Ibn Sina Society to Promote Education and Health in Arrabe

GOALS
Arrabe, near Sakhnin, has a population of approximately 19,500. The only services provided by the local council, which is on the verge of collapse, are those that can operate by inertia. But this past year even garbage collection was interrupted for several months because the council had not paid the contractor's bill. In this situation, civic organization is the only hope for developing the community and establishing youth clubs, women's clubs, etc.

Abu Sina (named for the pre-Islamic Arab philosopher and physician) was established in 2001 to coordinate community activity in the town and develop local leadership. The organization offers reinforcement courses for high-school pupils in English, mathematics, music lessons and prepares them for university entrance exams. In addition, the organization works to empower the local parents' committees and runs a women's group, managed by its members, designed to empower women.

ACTIVITIES IN 2006

• The women's group organized by the amuta continued to meet once every two weeks (rather than once a week as it did last year). The group grew to 40 women, from 25 last year. Some of the lectures were organized with assistance from Kayan (an NIF grantee). Among other topics, lectures were devoted to the consequences of the second Lebanon War and consultations with psychologists about how to deal with problems that children were having as a result.
• With the encouragement of the women's group, seven of its members (up from only one last year) joined school parents' committees. They are coordinating among themselves and consulting with the group about their committee activities.
• The Society continued to provide close guidance to 3 of the parents' committees (of the 8 in the town) with regard to their activities, rights, and possible modes of operation. A representative of the Society continued to sit on the municipal steering committee on education. The Society also continued to forward to all of the parents' committees information about budgets available from the local authority and possible ways to make use of them.
•  The Society joined an initiative by local residents and other groups in the region to file a petition with the High Court of Justice against the local authority for its failure to collect trash in the town. (Garbage collection had been suspended because the local council did not pay the contractor's bill.) The Society also took part in a demonstration organized by environmental activists to protest the fact that, as a result of the municipality's dysfunction, residents were taking their trash to an improvised garbage dump and leaving it there at random or burning it. This practice was injurious to neighboring localities and sometimes posed a safety hazard on the adjacent road. Thanks to the campaign, after about two months a budget was found to pay the contractor, making it unnecessary to actually file the petition.
• Once every two months the Society held a general meeting for approximately 100 residents, to discuss various items on the current agenda.

Other activities

• For legal reasons the Society was unable to exercise the tender it had won to run a Multidisciplinary Support Center (meitar) for the Ministry of Social Affairs, intended to provide a full-day program for children who have dropped out of other programs. Instead, it continues to operate a project to keep children from dropping out of school.
• Since its founding, the Society ran a center to provide health-care services. About two years ago it decided to transfer management of the clinic to a private management company in return for a fixed fee. In the wake of disagreements with the company it decided to stop working with it. Since then the company has operated the clinic with no connection to Ibn Sina.