Supporting, empowering, Mobilizing
Our Staff
Our Team
Our organizational and administrative team are hard at work supporting our Global Grassroots Activists Network around the world. They act as connectors, supporters, and emergency contacts in times of need.
Katherine Hughes-Fraitekh
Katherine Hughes-Fraitekh is one of the three co-founders of Solidarity 2020 and Beyond and its current Director. She is an expert on peace building, social justice movements and nonviolent strategy and resistance. She trains, convenes, and researches hundreds of grassroots activists and nonviolent campaigns and movements struggling for peace, self-determination, women’s rights, economic and environmental justice, and immigrant rights in Africa, Asia, Middle East, Europe, Latin America and North America.
Over the last 10 years, she has traveled to 75 countries, invited by organizers and activists, to provide training and education, strategic planning, capacity building and solidarity for social justice movements. She was a 2020 Rotary Peace Fellow at the Chulalongkorn University in Thailand and, upon return, co-founded Solidarity 2020 and Beyond, an international network of grassroots activists, journalists and scholars supporting nonviolent movements. She provides consultancy expertise for the Global Fund for Women, the EU Peace Initiative in Palestine/Israel, UN, EU and Danish-led Youth Advisory Panel, YAP, in Palestine, Women in the Peace Process in Afghanistan, curriculum development, training, and strategic planning support for Action Aid projects with African Youth Movement and Afresist.
Previously, Katherine served as the Director of Global Field Initiatives at the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict, ICNC, the Executive Director of Peace Brigades International USA, and Director of the Teamworks Program at the Commission on the Status of Women. She earned her MA in International Development and Peace and Conflict Resolution at the American University School of International Service and completed the Arab Studies program at Georgetown University, both in Washington, DC.
Ms. Hughes-Fraitekh is on the board of Day Africa, an economic empowerment and micro-farming initiative for women and youth in vulnerable communities in Kenya. Ms. Hughes-Fraitekh is herself a grassroots activist involved in anti-racism, anti-Islamophobia, anti-militarism, indigenous rights, gun control, immigrant and women’s rights and Palestinian human rights organizing in the US. She provides commentary on international news programs, serves on panels and speaks on webinars, publishes articles and contributes to books, including in Open Democracy, https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/civilresistance/nonviolent-resistance-in-palestine-steadfastness-creativity-and-hope/ and the Middlebury Institute, Reflections: https://sites.miis.edu/reflections/2014/12/28/reflections-on-the-importance-of-unarmed-civilian-protection/, and teaches classes on movement building and MENA, specifically Palestine/Israel.
Reem Ghunaim
Reem is currently the International Outreach and Development Deputy for Solidarity 2020 and Beyond. Her role entails co-leading our international outreach and development efforts to significantly build and strengthen our communication and programs within our Global Grassroots Activist Network (GGAN), with our advisory board, the Organizing Committee, OC, and with our partners such as Africans Rising, CIVICUS, Alliance for Peacebuilding, US Institute of Peace, EU committees, and United Nations departments, and prospective funders including foundations and Rotary Districts and Clubs. This will entail expanding regional networks in the Middle East and North Africa, South Asia, SE Asia, Latin America, Europe and Africa.
Reem’s role also includes overseeing our media and communications plan and campaigns to support our outreach and development goals which include highlighting the voices of grassroots leaders and their initiatives in venues around the world, (policy makers, scholars, organizers, journalists, students) including storytelling and highlights of best practices in peacebuilding and nonviolent action. Reem prioritizes working with youth and women-led campaigns including capacity building, skill building and connections and leading and organizing delegations and conferences for peer-to-peer cross-cultural learning and sharing, especially in the Middle East and North African (MENA) region.
Reem is the immediate past Executive Director for the Rotary Action Group for Peace based in Portland, Oregon. She served on RAGFP from 2016 to 2021. Reem is a Positive Peace Activator and a Global Peace Index Ambassador for the Institute for Economics and Peace. Reem started in Rotary as a Rotaractor in Ramallah, Palestine. Later, she earned a Rotary Peace Fellowship at Duke-UNC Rotary Peace Center where she earned her master’s degree in City and Regional Planning and a certificate in International Peace and Conflict Resolution.
In addition, Reem is the Founder and CEO of MediaX, a company she founded through the Founder Institute. She is a global leader on peacebuilding, social entrepreneurship, and technology and serves on the boards of multiple national and international organizations. Reem is a thought leader whose writings have helped community leaders in more than 125 countries. She is the recipient of the 2021 Global Peace and Humanitarian Award that recognizes her transformative work and leadership. Her work has improved the lives of many people around the world and consistently contributed to promoting a culture of peace.
Reem’s mission is to dismantle stereotypes and elevate the voices of the oppressed by cultivating mutual understanding, promoting Positive Peace, and protecting Human Rights for all.
Salsabila Nurhidajat
Salsabila Nurhidajat grew up in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and currently resides in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. She received her BA from Vanderbilt University, where she studied Political Science and Cinema & Media Arts, and is passionate about uplifting underrepresented voices through storytelling and media production. Salsabila has worked in the UAE, Jordan, Morocco, and Indonesia with several organizations and non-profits. She is excited to support Solidarity 2020 and Beyond and deepen her understanding of nonviolent action and human rights.
Diana Ante
Diana Ante is a marketing engineer, specializing in climate change. In 2020 she was a participant in the regional program for the study and practice of strategic nonviolent action in the Americas in Quito. She is the creator of Dialogues for climate action, a space where relevant environmental news in Ecuador is shared. Currently, she is a Master’s student in Contemporary Integration of Latin America at the Universidade Federal da Integração Latino-Americana (Unila, Brazil) and is developing the food sovereignty research project, from the perspective of food and nutritional security in the face of the post-pandemic in the areas urban Ecuador.
Annabell Knapp
Annabell Knapp is an American Activist who currently lives in London, where she is pursuing a PhD in Politics. She has received a Bachelor of Arts in History & Political Science and Global Studies from Bridgewater College in Virginia. She also has finished a Master of Arts in Politics, Development and the Global South from Goldsmiths, University of London. Annabell is passionate about human rights, nonviolence work and magnifying the voices coming from the Global South. She has worked within the NGO sector for a couple of years, where she has focused on Palestine Justice and the implementation of Kingian Nonviolence throughout various justice areas. Annabell is excited to join the team at Solidarity 2020 and Beyond and begin her journey with us!
Sarah Ammar
Business administration and economic sciences faculty graduate, Lebanese University. Holder of two bachelor’s degrees, the first one in Management information system, the other one in Marketing. Working on community development with a support team of 19 volunteers in her region, with the goal of providing social, educational, peacebuilding activities, and services. She worked for an NGO on a 5-months project where she engaged with them in a special volunteering experience in social services and relief. She led many relief projects funded by mini-grants to help people survive in their difficult economic conditions. Passionate about peacemaking, women empowerment, community development, and seeking to be a valuable member of her country and in the MENA region who suffer every day from many problems that never end.
Catherine Ndumbe
Catherine Ndumbe holds a Bachelor of Education in curriculum studies and teaching, Master of Arts in Peace, Conflict and Security Studies from the University of Buea, Cameroon, in 2013 and 2019 and post Graduate Diploma in Entrepreneurship and Business Development from the Pan African Institute for Development West Africa, Buea Campus Cameroon in 2015/2016. She was a community outreach assistant volunteer at Women for a Change Cameroon 2015 and a Humanitarian Aid Volunteer at Noela Lyonga Foundation, Cameroon from 2017 to 2021 and later did some remote work for the organization in Nigeria between 2020 and 2021. She is passionate about women’s reproductive health rights, children’s rights, peace building, social justice, non-violent communication and nonviolence action as a whole. Her awards, fellowships, etc. include African Changemakers Fellow 2019, Humanitarian Ambassador Award by Global Goodwill Ambassadors in 2019, Volunteer award by Noela Lyonga Foundation in 2019, Women Empowered Global Award, 2020 and Teaching human Rights Fellowship by the THP also in 2020. She’s very excited to learn and contribute towards the advancement of Solidarity 2020 and Beyond as well as the GGAN.
Tom Unitt
Tom Unitt is from the United Kingdom and recently graduated with a Master’s in International Politics from SOAS in London. He completed a BA in History and Politics at the University of Greenwich. He has worked with non-profits focused on climate issues and developed a passion for activism after spending three months in Palestine, where he taught English and studied Arabic. He is excited to join Solidarity 2020 and Beyond to deepen his understanding of activism and civil resistance.
Quisi Rodriguez-Oregel
Quisi is from Los Angeles, California, and currently resides in Denver, Colorado. She has her BA in International Relations with minors in Anthropology and Spanish. Currently, she is pursuing her Master’s at the University of Denver in Anthropology. Her interests lie in politics, immigrant/migrant populations, minorities, social justice, and cultures. She is also working as a research assistant with the University of Denver which has partnered with a community organization that focuses on agricultural workers’ rights in the state of Colorado. She is passionate about giving marginalized groups the space to speak and use their voice. She is very excited to learn more about social movements, nonviolent forms of action, and activism with Solidarity 2020 and Beyond.