The “Emergency Project for victims of the clashes in October 2000” of the Gaza community Mental Health Programme was designed during the first days of the Al Aqsa Intifada. Its aim is to enable the direct and indirect victims to cope with their traumatic experiences and their physical injuries and the psychosocial effects. International donors like UNICEF, UNDP, NORAD and the Heinrich Boell foundation from Germany gave their support to finance the additional staff, medications and equipment needed to respond to the high demands of psychosocial support.

In the current war like situation people have been traumatized in many different ways. Traumatic experience range from being injured to witnessing killings and injuries of relatives and friends, loosing family members or close friends and being shocked from the affects of the shelling from Israeli helicopters and the destruction of homes especially in areas closed to Israeli settlements. For the Gaza population, who has undergone decades of stress and trauma and is therefore particularly vulnerable for mental health disturbances, these events represent also an ongoing trauma similar to the previous Intifadah but worse in its intensity to the years of the Intifadah and not only a traumatizing situation.

The victims need to be supported and treated to alleviate the psychological pressure caused by the current political and socio-economic situation. Those, who suffer from mental health disorders like anxiety, acute stress disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, depression or panic attacks etc. need professional help as well as help from their families and of the community. Through home visits and public meetings we try to strengthen the ability of the families to cope and to give the necessary social support to the victims.

Since the very first days of the Al Aqsa Intifadah our psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses and social workers have been visiting the injured in the hospitals and their families in their homes as well as many families living in the areas which were affected by the shelling for a first debriefing of the victims and to offer psychological and social support. These visits help to identify the victims, who need a longer-term treatment through counseling, psychotherapy, physiotherapy etc. , the visits also strengthen our relationship with the community and help people to overcome their stigma towards mental illness.

Mostly affected because most vulnerable are the children. Therefore our staff gives extra attention to detect the children suffering from stress and trauma. One way to find these children are regular school visits during which teachers are informed of the symptoms of PTSD to be able to detect the children with psychological problems in their schools. Needed children receive then special treatment through individual behavioral psychotherapy, play therapy and family therapy.

In early November a free tall emergency hotline operating 12 hours per day started to operate. This gives people the opportunity to contact us in an anonymous way and consult our counselors about issues like how to deal with their children during this war like situation, how to cope with their own anxiety and fear etc. This service is announced in radio and newspapers and is already now widely used especially from people who cannot access any of our clinics like in areas which are temporary closed of in the south of the Gaza Strip and in areas of the West Bank. {link to Hotline articles}

An important aspect in the execution of the project is the cooperation with other NGOs dealing with Crisis Intervention. All these NGO’s involved, founded a committee to secure that psychosocial support is given in all areas of the Gaza Strip and focuse on raising public awareness on issues of mental health.