DETAILED ASSESSMENT OF UNRWA PERFORMANCE. 23 To further its protection work, UNRWA established the headquarters Protection Division in 2016 along with dedicated protection teams across all its fields of operations. Within the context of a resource-constrained organisation, the development of these protection structures and the prioritisation of protection in the MTS constitute a significant achievement. This restructure was undertaken following the realisation that the organisation needed a more institutional and strategic approach to protection rather than keeping protection siloed within a particular programmatic area. In consequence, the Agency has put significant emphasis and efforts into mainstreaming protection across field offices. The Protection Framework outlines the roles and responsibilities of different UNRWA stakeholders in delivering on protection and human rights. This brings together key activities to promote protection of human rights, such as the Agency’s long-standing engagement with the international human rights system (IHRS) under the Agency’s framework for such engagement that is led by the Department of Legal Affairs in co-ordination with protection functions. UNRWA has identified key protection standards to mainstream protection in the internal dimension of its protection work. These standards are to be used by senior staff, programme chiefs, programme protection focal points and others involved in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of programme activities. Field offices undertake biennial protection audits that monitor the degree of alignment with Agency protection standards in all aspects of programming and make remedial recommendations as necessary. The training of staff on protection is an Agency priority; training has been delivered on case management, gender-based violence (GBV) and child protection. The concept of human rights is also embedded within UNRWA’s programmes: UNRWA has a Human Rights, Conflict Resolution and Tolerance Policy, Strategy and Toolkit as part of its education programming. Limited core resources from the programme budget have been allocated to the relatively recent Protection Division and associated structures across UNRWA field offices. At the field office level, many of the resources available for protection are from projects, including for the salaries of key institutional protection posts. The programme budget pays for only 2 protection positions (Chief of the Protection Division and Head of the Gender Section) out of the approximate 112 staff in the headquarters Protection Division and Protection Units/Operations Support Office (OSO) teams. The Protection Division also receives around USD 226 000 annually from the programme budget for staff and ongoing activities such as workshops, travel, etc. By contrast, the Protection Units/OSO teams in the field offices do not receive any of the Programme Budget. The work on protection of the Protection Units/OSO teams in the field offices has been funded by a key donor; that donor recently has withdrawn its funding to UNRWA including for both legal support to the protection function across the Agency and for engagement with the IHRS, which until 2018 was funded through the emergency appeals. At the time of the MOPAN assessment, it was unclear how this important function would be funded going forward. UNRWA has an institutional commitment to gender as a cross-cutting area of its work and has a specific framework addressing gender that is aligned to international normative standards. While UNRWA’s Medium Term Strategy does not have a standalone outcome on gender equality and the empowerment of women, gender considerations are to be included in the strategic objective concerning protection. The MTS results framework includes a limited number of indicators with a gender-specific focus, and data are disaggregated by gender for some indicators. The MTS draws upon previous UNRWA normative documentation relating to gender. These include the Agency’s 2007 Gender Equality Policy, which commits the organisation to promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment, and the previous 2008-15 Gender Mainstreaming Strategy. The design of the 2016-21 Gender Equality Strategy (GES) is underpinned by a theory of change that takes into account both organisational and programme changes needed to achieve more equitable and inclusive services for Palestine refugees. Implementation of the GES is reported on annually against action plans developed by field offices and cascaded to all departments. At the field level, gender and protection units ensure that gender and protection are adequately incorporated into new projects and funding proposals in their project review checklists.