On Sunday May 20, 2012, Sina Institute for Knowledge Engineering and Arab  Technologies- Birzeit University, organized a training trip to Bethlehem within the training tutorials provided by  the Academy E-government project.

The training trip included activities that aimed at enhancing the team’s skills and building trust between individuals and groups. Mr.Wahid Zahran, with the help of Sina Institute team, organized and supervised the training trip’s activities.  Around 60 participants, from the private and public sectors and the academia attended the trip.

It’s worth mentioning, that the Academy seeks through its program to provide and design the necessary training material to increase the awareness of the Palestinian Society on developed e-government areas; this will be done in cooperation and partnering with individuals and the public and private sector.

نظم معهد ابن سينا لهندسة المعرفة والتقنيات العربية-جامعة بيرزيت رحلة تدريبية إلى مدينة بيت لحم، يوم الأحد الموافق 20\5\2012 ، وذلك في إطار مشروع  أكاديمية الحكومة الإلكترونية ضمن الدورات التدريبية التي تقدمها الأكاديمية.

وقد شملت الرحلة التدريبية نشاطات هدفت لبناء مهارات الفريق وتعزيز وبناء الثقة بين الأفراد والمجموعات، وقد أشرف على إعداد وتنفيذ تلك النشاطات المدرب وحيد زهران بمساعدة فريق العمل في معهد ابن سينا. وتضمن اليوم التدريبي أيضاً العديد من الأنشطة الترفيهية الهادفة، والتي ركزت على بناء الثقة بين الأفراد وتحقيق الانسجام بينهم بما يعود بالنفع على أدائهم اللاحق في مؤسساتهم ومجالات عملهم.

وقد شارك في الرحلة نحو 60 مشاركا ومشاركة من العاملين في القطاع العام والخاص والأكاديمي، فضلاً عن العاملين في المجالات التقنية والقانونية. والذين يشاركون حاليا في برنامج تدريبي نوعي مكثف حول المفاهيم المتعلقة بالحكومة الإلكترونية كالتوافقية والتبادل البيني، والأمن المعلوماتي، والاحتياجات القانونية، وذلك لتحقيق هدف الأكاديمية الرئيس المتمثل بتقديم خدمات وحلول متكاملة في مجال تكنولوجيا المعلومات وتصميم خطط وطنية تفي بغرض تطوير قطاع تكنولوجيا المعلومات في فلسطين.

وتجدر الإشارة إلى أن الأكاديمية  تسعى من خلال برامجها إلى تصميم وتوفير المواد التدريبية اللازمة لإثراء معرفة المجتمع الفلسطيني في مجالات تطوير الحكومة الإلكترونية، وذلك من خلال التعاون والشراكة مع القطاعين العام والخاص والأفراد، بما يتيح للمشاركين أفضل السبل لاكتساب المعرفة الكافية في التكنولوجيات الأساسية المتعقلة بالحكومة الإلكترونية، وذلك بفضل الخبرات الدولية والوطنية العاملة في هذا المجال.

د.مصطفى جرار يتحدث عن التحضيرات الجارية للمؤتمر الفلسطيني الاول للحوكمة والخدمات الالكترونية في جامعة بيرزيت يوم الاربعاء القادم 27-6-2012

Below is detailed information about these lectures:

PITA – The Palestinian Information Technology Association for companies hosted an event on 11/12/2011 that was attended by representatives of the Palestinian Private Sector, Academics, and representatives from many Ministries, to discuss the Palestinian E-Government Academy project. The meeting was moderated by Mrs. Heda Al Saqqa – Membership Manager in PITA, who talked about the importance of engaging the Palestinian Private and Public Sectors in the E-government Academy Project. Dr. Yahya Al Salqan – a board member in PITA, emphasized the essentiality of the project in serving the Palestinians and facilitating their matters of life.

Dr. Mustafa Jarrar gave a presentation about the Project that included a brief overview, followed by demonstrating the role of the training courses offered by the academy in supporting the project’s main goal, represented in developing the needed experience for building the Palestinian E-Government, which in turn would fulfill the needs of the private and public sectors in both technical and legal aspects required to carry on with the project.

For his part, Mr. Amjad Abo Zaid, the consultant of the Minister of Communication, showed the importance of the project for Palestine, not only as an E-government project, but also as a project that supports all E-services, and called for cooperation between all involved parties, to work together to achieve the project’s goals.

اجتمع ممثلين عن القطاع الخاص الفلسطيني واكاديميين وممثلين عن وزارة الاتصالات وعدة وزارات أخرى في مقر بيتا يوم الاحد 11-12-2011 لمناقشة مشروع اكاديمية الحكومة الالكترونية. وقد أدار اللقاء هداء السقا مدير علاقات الاعضاء في بيتا وقد تحدثت عن اهمية الشراكة بين القطاع الخاص والحكومة، وقد تحدث السيد د. يحيى السلقان عضو مجلس ادراة بيتا عن أهمية هذا المشروع في خدمة المواطن الفلسطيني وتسهيل شئون حياته

وقد قدم د. مصطفى جرار عرضا حول مشروع الحكومة الإلكترونية، وقد تضمن العرض نبذة عن المشروع تلاها شرح عن آلية التدريب التي سوف تتبعها الأكاديمية لدعم أغراض المشروع والتي تتمثل في تنمية وبناء القدرات والخبرات اللازمة في مجال الحكومة الإلكترونية، والتي تهدف بدورها إلى تغطية إحتياجات كل من القطاع العام والخاص في فلسطين من النواحي التقنية والقانونية اللازمة لبناء الحكومة الإلكترونية

ومن جانبة بين السيد أمجد ابو زيد مستشار وزير الاتصالات أهمية هذا المشروع، داعيا للتعاون المشترك بين كافة الاطراف؛ من جهات حكومية وجامعات وشركات القطاع الخاص للعمل على تطوير هذا المشروع وتحقيق أهدافه

Sina Institute for Knowledge Engineering and Arabic Technologies in Birzeit University hosted an academic team from the Republic of Korea. The purpose of the visit was to see the projects and the activities conducted by the Institute in the field of e-government and to discuss ways of cooperation. The director of the Institute briefed them about the mission and goals of the Institute, and the main projects that the Institute works on. He focused on the Palestinian e-Government Academy project, which is an ongoing project in the Institute. He explained the aim of the professional trainings that are provided by the project, which will help in implementing electronic services, especially for the Palestinian e-Government. He also discussed one of the most important achievements of the academy, which is “ZINNAR” the Palestinian Interoperability Framework, in addition to the main challenges that face the project.

At the end of the meeting, the Korean team expressed their appreciation of the idea of the project, and their intentions of implementing a training center in the Ministry of Telecommunication and Information Technology. They put forward ways of cooperation between them and the Institute to develop the training center, which will aim to train the government employees on using the electronic services offered by the project, and discussed the actions to be taken to support the project.

During the meeting, Dr. Jarrar presented the Palestinian e-Government Academy. The academy is established by Birzeit University as part of the TEMPUS-funded Pal-Gov project. The academy aims at building the capacity of the Palestinian private and public sectors in e-Government technologies. In particular, the academy intends to fulfill the needs of the Palestinian society in the technical and legal aspects necessary to build and maintain a Palestinian e-Government. This is done via (1) Training Programs (tutorials and academic courses), which cover the areas of Interoperability, Security, and Legal Informatics, (2) Consultancy for the private and public sectors in the area of e-Government and e-Governance, (3) Research, by which the academy aims to highlight and promote research problems and solutions and incorporate them to renovate and enhance the e-governance field, and (4) Publications that cover topics related to e-governance in order to make the exchange of technical knowledge and information possible.

Furthermore, Dr. Jarrar presented the Palestinian e-Government Interoperability Framework ‘Zinnar’. Zinnar (http://zinnar.pna.ps) was developed by six ministries and governmental institutions (in cooperation with the Palestinian e-Government Academy): Ministry of Telecommunication and Information Technology (MTIT), Ministry of Interior (MOI), Ministry of Finance (MOF), Ministry of National Economy (MNE), Palestine Monetary Authority (PMA), and the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS). Zinnar serves as an organizational/semantic mediator between heterogeneous governmental information systems and is also seen as framework/infrastructure upon which seamless e-government services are implemented.

During the meeting, the participants discussed further cooperation opportunities especially between the Palestinan e-Governemnt Academy and the Estonian e-Government Academy, particularly, on the topic of Information Security. Also, Mr. Astok presented a proposal of Training workshops where the Estonian Academy is to provide training to transfer know-how and skills to Palestinian governmental employees. The proposal comes as part of the Palestinian- Estonian cooperation program.

The director of the Sina Institute for Knowledge Engineering and Arabic Technologies, Dr. Mustafa Jarrar presented the institute’s experience in cooperating with Europe and overviewed the institute’s prior and ongoing projects, including the FP7-funded SIERA project on developing multilingual and multi-cultural knowledge sharing portal; the TEMPUS-funded PalGov project to establish the Palestinian e-Government Academy, the Google-funded Wojood project to develop tools and APIs for Arabic language processing, the Italian-funded GovSeer project on Interoperability of government services, among many other projects.

He also emphasized that connecting EU and Arab researchers is essential, in order to increase the economical and social cooperation and cultural exchange between the two regions; and that Birzeit University was the first Palestinian university which joined EUMED Connect (in 2007). Dr. Jarrar said that Palestine is an eligible country in most EU research funding programs (e.g., FP7, TEMPUS, Erasmus Mundus, among others); and despite of the political situation, Palestine is one of the most active Arab countries in such programs.

The conference was opened by H.H Sheikh Nahayan Mubarak Al-Nahayan, Minister of Higher Education & Scientific Research, UAE, HE Dr. Talal Abu-Ghazaleh, Chairman of ASREN, Jordan, H.E. Adam Kulach, Head of Delegation of the EU to Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, KSA, H.E Dr. Sultan Abu-Orabi, Secretary General, Association of Arab Universities, and by Mr. Fahem Al Nuaimi, CEO, Ankabut, UAE; where all of them stressed on the importance of advancing the research and education capacity of the Arab region within the knowledge age.

A draft of the status report on Arab e-Infrastructures is available both in Arabic and in English. All presentations can be downloaded from the conference program, the photos can be downloaded from the Conference’s Facebook page.

Dr. Mustafa Jarrar, the project director, explained that the project aims to bridge the knowledge gap and build the competencies of the Palestinian society with the know-how for implementing and deploying electronic and integrated services, in particular e-government services, which are a national priority. Specialized programs will be developed and delivered to the Palestinian ministries and to private sector; as well as several academic courses that will be introduced into the curricula of the partner universities. The project will focus on the capacity building in three main areas (Interoperability, Security, and IT laws), which are the main challenges in implementing any e-service in general and e-Government in particular. A Palestinian e-governance Academy will be established to disseminate and sustain the project results and outcomes.

The partners of the project are:

1. Birzeit University, Palestine (Coordinator)
2. Palestine Polytechnic University, Palestine
3. Palestine Technical University, Palestine
4. University of Trento, Italy
5. Vrije University Brussels, Belgium
6. University of Namur, Belgium
7. TrueTrust, UK
8. University of Savoie, France
9. The Ministry of Telecom and Information Technology, Palestine
10. Ministry of Interior, Palestine
11. Ministry of Local Government, Palestine

It is worth noting that Birzeit University is the initiator and the grant holder of the project, and will be fully responsible for the scientific and financial management. Moreover, Birzeit University is the only Palestinian university and one of leading Arab Universities that lead local and European universities in the coordinating Tempus projects. Tempus program is one of the most important cooperation programs between the European Union and neighboring countries, aiming to improve not only the quality of education but also to promote scientific research and transfer of knowledge and develop lifelong learning programs in society at large.

The competition this year was very high, in which 450 proposals have been submitted and only 64 proposals have been approved.

“Development of the Roadmap for Digital Information Security”

A workshop titled “Development of the Roadmap for Digital Information Security” will be held on 7-8 May, 2012 by experts and  lecturers from Estonia. This workshop is organized by the Estonian and Palestinian eGovernment Academies, and hosted by Sina Institute at Birzeit Unviersity.

The topics that will be discussed in the workshop include key elements of the cyber security and digital information protection, planning of roadmaps, action plan and organization development among others.

Following is the workshop agenda

Day 1

Monday, May 7, 2012

10:00-10:15 Opening of the session

Introduction of the participants, presenters and training program Hannes Astok

10:15-11:30 Digital information protection policy development. Samples of the national policies. Key elements of the roadmap for cyber security and digital information protection.

Raul Rikk, Arvo Ott

11:30-12:00 Coffee and snack break

12:00 -13:00 Group work: definition of the activities and work share of government and institution.

Raul Rikk, Arvo Ott, Hannes Astok

13:00-14:00 Presentation of the group work results. Discussion.

Raul Rikk, Arvo Ott, Hannes Astok

Day 2

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

10:00-11:30 Development of the roadmap for cyber security and digital information protection for the ministry/ institution. Key elements and activities.

Raul Rikk, Arvo Ott, Hannes Astok

11:30-12:00 Coffee and snack break

12:00 -13:00 Group work: development of the roadmap draft for ministry/institution..

Raul Rikk, Arvo Ott, Hannes Astok

13:00-14:00 Presentation of the group work results. Discussion. Conclusions.

Raul Rikk, Arvo Ott, Hannes Astok

Dr. Katrin Nyman-Metcalf, the  chair of Law and Technology Department at the Law Faculty in Tallinn University of Technology in Estonia, and the consultant at the Estonian e-Governance Academy, visited Sina Institute and Faculty of Law at Birzeit University  to discuss joint cooperation opportunities.

Dr. Metcalf first met Dr. Khalil Hindi the president of Birzeit University, Dr. Asem Khalil the dean of Law and Public Administration faculty, and Dr. Mustafa Jarrar the director of Sina Institute for Knowledge Management and Arabic Technologies. Two other meetings were then scheduled with members at the Faculty of Law and Faculty of IT to discuss possible joint research and capacity building projects with Birzeit University. In addition to discussing several topics of interest in the field of IT laws frameworks, including the issues of privacy, human factor in data protection, cyber security, digital transactions, and legal and ethical courses, among other topics. Dr Metcalf also reflected on the Estonian e-government experience, and discussed several matching points between the Estonian and the Palestinian e-governance experiences.

It is worth mentioning that Sina Institute was the coordinator of several projects aiming to build the Palestinian e-government services. Such projects include Zinnar, building the Palestinian e-government interoperability framework, and the Palestinian e-Government Academy, providing capacity building and training services in the domain of e-government.