Preventing Gender-based Violence in South Sudan

In the last few months, the IsraAID team in South Sudan has continued their training of 'community focal points'.

Focal points include a selection of local community representatives, who represent various groups, such as women or youth. Once fully trained, the focal points will play a significant role in supporting their communities.

In addition to specific training courses, focal points meet weekly with IsraAID’s social workers and protection staff, to identify best practices, discuss challenges encountered in the communities and explore solutions.

These particular training sessions focused on how to create and run Child Friendly Spaces (CFS). CFSs are typically used during emergencies, as a temporary space to ensure the care and protection of children, especially when educational frameworks have temporarily ceased. During the three-day training, the groups discussed - understanding causes of distress in children; the role of the focal points; plus, activities and games that can be used to provide psycho-social support.

By the end of the summer. IsraAID had trained 94 such focal points in Juba alone, and 240 more across three states in South Sudan. 

Strengthening communities at home and promoting their protection is a key part of our regional crisis response in East Africa. 

In South Sudan, IsraAID's team accompanies government and civil society social workers, police, as well as local community mobilizers, as they build community-based prevention and response mechanisms to fight gender-based violence.

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