We sat down with Lubaba Alahdab, CEO of the Syrian Women Association to learn about the impact of the earthquake and their experience of applying for a grant.
The Syrian Women Association is an NGO led by women. It was founded in 2006 in Amman, staffed by volunteers, to provide social, cultural, and educational services to the many Syrian women, girls, and children in Jordan. In 2015, the association was legally licensed in Türkiye and has offices in Antakya, Gaziantep and an office in northwest Syria. The Antakya office was destroyed when the building collapsed in the earthquake.
“Our projects in southern Turkey and northwestern Syria focus on protection of women and children, education, psychosocial support, early relief and recovery, and training and development. We target children of both sexes, women (including widows), the elderly and girls and women with disabilities. In emergencies we provide basic relief needs such as tents, food baskets, hygiene and heating baskets, heating fuel and blankets.
Education is a key component of our projects, from teaching the children in camps to read and write, to women’s vocational courses which support productive small projects, to making women aware of the law and their rights.
We applied for the Solidarity Fund as we needed to move fast after the earthquake, because we are a local organisation, so we know what needs to be done.
The grant we applied for is to provide psychosocial support to children and women who have survived not just the war in Syria but the earthquake and the terrible, continuing aftershocks which continue to this day.
There is a great need for psychosocial support among survivors, and if they do not get the necessary support now, they could develop PTSD.
We run courses and support groups to provide these services but sometimes the parents don’t want to send their daughters because of the stigma. Because psychosocial care is related to mental health, there is still a stigma around it.
Psychosocial care for children after the earthquake @SWA
Our experience of the Solidarity Fund was that it moved super-fast. From the time we applied online to the date we were awarded the grant was nine days, and then we received the funds two days later.
This fund is necessary because this funding is considered a humanitarian response to the earthquake that occurred on February 6. The importance of this response is that it is quick and effective, as it was able to meet the basic needs of those affected by the earthquake and mitigate the negative effects that occurred on them based on the approved humanitarian standards.
The project provides awareness sessions on gender-based violence for men and women, as violence increases within the family and in the community in cases of disasters, especially in collective shelters. Sessions were provided based on the standards of the gender-based violence sub-cluster and the adoption of the appropriate curriculum in cases of disasters and crises.
The project also focused on providing psychological first aid sessions to women and adolescent girls, as the earthquake caused panic and great fear. This is in addition to providing individual psychological counseling services to mitigate the negative psychological effects on those affected and so that they can continue their lives normally.
The project also provided for a kit to meet basic personal needs of women and girls, which we called the Rose Kit, which includes clothes and personal hygiene items.
Our feedback for the Solidarity Fund is the process was fast and efficient and the funds were able to reach the affected people quickly and effectively. The Fund also contributes to the localisation process by directly financing local organisations operating at the forefront in emergencies.
