Gaza - Community Media and Development Center - May 2023

The Community Media and Development Center (CDMC) inaugurated the activities of the project “Guiding the community towards digital safe spaces by promoting digital literacy in the Gaza Strip,” which it is implementing in partnership with CCFD. The project aims to combat all forms of electronic violence based on gender, in addition to promoting awareness about the safe use of social media platforms.

Andalib Adwan, Director of the Community Media and Development Center (CDMC), (formerly the Community Media Center - CMC), said, “For years, we have been adopting in our work to spread and promote a culture of digital safety among groups and individuals of society in the Gaza Strip, and at every stage we work with a different group, we develop our directions and tools according to the needs of groups, official studies, and developments in the digital space.”

Adwan added, “During previous years, we have contributed to developing the capabilities of dozens of media professionals, lawyers, and activists of both sexes, and they are now leading the process of raising digital awareness among a large audience of men and women in marginalized areas, youth of both sexes, university students, the elderly, in addition to children and adolescents.” In all governorates of the Gaza Strip, in addition to launching media and digital awareness campaigns, during which we produced many digital materials through which we tried to reflect our experience in field work with different groups and meet their knowledge and skill needs.

While the Community Media and Development Center (CDMC) worked this year to expand the targeting circle with the aim of enhancing knowledge and digital awareness among parents, specialized teachers and psychological counsellors of both sexes in the schools of the Ministry of Education and private schools, in addition to continuing to work with school students and adolescents, The Center for Development and Community Media (CDMC) is actively working to provide all groups with the necessary knowledge and skills to enhance their safe behavior in using the internet.

The Community Media and Development Center (CDMC) began holding a series of orientation sessions with the participation of facilitators of awareness workshops on digital security who contributed to the process of raising digital awareness among school and university students during the past two years. They are media professionals and lawyers of both sexes who participated in the two digital security projects. During the years 2021 and 2022, they were trained and developed in everything related to digital security and privacy protection on the Internet.

In parallel, the Community Media and Development Center (CDMC) implemented three awareness workshops on the concepts of digital security and cybercrime and prevention, in cooperation with 3 schools, with the participation of middle and high school students, and is preparing to complete the implementation of dozens of workshops in all governorates of the Gaza Strip.

In addition, the Community Media and Development Center (CDMC) is preparing to hold two specialized trainings on safe digital space, with the participation of a group of parents, and a group of teachers and psychological counselors of both sexes working in the schools of all principals of education in the Gaza Strip.

In addition to the above, the Community Media and Development Center (CDMC) will make available and distribute hundreds of printed copies of the Digital Safety Guide to parents, technology teachers and psychological counselors during the digital safety trainings they will receive, in addition to distributing it to secondary school students during awareness workshops which will be completed in the coming period.

The Community Media and Development Center (CMC) will continue its endeavor to establish a culture of digital safety, improve ways of prevention and protection from cybercrime among all segments of society, involve all actors, and invest all available opportunities and resources, in order to reach a safe digital environment in which everyone enjoys safety, freedom and privacy without Exposure to any violation or feeling of censorship.

It is noteworthy that the Development and Media Center (CDMC) is a development and media institution that invests and employs the media as a platform for democratic discourse, advocacy for human rights and citizenship, and the promotion of social justice, freedom and prosperity.