As a Palestinian-American, Noura Erakat tells the story of the people and a land in compelling, personal, and informative ways – from first-hand experience. She has lived, worked, and studied in Israel-Palestine and has a keen understanding of the different issues underlying the conflict. Her ability to present the basics in a fair way to people who know little is astounding, as is her belief in relating the Palestinian struggle to others around the world.
While a leading student activist for Palestinian rights and divestment from Israel, she studied the Middle East at the University of California, Berkeley. Upon finishing law school at UC Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law, Erakta received a New Voices Fellowship to work at the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation (USC) in Washington, DC. At the USC, she works as the National Grassroots Organizer and Legal Advocate.
From numerous speaking appearances, Erakat developed a reputation for an exhilarating speaking ability. Erakat is informed, but far from dry; persuasive, but fair; and passionate enough to make sure audiences have no choice but to be engaged.
Erakat is also an artist. She wrote and directed the play, “Pulse of the Intifada,” based on an oral history she gathered in Palestine during October 2000, the first month of the
Al-Aqsa Intifada. After visiting Shatila refugee camp in Beirut, Lebanon in August 2002, she produced a radio documentary to commemorate the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacre. The National Federation of Community Broadcasters later nominated the piece for the Golden Reel 2003 award for “Best Local Documentary.” She is completing another radio documentary on Israel's systematic discrimination against Palestinians using first-hand materials she gathered in the Summer 2003 while interning at Adalah: the Legal Center for Arab Minority Civil Rights in Haifa, Israel.
With media appearances on MSNBC and ‘Politically Incorrect’ with Bill Maher, among others, Erakat is emerging as an important voice for Palestinians in the United States.
