UN Women: International Consultant, Expert Gender and Disability in Crisis and Recovery Settings; Retainer

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. Placing women’s rights at the centre of all its efforts, the UN Women leads and coordinates the United Nations system efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality and gender mainstreaming translate into action throughout the world.

It provides strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts, building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors.

UN Women’s triple mandate, along with its global network and deep policy and programming expertise, continues to endow the Entity with a unique capacity to: (i) support Member States to strengthen global norms and standards for gender equality and women’s empowerment, and mainstream gender perspectives in other thematic areas; (ii) promote coordination and coherence across the UN system to enhance accountability and results for gender equality and women’s empowerment;

and (iii) undertake operational activities to support Member States, upon their request, in translating global norms and standards into legislation, policies and strategies at country level.

UN Women plays an innovative and catalytic role in the State of Palestine since its inception in 1997 (as UNIFEM). In line with the national priorities, the work of UN Women for the period  is aligned with three of the Palestine United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework’s (UNSDCF) outcomes:

• Palestinians have greater access to economic opportunities that are inclusive, resilient, and sustainable, including decent employment and livelihoods opportunities in an empowered private sector.
• Palestinians, including the most vulnerable, have equal access to sustainable, inclusive, gender responsive and quality social services, social protection, and affordable utilities.
• Palestinian governance institutions, processes, and mechanisms at all levels are more democratic, rights-based, inclusive, and accountable.

Its three-year Strategic Note supports the efforts to achieve measurable results in country in terms of four UN Women global Strategic Plan impacts ): (SP Impact
1). Governance and participation in public life; (SP Impact
2). Women’s Economic Empowerment; (SP Impact
3). Ending Violence Against Women and Girls; SP Impact
4. Women peace and security, Humanitarian & Disaster Risk Reduction.

Women and girls with disabilities face multiple and intersecting barriers in accessing protection services, recovery opportunities, justice, information, participation mechanisms and decision-making processes. These barriers have been exacerbated by the ongoing crisis in Gaza. Strengthening collaboration between WLOs and OPDs, improving accessibility of services, generating evidence, and ensuring meaningful participation of women with disabilities are critical components of an inclusive recovery process.

The consultant will provide technical expertise to UN Women and partners across multiple recovery, resilience, protection, livelihoods, women’s economic empowerment, governance and social-cohesion initiatives implemented in Gaza. The consultant will ensure that disability inclusion is systematically integrated across programme design, implementation, monitoring, evaluation and knowledge generation, with particular attention to the rights and participation of women and girls with disabilities.

The consultant will support disability-inclusive approaches across a range of sectors…