Israel. The grassroots women's groups are working to deliver packages of critical supplies (food, medicine, and hygienic products) to single mothers, domestic workers, and vulnerable women in the community. This effort is accompanied by extensive support, including informing women of Kayan's expanded hotline support service.
The best way to respond to a crisis is to base the response in long-term grassroots work. These women leaders have been building relationships within their community and with local government long before the crisis and will continue after. They are using all their acquired skills, connections, and integration into decision-making roles to support other local women. This project also addressess the disproportionate violence and discrimination that Palestinian women face, not just now but always.
