JENIN REFUGEE CAMP

Jenin camp was established in 1953, within the municipal boundaries of Jenin on 373 dunums. Most of the camp's residents came from villages which can be seen from the camp and which today lie beyond the Green Line inside Israel. Many of the refugees still maintain close ties with their relatives in those villages.

While camp residents find employment in the agricultural sector around Jenin, many are still dependant on work inside Israel.

After the redeployment of the Israeli army in 1995, the camp came under Palestinian Authority control.

In the early hours of 3 April 2002, as part of Operation Defensive Shield, the Israeli Defence Forces entered the city of Jenin and the refugee camp adjacent to it, declared them a closed military area, prevented all access, and imposed a round-the-clock curfew. By the time of the IDF withdrawal and the lifting of the curfew on 18 April, at least 52 Palestinians, of whom up to half may have been civilians, and 23 Israeli soldiers were dead. Many more were injured. Approximately 150 buildings had been destroyed and many others were rendered structurally unsound. Around 435 families were rendered homeless.

The fighting lasted approximately 10 days and was characterized by two distinct phases: the first phase began on 3 April and ended on 9 April, while the second phase lasted during 10 and 11 April. Most of the deaths on both sides occurred in the first phase but it would appear that much of the physical damage was done in the second.

As the fighting began to subside, ambulances and medical personnel were prevented by IDF from reaching the wounded within the camp, despite repeated requests to IDF to facilitate access for ambulances and humanitarian delegates, including those of the United Nations. From 11 to 15 April, United Nations and other humanitarian agencies petitioned and negotiated for access to the camp with IDF and made many attempts to send in convoys, to no avail. At IDF headquarters on 12 April, United Nations officials were told that United Nations humanitarian staff would be given access to the affected population. However, such access did not materialize on the ground, and several more days of negotiations with senior IDF officials and personnel of the Israeli Ministry of Defence did not produce the necessary access despite assurances to the contrary. On 18 April, senior United Nations officials criticized Israel for its handling of humanitarian access in the aftermath of the battle and, in particular, its refusal to facilitate full and safe access to the affected populations in violation of its obligations under international humanitarian law.

UNRWA mounted a large operation to deliver food and medical supplies to needy refugees who had fled the camp and to Jenin hospital but was not allowed to enter the camp until April 15, 12 days after the start of the military operation. UNRWA relief teams immediately began distributing water, food, blankets and kitchen kits to the needy. With assistance from the Government of Sweden UNRWA set about making the camp population safe from the many hundreds of items of unexploded ordnance, both Palestinian and Israeli, that littered the camp. The Agency also distributed cash assistance to those who had lost their homes and needed to rent temporary accommodation.

For more detail on the events of 3-15 April 2002, see the Secretary General’s Report on the fighting at http://www.un.org/peace/jenin/

In July 2002 UNRWA and the United Arab Emirates Red Crescent Society signed an agreement whereby the UAE would donate $27 million for UNRWA to reconstruct the centre of the camp and re-house all of those made homeless. With this donation the Jenin Rehabilitation Project was created to build 435 new homes, repair around 1,500 that had been damaged and to rebuild community infrastructure in the camp.

The Jenin Rehabilitation Project suffered a number of major difficulties because of the extremely tense situation in Jenin. There were regular Israeli military incursions into the camp, including one in November 2002 when Iain Hook, the project’s British manager was shot and killed by an Israeli sniper while in the UNRWA compound in the camp. Repeated curfews prevented work taking place and closures on the camp repeatedly halted the transport of building supplies. Work was also stopped because of threats to the security of the project team by Palestinian armed groups.

Throughout the project UNRWA worked with the beneficiary families in the camp through a project committee to ensure that their views were heard and that community disputes were equitably settled. Dialogue with the refugees was particularly important because of the decision, on the grounds of health and urban planning best-practice, not to rebuild the camp in its original, over-crowded state. New land was purchased by the UAE outside of the existing camp for some of the new shelters and to enable wider streets and more space to be created in the camp.

Despite the difficulties, the Jenin rehabilitation project is due to be completed in October 2004.

photos from Jenin camp, April 2002

FACTS AND FIGURES

• Registered Refugee Population: 15,496.
• Special hardship cases: 392 families.
• Number of families receiving emergency food rations: 2205
• Number of pupils: Male: 1487, female: 1343
• Construction works in the camp were concluded in October 2004. Houses were handed over to the beneficiaries in the presence of H.E Khalifa Nasser Alswaidi, Chairman of the UAE Red Crescent Society and UNRWA Commissioner General Mr. Peter Hansen.
• A new school consisted of 24 class rooms was constructed.
• Number of refugees benefiting from emergency employment program: 130