Marwa Fatafta
Marwa is a Palestinian writer, researcher and policy analyst based in Berlin. She leads Access Now’s work on digital rights in the Middle East and North Africa region as the MENA Policy Manager. She is also an advisory board member of the Palestinian digital rights organization 7amleh. Previously, she worked as the MENA Regional Advisor for Transparency International Secretariat. Marwa was a Fulbright scholar to the US, and holds an MA in International Relations from Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University. She holds a second MA in Development and Governance from University of Duisburg-Essen.
Zena Agha
Zena Agha served as Al-Shabaka’s US Policy Fellow from 2017 – 2019. Her areas of expertise include Israeli settlement-building in the occupied Palestinian territory with a special focus on Jerusalem, modern Middle Eastern history, and spatial practices. She has previously worked at the Economist, the Iraqi Embassy in Paris, and the Palestinian delegation at UNESCO. In addition to opinion pieces in The Independent, and The Nation, Zena’s media credits include the BBC World Service, BBC Arabic and El Pais. Zena was awarded the Kennedy Scholarship to study at Harvard University, completing her Master’s in Middle Eastern Studies.
Zachariah Sammour
Al-Shabaka Policy Member Zachariah Sammour completed his undergraduate studies in law at the London School of Economics in 2012 and received his master’s degree from Oxford University in 2013. He is particularly interested in international law, constitutional law, and constitutional theory.
Yasmeen El Khoudary
Al-Shabaka Member Yasmeen El Khoudary is an independent London-based researcher and writer specialised in Palestinian archaeology and cultural heritage, with a focus on Gaza. She holds an MA in Cultural Heritage Studies from University College London. Prior to moving to London, she co-founded Diwan Ghazza, an independent, voluntary cultural initiative based in Gaza. She has published extensively on several topics in the Guardian, CNN, and Al-Jazeera English, among others. Twitter handle: @yelkhoudary | Blog: yelkhoudary.blogspot.com.
Valentina Azarova
Valentina Azarova is an international legal academic and practitioner working at the intersection of power, law, and violence, with over 15 years of experience advising social and liberation movements, NGOs, international and inter-governmental organizations and governments, primarily in the Middle East, Central Asia and Africa. She holds a PhD in law from NUI Galway’s Irish Centre for Human Rights and currently teaches transnational lawyering and human rights practice at different universities and is also a Research Fellow at the Manchester International Law Centre, University of Manchester. Valentina’s current research concerns practices and processes reproduction of (ir)responsibility in/by international law, and the relation between social justice struggles, accountability practices and the law.
Victor Kattan
Victor Kattan is a Senior Research Fellow at the Middle East Institute at the National University of Singapore. He previously served as Al-Shabaka’s Program Director and was a postdoctoral fellow at the Law Faculty of the National University of Singapore. He is the author of From Coexistence to Conquest: International Law and the Origins of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1891-1949 (London: Pluto Books, 2009) and The Palestine Question in International Law (London: British Institute of International and Comparative Law, 2008). He was a legal adviser to the Palestinian Negotiations Support Project from 2012-2013 and a Teaching Fellow at the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) from 2008-2011 where he obtained his PhD in 2012. He worked for the British Institute of International and Comparative Law from 2006-2008, Arab Media Watch from 2004-2006, and the BADIL Resource Centre for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights from 2003-2004.
Tareq Baconi
Tareq Baconi serves as the president of the board of Al-Shabaka. He was Al-Shabaka’s US Policy Fellow from 2016 – 2017. Tareq is the former senior analyst for Israel/Palestine and Economics of Conflict at the International Crisis Group, based in Ramallah, and the author of Hamas Contained: The Rise and Pacification of Palestinian Resistance (Stanford University Press, 2018). Tareq’s writing has appeared in the London Review of Books, the New York Review of Books, the Washington Post, among others, and he is a frequent commentator in regional and international media. He is the book review editor for the Journal of Palestine Studies.
Tamara Ben-Halim
Al-Shabaka Policy Member Tamara Ben-Halim holds an MSc in Human Rights from the London School of Economics and an MA in Modern European Languages from the University of Edinburgh. Tamara has worked in non-profit and civil society for over 6 years, focusing on creative solutions to problems of social injustice, community mobilisation, and communication and outreach. She co-founded and led the international effort, Cycling4Gaza, for many years. She has produced several short films, including her documentary film Ain El Hilweh, which was nominated for an award at the California Arab Film Festival in 2011.
Tahani Mustafa
Tahani Mustafa is the Palestine analyst at the International Crisis Group, where she works on issues including security, and socio-political and legal governance in the West bank. She holds a PhD in politics and international studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. She is based between the UK, Jordan, and Palestine.
