Rising Stars Winners

We are thrilled to announce that our Human Rights Award’s Rising Stars winners for 2024 are: Eran Nissan and Rawyah Handaqlu.

Rawyah Handaqlu– Emergency Headquarters to Combat Crime and Violence in Arab Society

A dynamic, articulate, leader, lawyer Rawyah is at the head of the newly formed Emergency Headquarters to Combat Crime and Violence in Arab Society. Organised crime within Arab towns in Israel has reached a crisis point in the last two years, with the current government’s widespread neglect of the issue widely accepted as a major contributing factor. See her advocate for the Arab-Israeli population (in Hebrew) here, or see a translation of the video here.

Rawyah is a trained lawyer with an MA in public policy from Haifa University, where she currently lives. She was instrumental as a consultant for the NIS 10 billion 922 national economic programme for developing Arab society. She is recognised by Calcalist (a leading financial paper in Israel) and Haaretz as ‘one to watch’. See a Calcalist article about Rawyah in Hebrew here or an English translation here. Over her impressive professional career, she has been involved in several joint Jewish-Arab regional council leadership projects and held roles with NIF grantees Adalah and Kayan.

Rawyah, a Palestinian Citizen from the village of Jatt in Israel’s ‘triangle’ area, has been campaigning on gender-based and political issues since she was a small child.

 

Eran Nissan – Mehazkim

Eran is a young, impressive vision-orientated Jewish Israeli leader and the CEO of Mehazkim, a digital activism movement that reaches 1.5 million Israelis a month. Through on-the-ground protest and digital campaigns, Mehazkim is working effectively to strengthen the progressive, democratic base in Israel. Mehazkim’s model of change works to energise and empower the progressive camp in Israel and from this place of power persuade those in the mainstream to ‘connect the dots’ and imagine a different political future.

Eran is also part of a group working on new visions for political horizons in Geneva. In 2019 Eran interned in a congressional office in Washington D.C. as part of the ‘New Story Leadership’ programme.

He holds a BA in political science & Philosophy, and an M.A. in Emergency & Disaster Management.

A qualified medic, Eran provided immediate emergency room relief in the wake of October 7th.

After aiding those who were injured during a terror attack in Jaffa on the 1st of October, Eran spoke out against Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, for his inflammatory anti-muslim comments. He also appeared on the British political podcast, ‘Byline’ along with Standing Together National Field Organiser, Uri Weltman, to discuss pathways to peace. Both can be found below.

 

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