JUSTICE IS COLLECTIVE
To mark International Women’s Day on 8 March, we celebrate five women advancing human rights. From a community leader tackling poverty to a barrister defending Palestinian rights and a journalist campaigning for disability justice, these women are making waves locally and globally.
DANIA ABUL HAJ Senior legal officer, International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP)
Dania Abul Haj is a leading Palestinian lawyer working on business and human rights, torture, administrative detention and campaigns against the defamation of NGOs. Born
in Jerusalem, her childhood was
shaped by the second intifada, military checkpoints and the apartheid wall. ‘From an early age, words like Nakba and occupation were part of my daily reality,’ she says. At 14, she witnessed neighbours forcibly evicted by Israeli forces. ‘I woke up to the sound of their screams. Experiencing injustice is what creates a deep understanding of justice.’ She began working on Palestinian rights at 18 at Al-Quds University, documenting Bedouin displacement linked to Israeli settlements. This work revealed how law is used to legitimise
dispossession: ‘These
policies are not incidental or isolated, but deliberate and structural.’
An internship documenting torture in Israeli and Palestinian detention facilities followed by the killing of Hasan Al Baw by Israeli forces set her path to working on accountability and international legal action in defence of Palestinian rights. ‘He was a fellow law student, just like me.’
24 AMNESTY SPRING 2026
‘Experiencing injustice is what creates a deep understanding of justice’
At the ICJP, she advocates for legal accountability for international crimes by gathering evidence and building cases. She also speaks out on war crimes and anti-Palestinian racism, highlighting the international community’s ‘deafening silence’ on Gaza, calling on the UK attorney general to revoke charity status for groups funding Israeli settlements and military activities, and condemning proposed US sanctions against the International Criminal Court. Her work is urgent: ‘The international community is at a crossroads,’ she says. ‘Courts face unprecedented intimidation, and the coming months must see concerted global action to defend international law.’ She feels a sense of achievement in her work to ensure survivors of Israel’s genocide are heard. She recently spent three months in a refugee camp collecting first-hand witness statements. ‘I’m most committed to victim- centred justice. Justice is collective and indivisible – and Palestinian lives must be protected by law, like any others.’
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48
