Upon the invitation received form UNISCO- Paris office, and the American agency USGS, the Urban Planning and Disaster Risks Reduction Center, and the Seismic Engineering Unit at the University represented in its director Dr. Jalal Al-Dabeek, the Vice President of the National Authority for Disaster Risk Mitigation in Palestine, and the researcher Radwan Al-Kilani, participated in the workshop for the RELEMR of “Reduction of Earthquake Losses in the Extended Mediterranean Region”. Palestine was represented by Dr Osama Zien Al-deen form Al-Azhar University in Gaza strip who participated in the workshop along with a number of experts from countries in Eastern Mediterranean, and Europe, and the United States. 

The main theme and the title of the workshop highlighted “Earthquakes and Tsunamis Early warning systems and networks in the Mediterranean region”.  Themes of the workshop’s sessions focused on reviewing international experiences of Tsunamis and Earthquakes early warning networks  particularly the American and Japanese ones. On focus was also what Europe countries and Turkey had achieved in this field. The participants further discussed the way in which countries of the region could possibly take part in the early warning systems and the possibility of establishing and developing networks for each country on its own, in addition to the mechanism by which such networks are interconnected.

During the workshop’s sessions that reviewed the studies carried out by scientific institutions and centers in the participating countries in 2012, a work paper was presented which included the method of employing seismic geophysical studies in conducting Slope Stability analysis studies and consequently locating prospective landslides. It also included case studies of landslides that had occurred in Palestine in the past years  along with a number of case studies about slides that occurred in the West Bank in 2012, namely in Bait ‘Ur in Ramallah, Araba within Jenin governorate, Al-Bathan road,and  Kafr Qallil in Nablus. Furthermore, the work paper presented the solutions suggested by the center to mitigate some of the slides that occurred in 2012 and the recommendations of the center to the concerned governmental bodies, which aimed to avoid the occurrence of such slides through the solutions and studies related to policies of using lands, and creating illustrative maps for each region separately, and consequently all to be taken into consideration when designing structural schemes for cities and communities.