Saleh Hijazi
Al-Shabaka Policy Member Saleh Hijazi is a human rights activist and researcher presently living in London where he works at Amnesty International. He is advisor to Al-Quds University Human Rights Clinic where he worked as academic coordinator and lecturer. Saleh holds a master’s degree in human rights from the University of Essex and a bachelor degree in philosophy and political science from Lawrence University. His interests are social movements and caricature.
Refqa Nabil Shaqour
Al-Shabaka Member Refqa Nabil Shaqour is a Belgium-based political scientist and writer. Born in Nablus, she holds a BA in political science, a master’s degree in planning and political development from An-Najah National University in Palestine, and a master’s degree in media and public relations from Cairo University. In addition to publishing political and cultural research papers in Arabic periodicals, her book “The Influence of Hezbollah in the Evolution of Resistance Ideology and Methods in the Arab Region” was published in 2010. She is a regular contributor to Al-Arab newspaper and Al-Jadid cultural magazine, and is a member of PEN International, the Flemish Branch in Belgium, as well as a researcher at the Egyptian Institute for Political and Strategic Studies in Turkey. Shaqour is currently pursuing her doctorate degree.
Refqa Abu-Remaileh
Refqa Abu-Remaileh is professor of Modern Arabic Literature and Film at the Freie Universität Berlin’s Arabic Department, specializing in Palestinian literature and film. She is the Principal Investigator of the European Research Council (ERC) project “PalREAD – Country of Words: Reading and Reception of Palestinian Literature from 1948 to the Present” (2018-2023). She received her MSt in modern Middle Eastern Studies and DPhil in Oriental Studies from the University of Oxford (2004, 2010).
Rayya El Zein
Al-Shabaka Member Rayya El Zein is a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Advanced Research in Global Communication at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. Her research concerns performance, media, popular culture, the political economy of leisure, and spectatorship in urban Arab contexts and diasporas.
Raya Naamneh
Al-Shabaka Policy Member Raya Naamneh is a Palestinian student and activist from Arraba village in the Galilee. She is working on her B.A. in English Language and Literature at Haifa University and is deeply interested in colonial and post-colonial literature as well as intersectional politics as regards the experiences of women and the LGBTQ community around the world, with special focus on Palestinian society. She is an active member of al-Qaws for Sexual and Gender Diversity in Palestinian Society. She recently started working at Baladna – Association for Arab Youth in Haifa as a resources and project development coordinator.
Remi Kanazi
Al-Shabaka Policy Member Remi Kanazi is a poet, writer, and editor. He is the author of Poetic Injustice: Writings on Resistance and Palestine and the editor of Poets For Palestine. His political commentary has been featured by news outlets throughout the world, including Al Jazeera English, GRITtv with Laura Flanders, and BBC Radio. He is a recurring writer in residence and advisory board member for the Palestine Writing Workshop and he is on the organizing committee of USACBI (the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel).
Rawan Damen
Al-Shabaka Member Rawan Damen has produced and directed more than 25 hours of TV documentaries, translated into multiple languages, including the award-winning Al Nakba series. Rawan worked as a senior commissioning producer at Al Jazeera Media Network from 2008 to 2016, where she supervised 250 hours of documentaries. She has founded and led teams on multiple digital platforms, notably the innovative project Palestine Remix and was awarded the Media Creativity Award from the Arab Thought Foundation in December 2015. Rawan holds an MA in Communications Studies from Leeds University, UK, and a BA in Media and Sociology from Berziet University, Palestine.
Rashid Khalidi
Rashid Khalidi is the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies in the Department of History at Columbia University. He is past President of the Middle East Studies Association, was an advisor to the Palestinian delegation to the 1991-1993 Arab-Israeli peace negotiations, and is the editor of the Journal of Palestine Studies. Khalidi is the author of Brokers of Deceit: How the U.S. has Undermined Peace in the Middle East (2013); Sowing Crisis: American Dominance and the Cold War in the Middle East (2009); The Iron Cage: The Story of the Palestinian Struggle for Statehood (2006); Resurrecting Empire: Western Footprints and America’s Perilous Path in the Middle East (2004); Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness (1997); Under Siege: PLO Decision-making during the 1982 War (1986); and British Policy towards Syria and Palestine, 1906-1914 (1980). He has written over ninety articles on aspects of Middle Eastern history.
Randa Wahbe
Al-Shabaka Member Randa Wahbe is a graduate student in anthropology at Harvard University. Her research focuses on how Palestinian dead bodies are exploited by the Israeli state to facilitate its settler-colonial expansion. She also holds an M.P.H. in Epidemiology from the Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health and a B.A. in International Development from the University of California, Los Angeles, and is a founder of Students for Justice in Palestine at both universities.
