As AVSI we express our sorrow for all the victims and great concern about the war that has broken out in Palestine and Israel, where we have been working since 1993 with development cooperation projects, particularly in education, protection, health and economic development.
Our staff in the field are safe and well. So are the children within our Distance Support program: today, classes have just started back up remotely.
We are monitoring the situation hour by hour, as it evolves, in Bethlehem, Jerusalem and throughout the West Bank, where our projects are ongoing, and we are on high alert throughout the Middle Eastern Region (AVSI has offices and projects in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Iraq) to ensure maximum safety for our staff and beneficiaries.
As we always do in emergency situations, we will assess whether to continue implementing our projects or suspend them until it is possible to resume all activities, and we will keep our network of supporters and friends informed through our channels.
This new, extremely serious crisis further renews our trust in our mission and conviction that our development interventions are essential for peace-building, now more than ever that peace appears to be increasingly fragile.