Just Peace Festival

Just Peace Dialogue: Peace in Israel-Palestine

Date: Thursday 19 June 2025
Time: 16:00 - 19:00 hour
Address: The Hague Humanity Hub
Fluwelen Burgwal 58
2511 CJ The Hague
Room: Forest

Registration is required. Tickets are free. Get yours here.

Meet the Panel

Umayya Abu-Hanna, Palestinian Author

Umayya Abu-Hanna is a Palestinian author living in Amsterdam and working on urban futures. Her book The Holy Girls, about Palestinian histories will be published in 2026. In Helsinki she was a member of the Helsinki City Council, Arts Council Finland, and was Head of the Media department at Helsinki University of Applied Sciences. She believes that hope is a discipline.

Taghreed El Khodary, Journalist for Gaza

Before moving to the Netherlands, El-Khodary was the New York Times correspondent in Gaza from 2001 to 2009, an analyst for the International Crisis Group, and a TV reporter for Al-Hayat-LBC. Taghreed covered the second Intifada, Israel‘s unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, the Palestinian civil war in 2007, and the war on Gaza in 2008-2009. She also trained journalists in Palestine and Sudan. Taghreed worked for eight years as a senior editor for Fanack.com, a chronicle on the Middle East and North Africa. Currently, Elkhodary is a commentator on Gaza and Palestine and gives media training at RNW Media.

Jeff Handmaker, Erasmus University Rotterdam

Jeff Handmaker is an Associate Professor of Legal Sociology at the Hague-based International Institute of Social Studies (ISS) of Erasmus University Rotterdam and in a Visiting capacity in the School of Law, University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. He has published widely on topics concerning Palestinians’ decades-long impasse with Israel and previously worked as a human rights lawyer in South Africa and other parts of the world. He conducts research on legal mobilization and in 2022 co-founded with others the Legal Mobilization Platform, a network of more than 350 scholars and practitioners.

Noa Schonmann, Leiden University

Dr Noa Schonmann is Assistant Professor in International Relations of the Middle East at Leiden University's Institute for Area Studies (LIAS) in the Netherlands. Previously she was Lecturer at the Department of Politics and International Relations (DPIR) and a Fellow of Pembroke College, University of Oxford, UK. Her research focuses on conflict and regional order in the Middle East, Israeli foreign policy and diplomatic history.

Nadia Sonneveld, Picturing Scholasticide Project

Nadia Sonneveld works as an Associate Professor at the Van Vollenhoven Institute for Law, Governance and Society, Leiden Law School. Her socio-legal research focuses on life events, religion, law and citizenship in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). She is involved in Picturing Scholasticide, a multimodal exhibition created by staff and students of Leiden University to highlight the social and legal consequences of Israel’s efforts to dismantle Palestinian institutions of higher education.

Moderator: Jan Aart Scholte, Leiden University

Jan Aart Scholte is Professor of Global Transformations and Governance Challenges at Leiden University, with a split appointment between the Institute of Political Science and the Institute of Security and Global Affairs. Also principal coordinator of the Just Peace Dialogues.

Schedule

15.30 Doors open
16.00-17.00 Roundtable
17.00-18.00 Breakout Groups
18.00-19.00 Borrel

Register for the Just Peace Dialogues!

The Just Peace Dialogues are a free event hosted by Leiden University. Space is limited, therefore registration is required for all Just Peace Dialogues.

The Just Peace Dialogues are a set of meetings for public deliberation of key aspects of building peace in today’s world. The dialogues are held from 16 to 22 of June and address each of the festival’s six main themes. The aim is stimulate creative discussion about conditions for a just peace in contemporary society.

The dialogues are:

Imagining Peace (16 June 2025 16:00 - 19:00);
Peace in Europe (17 June 2025 16:00 - 19:00);
Peace in Sudan (18 June 2025 16:00 - 19:00);
Peace in Israel-Palestine (19 June 16:00 - 19:00);
Democracy and Peace (20 June 2025 16:00 - 19:00);
Cybersecurity and Peace (21 June 14:00 - 17:15);
Climate and Peace (22 June 14:00 - 17:15).

About the Just Peace Festival

global transformations and governance challenges