#ImFromGaza a Retrospective & Looking Forward

June 06, 2013

What is #ImFromGaza

When the latest war in Gaza began last November, the Al Fakhoora students and team were left wondering what could be done to get the students more involved; for a number of reasons, initially to get them active and put the skills they had been learning in the Virtual Majlis over the past year to the test.  Alongside that, it had to be tried to add a student voice to the global conversation, and see if it would be picked up and contribute a new perspective to a problem that is weighed down by old perspectives.

A strategy was put together with students in Gaza, the US and the Fakhoora team in Qatar.  The basis of the strategy was to develop a platform, and have the students populate that platform with interesting information about their lives during the conflict, what they were seeing, how they were feeling, what they and their families would do while their city was being bombarded to remain safe, calm and alive.   

A trip to Gaza weeks earlier had produced a video as part of a practical experiential learning exercise with eight student leaders, which was in the process of being edited at the time. The video was about stereotypes and it became the theme of ImFromGaza; ending stereotypes by showing the world what the youth of Gaza are really like.  The video picked up thousands of views in just a few days and the response was amazing, with messages of support from around the world across all the social networks. 

Advocacy on video
 

After the cease-fire had been agreed to and things calmed down in Gaza, the Al Fakhoora TAs were able to put together a series of three videos describing where they were as the war began and their experience during the attacks. The video served a double purpose of providing a different perspective against the existing stereotypes of people in Gaza and also as a chance for our students to speak out and reflect after the traumatic experience they had lived through. The videos continued to add to the success of #ImFromGaza and received thousands more views since being posted in December 2012. 

Ongoing vision for #ImFromGaza

#ImFromGaza isn’t for everybody, but neither are the same old arguments and discussions around the Palestinian issue. The investment in youth has to go beyond building materials and scholarships if there is to be prosperity; and if there is to be peace, then it is the investment in youth that is going to bring about new solutions and ways of thinking to old problems.   In the future, #ImFromGaza aims to continue to be a platform for student generated content that will come from their participation in our advocacy program and relevant social media and advocacy. We will also be working with the students to hand over management of the page, content and conversations themselves, with guidance and oversight from PSU and Al Fakhoora to help them with the difficult conversations or issues that may appear. This will give them a chance to express themselves using the advocacy and communications skills they have developed being part of the Al Fakhoora program.   Beyond that, building ImFromGaza into a source for a student voice on issues in and outside Palestine, and a platform that allows students in Gaza to express themselves, exchange ideas and have discussions with people around the world.  

For more information on #ImFromGaza and how you can support it, check out the links:

www.fakhoora.org/imfromgaza

www.facebook.com/imfromgaza

http://bit.ly/imfromgaza