The Young Women’s Christian Association of Palestine—A Haven for Life

The Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA) has been serving the population of Jerusalem for more than 100 years, offering life-changing skills and training to women of all ages, backgrounds, and religions in Jerusalem and beyond.

It’s not hard to find the YWCA community center in Jerusalem. It’s bang in the middle of Sheikh Jarrah, in a colossal seven-story building with a huge, blue sign outside. This building used to be a hotel, which is why the reception area feels so luxurious and the ceilings are so high, with a wide, open stairway right in the center.

Over the years, the YWCA has maintained that air of hospitality. The people who come here really are guests. They travel from all over Jerusalem to learn new skills that increase their employability. Here, Jerusalem’s Palestinian population can enroll in subsidized secretarial, office management, modern kitchen, graphic design, fashion design, film, and photography courses. Seniors can enjoy craft workshops with their peers, while new mothers can get together with their babies. At the YWCA, you can attend a funeral service, a rooftop barbecue, a gymnastics lesson, and a careers fair all in the same day, but most important, people get to know one another and build community and friendships in a city where, for the Palestinian population, that is actively discouraged.

The YWCA—the women’s branch of the Young Men’s Christian Association—is a global nonprofit organization that focusses on empowerment, leadership, and the rights of women and girls in more than 100 countries. Founded in the United Kingdom in 1855 and in Jerusalem in 1918, the organization’s early courses taught women how to type, how to cook, and skills to work in factories. It was one of the first organizations committed to fighting for women’s rights and protecting women from gender-based violence.

Today, the executive director of YWCA Jerusalem, Sandrine Amer, is showing us around. Just about everyone we cross paths with smiles when they see Sandrine. A middle-aged woman with a trolley greets her with a cheery “good morning,” and a group of young women wave as they hurry to their class. It’s 10:30 a.m., so the first stop of our tour is the children’s nursery, because they’re just finishing their craft lesson and it’s almost time for their nap.

YWCA’s nursery is on the fourth floor of the building. The walls are covered with art by the children as well as murals of flowers, animals, and trees. Inside one classroom, a group of two-year-olds make necklaces out of fruit loop cereal, although most of it is going in their mouths. But they all look calm, content, and focused, sitting on their tiny chairs while three women attempt to show them how to thread the cereal on to a string.

“They’re very well behaved right now,” Sandrine says. “But just wait until they get hungry or tired.”1

We visit two more classes, each for children slightly older than the last, and all of the children seem serene. Some are sticking cutout flowers onto colorful sheets of paper, and others are learning all about the senses by trying to find objects in a box of sand. Every time they do, they get a round of applause.

This kindergarten and nursery were Sandrine’s idea. Since she became executive director 12 years ago, she’s constantly thinking of ways to serve her community while building a lucrative and sustainable business model. That a Palestinian organization has managed to keep hold of this building right in the center of one of Jerusalem’s most contested neighborhoods is no easy feat, and Sandrine repeatedly tells Jerusalem Story: “We do not take this for granted.”

Next, we head to the third floor, where a group of young women sit in a computer lab sketching out dresses for a fashion design course. In the room next door, a gaggle of young adults take a quiz to launch their office management skills, and a few doors down from that, a group of students make a short film in the library.

Everywhere we go, there’s activity, movement, and positive energy.

The YWCA runs many programs aimed at tackling societal issues such as under-age marriage, domestic violence, and school dropouts. In one classroom, a group of women who have all been victims of gender-based violence knit blankets. Sandrine says that working with their hands helps ease their stress and allows them to connect and support one other.

The final stop on our tour is a sunny space where senior women are painting some vases. They’re a glamorous bunch—well-dressed with expert makeup—but perhaps most remarkable is how at ease they all seem here, like they’re sitting in their own living rooms.

A woman called Yvette tells me she’s been coming here since she was a schoolgirl. She was born and raised in Jerusalem and taught English in the city. On her days off, she’d volunteer or take courses at the YWCA. “So I’m really part of the furniture,” she says.2

Many of the women in this room say the same thing. They came here as young girls, and now their daughters, nieces, and grandchildren come here too. It’s impossible to underestimate just how important this institution is for Palestinian women in this city and just how sacred this space is for building community.

In a region so often associated with machismo, it’s refreshing to walk into a space full of feminine energy. Everyone is happy to smile for the camera; they’re proud of this flourishing community and the beautiful space they call home.

Sandrine’s life was also shaped inside these walls. Born and raised in the Old City, Sandrine’s family have lived there for around 300 years, and most of her female relations have been involved with the YWCA in one way or another since it opened in 1918.

“I grew up in this organization,” Sandrine says, speaking from her office desk, backdropped by the white sandstone buildings of Sheikh Jarrah. “I took part as a child, and my mother and aunts learned skills here. The YWCA was part of our life, and I always believed in the mission.”

Sandrine finished her BA in law at al-Ahliyya University and her MA in human rights and democratization at the University of Malta. She returned to the YWCA to help establish youth groups and address the needs of the community with different activities for women, youth, and children. She then joined a variety of committees, ranging from human rights to constitutional development, “so I’ve been involved in all aspects of the Y,” she says affectionately.

Sandrine joined the Board of Directors as a young member in 2004, where she cemented her reputation as a reliable, committed, and visionary leader. In 2012, she was asked to serve as Executive Director.

Sandrine notes how unusual it is for a young woman to be asked to lead an organization of this caliber in a patriarchal society, but there’s no better person for it. She understands just how crucial this organization is to the fabric of Jerusalem’s Palestinian population, and has committed her life to ensuring its continued success. “I came here to lead, mobilize, and sustain,” she says. “It’s a privilege and a big responsibility, because the YWCA is an organization of legacy. It’s been in Palestine since 1893, formally established in 1918, and it protects and fights for women’s rights. Our niche has always been the economic empowerment of women and young ladies.”

One of the reasons the YWCA has been able to continue its work in this location is because, under Sandrine’s leadership, it is able to prove its existence here since the early 1900s. It’s a fact that’s been signed and sealed in its registration with the Israeli registrar, which will make it very difficult to uproot them. “We’ve worked hard to achieve this,” Sandrine says. “These neighborhoods are always under the spotlight. We are in a very sensitive geographical location and I need to continue ensuring the YWCA is a safe space for everyone.”

Sandrine is committed to creating a multifunctional building. “It’s not a museum,” she says. “It must serve the community. Creating sustainable programs like the nursery and kindergarten empowers their mothers to continue work, as we can supervise their children from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m.”

This empowerment extends to the children, too. The YWCA encourages them to express their feelings and needs, to be independent, creative, and collaborative, and to learn new skills. It was the first organization to offer kindergarten services for children in refugee camps after the 1948 War.

Their ballet program has been running since 2012, with trainers using the curricula from the Royal British Academy of Dance. “We live in a city which is fragmented with many forms of violence and oppression,” Sandrine says. “We want to see young leaders, we want to see agents of change, but it doesn’t come with a magic wand. We have to work to create a safe space.”

The YWCA offers preventive gender-based violence workshops to teach women about international law and their rights, and they teamed up with other Palestinian organizations to host three different campaigns to address early marriage (marriage of women under the age of 18). “In 2016, the early marriage rate was 40 percent in the occupied Palestinian territories. Since these campaigns, it’s dropped to 26 percent,” Sandrine says.

Over summer, the YWCA host camps with dance, art, and food workshops, designed to ignite a new passion within young people. It offers a one-year office management course, which awards a diploma certified by the Palestinian Ministry of Labor, and it offers photography, graphic design, multimedia, and modern kitchen diplomas, which teach culinary arts and cooking techniques. All of these courses are a response to the needs of their community and are based on market research.

“These diplomas are mostly for young men and women who completed 12 years of education but did not necessarily pass the governmental exam, so we welcome them here,” Sandrine says. The courses usually end with internships and apprenticeships that then lead to full-time jobs. The YWCA hosts open days and career days to create a self-sustaining ecosystem to support the careers of Palestinians in Jerusalem. The idea is to boost employment, the economy, and the confidence of the community. More than 26 percent of school children in Jerusalem drop out of school at the age of 14 or 15,3 so these courses and opportunities enhance their skills, increase their employability, and scale up their earnings.

“Palestinian people have always been known as educated people,” Sandrine says. “So we work to make sure our people remain empowered and educated.”

The YWCA gets about 50 percent of its funding from donors and 50 percent from its own initiatives. Sandrine ensures they have multiple sources of income to maintain the organization, as well as a steady stream of in-house ventures that generate income, such as the nursery and kindergarten, diploma programs, courses, and room rental. For a nonprofit organization of this size, to be 50 percent self-sustaining is extremely rare, but so is a leader like Sandrine.

Since October 7, 2023, Sandrine says she and her colleagues have felt helpless. All they can do is watch what’s happening, which is against their beliefs as feminists, as human rights advocates, and as people who believe everyone should be free to live with dignity. “We’ve worked hard to be civil, democratic, equal, and culturally diverse,” she says. “These are our values, rooted in human rights, and right now you can see the exact opposite being live streamed.”

In response to the war, the YWCA is providing psychosocial support to those who need it, and it pledges to continue to nurture their community and help them flourish, despite the backdrop of violence.

“I come from a family that doesn’t differentiate between religion, race, or gender,” Sandrine says. “And that’s what we believe in at the YWCA—that people should live in dignity, with respect and in peace.”