10. Income Generation

ASALA; the Palestinian Businesswomen’s Association has been actively providing loans to women since its establishment in 1997. ASALA’s headquarters is in Ramallah and it has ten strategically located branch offices throughout the West Bank and Gaza Strip. ASALA targets impoverished and excluded Palestinian women in order to empower them and put them on a track that will lead to financial independence and stability. ASALA provides Palestinian women entrepreneurs with a comprehensive package of support including guidance, counseling, training, micro, small, and Islamic financing, and extensive follow up. Success stories are real, tangible, and documented. ASALA, in partnership with women entrepreneurs, is alleviating suffocating and detrimental poverty in Palestine one family at a time. Progress may be slow, but it is stable, sustainable, and recyclable.

ASALA Association is a leader in small and micro financing and believes in the role of micro-credit in the fight against poverty. ASALA also believes that its microfinance program serves as a leading model for reaching sustainable long term development. Palestinian women, often the only individual able to revive the economic life of the family due to the suffocating and exacerbating political reality, are given real opportunities to pull themselves and their families out of poverty.

ASALA was born of a dream to empower and sustain impoverished Palestinian women. it was born in 1997 with a relatively small lending capacity. 13 years later, ASALA’s small loan volume has rotated over 10 times, and resulted in a loan portfolio of 3 million USD. ASALA has successfully served over 15,000 project all over Palestine, and is now bracing herself to take some very large steps. ASALA has remained true to its vision of enabling and assisting Palestinian women to achieve economic independence.