HOPING stands for Hope and Optimism for Palestinians in the Next Generation. This generation will be the key to peace, and supporting Palestinian children is a real catalyst for change. Young Palestinian refugees need the simple chances and ordinary possibilities that can offer them creative solutions to their lives. The most important thing we can do is to help generate these possibilities, giving them a belief in the promise of a better future. We want to show young Palestinians that their struggle to transform their lives is encouraged and supported by the people in Britain and throughout the rest of the world. 

At Hoping we provide grants to grassroots community associations working in the refugee camps.  Our application procedure ensures that it is the Palestinians themselves who identify their needs and design the activities we support.  We work closely with local Palestinian volunteers in the refugee camps, particularly through the Youth Activity Centres which are the heart of the camp communities. The projects we are asked to support give these children the rare opportunity to play and express themselves through art, photography, film, music, theatre, dance and sport.

Who are the Palestinian Refugees?

Palestinians are the world's largest refugee population, and comprise over a third of all refugees worldwide. Many of those living in the refugee camps are now third and fourth generation refugees.

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled or were forced to leave their homes in 1948 when Israel was created, and again in 1967 during the six day war. At first families lived in tents; they did not plan to stay long, expecting to be able to return to their homes, towns, farms and villages. Today they are still living in the same refugee camps waiting for a solution to the conflict, their lives on hold, caught in terrible circumstances.

There are currently over 8 million Palestinian refugees worldwide. More than half of them are children under age of 15, whose parents and grandparents were born in the refugee camps. The majority of Palestinian refugee children live difficult and harsh lives, facing the realities of continued Israeli occupation, the trauma of war, severe overcrowding, unemployment, and reliance on international handouts.

Where do the refugees live?

A third of Palestinian refugees that are registered with UNRWA live in 59 refugee camps in Jordon, Lebanon, Syria, Gaza, and the West Bank.

The facilities in these refugee camps are administrated by UNRWA (the United Nations Relief and Works Agency) with which Hoping has a special affiliation through our Hoping for UNRWA association. The rest live in and around the cities and towns of the Arab host countries and in the occupied Palestinian territories, often in the environs of the refugee camps.

Conscious of the fact that the majority of Palestinian refugees reside throughout the Middle East, Hoping supports activities and projects for young Palestinian refugees wherever they live, in the West Bank and Gaza as well as Syria, Lebanon. Jordan, Iraq and further afield.

Quilliam is the world’s first counter-extremism think tank set up to address the unique challenges of citizenship, identity, and belonging in a globalised world. Quilliam stands for religious freedom, human rights, democracy and developing a Muslim identity at home in, and with, the West.

Extremism, a prelude to terrorism, cannot be contained by Muslims alone. Not least because religious rigidity and extremism are products of the failures of wider society to foster a shared sense of belonging and to advance liberal democratic values among all sections of society. That said, we believe a more self-critical approach must be adopted by Muslim leaders to free communities from Westophobic ideological influences, escape social insularity and facilitate the organic growth of Western Islam.

Quilliam seeks to challenge what we think, and the way we think. It aims to generate creative thought paradigms through informed and inclusive discussion to counter the Islamist ideology behind terrorism, whilst simultaneously providing evidence-based recommendations to governments for related policy measures.

Quilliam was named after Shaikh William Henry Abdullah Quilliam in order to strengthen British Muslim identity which, whilst being faithful to the basic tenets of Islam, takes into account a British context and seeks to find harmony between being British and being Muslim. Having said that, Quilliam is not a religious organisation. Rather, we seek to address issues of citizenship, identity, and belonging, which are matters that are currently pertinent to Muslims in the West.

Shaikh William Henry Abdullah Quilliam (1856-1932) was a native Englishman, a solicitor, from Liverpool, England, who was a Muslim by choice. He and many of his contemporaries embraced Islam voluntarily and established Britain’s first mosque in Liverpool, now a national heritage site. Quilliam’s community of nineteenth century Muslims were our forebears in British Islam.

The mass immigration of Muslims from the Indian subcontinent, while a welcome development, must not blur our understanding of the history of British Islam. Some academics trace the roots of Muslim presence to the eighth century, citing the Islamic minting of coins issued by Offa (d.796), King of Mercia (now known as the English Midlands). Chaucer in the introduction to his Canterbury Tales 1386 wrote of a ‘doctour of physik’ who learned from Muslim sources. In Tudor and Elizabethan times, Muslim influences were palpable in literature and trade. Captain John Ward of Kent for example, provides an instructive anecdote of his times. However, the first native Muslim community, dedicated to serving fellow Brits on the English mainland, was that of Abdullah Quilliam’s in Liverpool and, later, Lord Headley in Woking.

Who we are

© UNICEF/HQ92-0017/Charton

A Kyrgyz nomad girl from the north west province of Xinjiang, China.

UNICEF is the driving force that helps build a world where the rights of every child are realized. We have the global authority to influence decision-makers, and the variety of partners at grassroots level to turn the most innovative ideas into reality.  That makes us unique among world organizations, and unique among those working with the young.

We believe that nurturing and caring for children are the cornerstones of human progress.  UNICEF was created with this purpose in mind – to work with others to overcome the obstacles that poverty, violence, disease and discrimination place in a child’s path.  We believe that we can, together, advance the cause of humanity.

We advocate for measures to give children the best start in life, because proper care at the youngest age forms the strongest foundation for a person’s future.

We promote girls’ education – ensuring that they complete primary education as a minimum – because it benefits all children, both girls and boys. Girls who are educated grow up to become better thinkers, better citizens, and better parents to their own children.

We act so that all children are immunized against common childhood diseases, and are well nourished, because it is wrong for a child to suffer or die from a preventable illness.

We work to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS among young people because it is right to keep them from harm and enable them to protect others. We help children and families affected by HIV/AIDS to live their lives with dignity.

We involve everyone in creating protective environments for children. We are present to relieve suffering during emergencies, and wherever children are threatened, because no child should be exposed to violence, abuse or exploitation.

UNICEF upholds the Convention on the Rights of the Child.  We work to assure equality for those who are discriminated against, girls and women in particular. We work for the Millennium Development Goals and for the progress promised in the United Nations Charter. We strive for peace and security. We work to hold everyone accountable to the promises made for children.

We are part of the Global Movement for Children – a broad coalition dedicated to improving the life of every child.  Through this movement, and events such as the United Nations Special Session on Children, we encourage young people to speak out and participate in the decisions that affect their lives. 

We work in 190 countries through country programmes and National Committees. We are UNICEF, the United Nations Children’s Fund.