51猎奇

14 August 2025

Introduction:

The year 2024 was marked by severe emergencies leading to significant casualties and widespread displacement of populations. This presented unprecedented challenges for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and its Social Services Division (SSD). In the Gaza Strip, continuous war and tight siege resulted in the mass destruction of residential buildings and public infrastructure, shortage in medical, food and other basic supplies, causing numerous civilian casualties, dire living conditions and displacing hundreds of thousands of people. The occupied West Bank faced intensified military operations, leading to increased displacement and trauma among the population; Lebanon faced military attacks resulting in population displacement, while Syria continued to face economic collapse in addition to the influx of refugees from Lebanon; and in Jordan, the economic strain exacerbated the vulnerability of populations. Those adverse conditions further strained the already fragile social systems in the fields of operation.

These crises led to an increase in protection risks for vulnerable populations especially children, women, older people and persons with disabilities (PWD). The need for scaled social work interventions and protection case management became more urgent than ever, as UNRWA and other humanitarian organisations worked tirelessly to provide essential services and support to those affected. In the Gaza Strip and most fields, the ongoing conflicts and severe humanitarian crises necessitated an intensified focus on emergency response, protection and psychosocial support.

The Social Work interventions in 2024 were marked by a significant scaling to meet these growing needs. The SSD expanded its case management, child protection, gender-based violence prevention, and psychosocial support programmes across all affected fields. Despite the challenging context, UNRWA’s dedicated social workers remained at the forefront, providing essential services to Palestine Refugees and striving to ensure their well-being and dignity.

During the reporting period, there were a total of 14,026 direct individual beneficiaries across all UNRWA fields of operation, 7543 females and 6483 males (compared to a total of 5,839 beneficiaries in 2023).

This report outlines the main achievements of the Social Services Division (SSD) during 2024, including social workforce professionalisation, social work interventions through case management and psychosocial support (PSS) across the five fields, community engagement, partnership development, disability inclusion and gender mainstreaming initiatives, and the roll-out of version two of Primero, the protection case management information system. The report concludes with the key challenges and opportunities for the SSD and an annex on testimonials by the social worker.

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The way forward:

The SSD will continue to institutionalise and solidify the approaches to social work interventions.

Internal review exercise:

The Agency is finalising the report on the internal review exercise of the social work reform which was conducted in 2024. It examined various aspects of the current social services structure. The report will feed into a reflection workshop with the GIZ, the donor of the social work reform, planned in 2025.

Case management data and trend analysis:

UNRWA is analysing the data in Primero on protection risks addressed by the social work teams and comprehending risk patterns and population coping trends to better align programmes and interventions to population’ needs.

Strengthening community engagement:

The Community Engagement Framework drafted in 2024 will be finalised in the coming year followed by the capacity building of the social workforce on the framework. This will introduce staff to an inclusive communitybased approach embedded within the contextual reality of the five fields and on key concepts on inclusion of youth, sensitivity towards persons with disabilities and genders. The training will equip them with tools to use in their engagement with these communities.

Referral workshop:

Strengthening inter-departmental referral mechanisms remains an area of priority to the SSD to ensure integrated and holistic response to the refugees’ complex needs. A referral workshop with the Health, Education and Protection departments is planned for 2025.

The referral coordination workshop was postponed due to the emergencies in the Gaza Strip, the occupied West Bank, Lebanon, and Syria and will be held in 2025 bringing together UNRWA programmes to strengthen internal referral processes. The workshop will also clarify the approach to case management as a result of the social work reform and put forward actions to better implementation of referrals across programmes at field level.

Accountability to affected population:

The SSD will continue with the annual satisfaction survey together with other feedback mechanisms to monitor accountability to Palestine Refugees benefiting from social work interventions.