Adalah Justice Project

Adalah Justice Project Logo

Adalah Justice Project (AJP) describes themselves as "a Palestinian-led advocacy organization based in the U.S. that builds cross-movement coalitions to achieve collective liberation. Our work is rooted in the conviction that drawing the linkages between US policy abroad and repressive state practices at home is crucial to shifting the balance of power."

Team

From the Adalah Justice Project website dated January 27, 2024:

• Sandra Tamari, Executive Director

Sandra Tamari is a Palestinian organizer and the Executive Director of Adalah Justice Project (AJP). She is a co-founder of the St. Louis Palestine Solidarity Committee and was co-chair of the Steering Committee for the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights from 2015-2018. Based in St. Louis, the murder of Mike Brown in Ferguson in August 2014 greatly impacted Sandra’s work, and since then she has focused on building joint liberation efforts between Palestinians and Black communities. She was a lead organizer of the Palestinian contingent to Ferguson October in 2014.

• Sumaya Awad, Director Of Strategy And Communications

Sumaya Awad is a Palestinian writer and analyst based in New York City. Her writings focus on Palestinian liberation, anti-imperialism, Islamophobia, and immigration. Sumaya is the co-author of “Palestine and Elections “ in the collection Strategy and Electoral Politics, released by Verso Books, Jacobin Magazine, and Haymarket Books in 2019. She has spoken widely at universities and grassroots organizations across the country, and is a cofounder of the Against Canary Mission Project, which defends student activists targeted by blacklists for their Palestinian rights advocacy. Her edited volume Palestine: A Socialist Introduction was released in December 2020.

Advisory BOARD MEMBERS

• Audrey Bruner, Development & Digital Director

Audrey is a Brooklyn-based community organizer passionate about expanding Adalah Justice Project’s grassroots support. Audrey previously was the Deputy Data Director for the National Domestic Workers Alliance and co-led the grassroots fundraising program at Jewish Voice for Peace.

• Soheir Asaad

Soheir Asaad is a Palestinian human rights lawyer and a political and feminist organizer based in Haifa. She is the Advocacy team member of Rawa Fund.

• Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson

Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson is an Affrilachian (Black Appalachian) woman from the working class, born and raised in Tennessee. She is the first Black woman to serve as Co-Executive Director of the Highlander Research and Education Center.

• Nadia Ben-Youssef

Nadia Ben-Youssef (she/her) is the granddaughter of artists, refugees, and revolutionaries, who is happiest when she is dreaming and building with co-conspirators towards horizons of abolition, decolonization, and collective flourishing. A human rights lawyer by training, Nadia currently serves as the Advocacy Director at the Center for Constitutional Rights, a radical legal and advocacy organization working with social movements to dismantle white supremacy, cis heteropatriarchy, economic oppression and abusive state practices.

• Jamil Dakwar

Jamil Dakwar is the Director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Human Rights Program. Before joining the ACLU, he worked at Human Rights Watch and before coming to the United States he worked at Adalah: The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel. He is an adjunct professor at Hunter College and John Jay College of Criminal Justice (CUNY) and a graduate of Tel Aviv University and New York University School of Law.

• Donna Nevel

Donna Nevel, a community psychologist and educator, is co-director of PARCEO, a resource, education, and research center rooted in principles of Participatory Action Research (PAR). She is a long-time organizer for justice.

• Nadia Saah

Nadia Saah has served as a business development executive, campaign director and strategist for media companies, rights organizations and foundations, including; Discovery Communications, Warner Bros., Nintendo, the Gere Foundation, Institute for Middle East Understanding, Arab Fund for Arts & Culture, and BoomGen Studios. With a background in film, Nadia worked on several Hollywood and independent features. She is currently developing a cross-platform project to advance awareness of the Palestinian Nakba, while producing and consulting on Palestine-themed film & tv productions that envision a more just and sustainable future.

• Jeffrey Haas

Jeffrey Haas is a movement lawyer based in Santa Fe, New Mexico. In 1969, Jeff and his partners formed the People's Law Office in Chicago, representing Black Panthers and other social movement organizers. In 2009 Jeff published The Assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and the Chicago Police Murdered a Black Panther. Most recently from 2016 to the present Jeff represented Water Protectors at Standing Rock. Jeff is on the board of the indigenous-led Water Protectors Legal Collective.

NYC 4 Ceasefire

Members of the New York State Communist Party and the New York Young Communist League joined a press conference and vigil at City Hall Park in NYC with the NYC 4 Ceasefire coalition on Wednesday, Feb. 28 2024, demanding the NYC Council pass a pro-ceasefire resolution.

Jawanza Williams of VOCAL NY opened up the press conference. “We have gathered here today to show city-wide support for an immediate and permanent ceasefire and end to the genocide in Palestine,” he said. More than one hundred people joined the press conference.

Activists and leaders from Adalah Justice Project, Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, and others also spoke, as well as a number of NYC Councilmembers supporting the resolution, and NYC Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams.

Members of the NY Young Communist League attended the vigil. “We young communists want to express our deepest sympathies with all Palestinian people — to the tens of thousands who have been martyred and to the millions who are still struggling for their liberation,” NY YCL co-chair Brooklyn Crawford said. “The U.S. working class opposes the use of its tax dollars to fund the murder of Palestinians, not only because that money should be being used for the betterment of our own citizens in social programs, in healthcare, in education, in housing, … but also because we simply have a duty to always stand up against the brutal and cruel treatment of other human beings.”

Advocacy for the Ceasefire Now Resolution

Adalah Justice Project Ceasefire Now Letter

On January 26, 2024, Adalah Justice Project "sponsored" a letter with Democratic Socialists of America, MPower Change, Jewish Voice for Peace Action urging people to send a letter to Congress "demonstrat[ing] mass support" for the Ceasefire Now Resolution.

Initial Endorser of the Ceasefire Now Resolution

Ceasefire Now Resolution

Adalah Justice Project was listed as an endorser of the Ceasefire Now Resolution, which called for Joe Biden to pressure Israel to stop their efforts to destroy Hamas and to send "humanitarian aid" to Palestine after the Hamas terror attack on October 7, 2023. The Ceasefire Now Resolution was initiated by Cori Bush, Rashida Tlaib, Summer Lee, and Delia Ramirez.,

From an October 16, 2023 Cori Bush Press Release:,

Washington, D.C. (October 16, 2023) — Today, Representatives Cori Bush (MO-01), Rashida Tlaib (MI-12), Andre Carson (IN-07), Summer Lee (PA-12), and Delia Ramirez (IL-03), alongside Representatives Jamaal Bowman (NY-16), Bonnie Watson Coleman (NJ-12), Chuy Garcia (IL-04), Jonathan Jackson (IL-01), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14), Ilhan Omar (MN-05), Ayanna Pressley (MA-07), and Nydia Velazquez (NY-07) announced a resolution urging the Biden Administration to call for an immediate de-escalation and ceasefire in Israel and occupied Palestine, to send humanitarian aid and assistance to Gaza, and to save as many lives as possible.

“I am grieving for every Palestinian, Israeli, and American life lost to this violence, and my heart breaks for all those who will be forever traumatized because of it. War and retaliatory violence doesn’t achieve accountability or justice; it only leads to more death and human suffering,” said Congresswoman Bush. “Today I am introducing the Ceasefire Now Resolution, vital legislation that calls for de-escalation and an immediate ceasefire in Israel and Occupied Palestine, and for humanitarian assistance to urgently be delivered to the 2.2 million people under siege and trapped in Gaza. The United States bears a unique responsibility to exhaust every diplomatic tool at our disposal to prevent mass atrocities and save lives. We can’t bomb our way to peace, equality, and freedom. With thousands of lives lost and millions more at stake, we need a ceasefire now...”