Aaron Peterer has been working for the Anne Frank House since 2002. Being Austrian he had the opportunity to do his civil service in form of a memorial service for 14 months at the Anne Frank House. After completion of his service he continued working in the International Department of the Anne Frank House. Today he is a Project Manager in the Educational Projects Department. He has worked in Western, as well as in non-Western educational and cultural settings. From 2009 to 2012 he organized the "Anne Frank - A History for Today" exhibition school tour of 20 schools in South Africa, training more than 200 students to become peer-guides for the Anne Frank exhibition. He co-conceptualized the Free2choose-Create and Memory Walk film workshops, where students create debate films on human rights issues and on memorialization. Aaron holds a degree in Comparative Arts and Media Studies from the Free University of Amsterdam.

Bashir, from Rwanda, is currently Technical Director at MindLeaps. He started dancing in 2008 in the Inshoza Contemporary Dance Company. Bashir holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Urban and Regional Planning from the National University of Rwanda and is fluent in English, French, Luganda, Kiswahili and Kinyarwanda.

He has been working with MindLeaps since 2014 and launched the 2018 program with United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Rwanda. Bashir served as the Assistant Director of MindLeaps in Rwanda before becoming Director of Strategic Partnerships in 2019. In that role, he launched MindLeaps’ UNHCR project serving vulnerable children across Rwanda’s six refugee camps. He trained and managed a team of 36 youth refugee trainers to implement the program. In 2020, Bashir moved into his new role as Technical Director in which he is standardizing operations across the continent of Africa andl aunching a MindLeaps Academy to build leadership skills in African youth.

Most recently, Bashir has been joining MindLeaps’ Rebecca Davis to speak about the organization’s response to COVID-19 and new online learning strategies. Some recent publicity engagements have included Together We Remember Vigil (Global), TV21 in North Macedonia, and interviews with Budd Mishkin, Issroff Family Foundation and Russian Pointe’s 5-6-7 EIGHT podcast.

Imam Abdullah Antepli is a Fellow on Jewish-Muslim Relations at the Shalom Hartman Institute and Co-Director of the Muslim Leadership Initiative. He is on the faculty at both Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy and Duke Divinity School, where from 2008–2014 he served as the university’s first Muslim chaplain, one of only a handful of full-time Muslim chaplains at U.S. colleges and universities. He was recently recognized as one of the most influential Muslims in US Higher Education by the NonProfit Times.

In his multiple roles at Duke, Imam Abdullah engages students, faculty, and staff across and beyond campus through seminars, panels, and other avenues to provide a Muslim voice and perspective to the discussions of faith, spirituality, social justice, and more. Imam Abdullah also serves as a faculty member in the Duke Divinity School, teaching courses on Islam and Muslim cultures.

From 1996–2003 Imam Abdullah worked on a variety of faith-based humanitarian and relief projects in Myanmar (Burma) and Malaysia with the Association of Social and Economic Solidarity with Pacific Countries. He then served as the first Muslim chaplain at Wesleyan University, and subsequently as the Associate Director of the Islamic Chaplaincy Program & Interfaith Relations and an adjunct faculty member at Hartford Seminary in Connecticut.

Imam Abdullah is the founder and executive board member of the Association of College Muslim Chaplains (ACMC) and a board member of the Association for College and University Religious Affairs (ACURA).

Ahed Festuk, an activist from Aleppo, Syria, was one of Syria's pioneer women demonstrators. When the war erupted, she worked as a paramedic on the frontlines, and remained in Aleppo's rebel-held side until late November 2015.Festuk also joined several local organizations, helping them provide humanitarian relief and raising funds to expand their efforts. Simultaneously, she became a member of the ancillary staff of the Aleppo local council. Before seeking asylum in America in 2016, Festuk was contracted to train hostile-environment and first aid responders inside Aleppo. In 2019, she joined the Multifaith Alliance for Syrian Refugees as Manager of Humanitarian Relief and is a prominent member of the Syrian Women's Political Movement.

Cathy Buerger is the Director of Research at the Dangerous Speech Project (DSP), a Washington, DC-based NGO that studies the relationship between speech and violence. She holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Connecticut, where her research examined how civil society activists in Ghana work together to support positive norms and to uphold human rights. Her current research at the DSP focuses on civil society responses to dangerous and hateful speech online. She is a Research Affiliate of UConn’s Economic and Social Rights Research Group, Managing Editor of the Journal of Human Rights, and an Editor for the Teaching Human Rights Database.

Dina Bailey is the CEO of Mountain Top Vision, a consulting firm that generates systemic change within organizations so that they can more positively impact their communities and, so, impact the world. Using a unique approach that combines research in empathy, bias, diversity, equity, and inclusion with strategies and techniques from the fields of education, anthropology, and transitional justice, Mountain Top Vision specializes in supporting organizations as they transform themselves into places that consistently center inclusion in decision-making and action. Dina has over 15 years of experience in formal and informal education. Ten years of that time were focused on building deep, authentic community relationships through various dialogic formats at both the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center as well as the National Center for Civil and Human Rights. Those organizations’ missions tied, the past, present, and future together through the topics of enslavement and civil rights respectively. The remaining five years have been spent in consulting with organizations who are focusing on the intersection of race, memory and activism. Dina may be reached at dina@mountaintopvisionllc.com and www.mountaintopvisionllc.com.

Kerry Whigham is Assistant Professor of Genocide and Mass Atrocity Prevention at Binghamton University's Institute for Genocide and Mass Atrocity Prevention (I-GMAP). He received a Ph.D. in Performance Studies from New York University. His first book, Resonant Violence: Affect, Memory, and Activism in Post-Genocide Socities, will be published in 2021 by Rutgers University Press. He is the Communications Officer and a member of the executive board for the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS). In addition to his academic work, he is the Director of Research and Online Education at the Auschwitz Institute for the Prevention of Genocide and Mass Atrocities, an international non-governmental organization that works with over 80 countries around the world on creating public policy for the protection of vulnerable groups and the prevention of mass atrocities. www.kerrywhigham.com

Kondwani Fidel has used the power of storytelling to confront education reform and civil rights all over the world. Fidel was honored in the "Best of Baltimore" issue of the Baltimore Sun for his courage, innovative thinking, and leadership in local schools and communities. Fidel is the author of The Antiracist: How to Start the Conversation about Race and Take Action, Hummingbirds in the Trenches and Raw Wounds. He received his BA in English from Virginia State University, and his MFA in Creative Writing and Publishing Arts from the University of Baltimore. Fidel was honored with the Baltimore City 2018 Civil Rights Literary Award, and his bio-film Hummingbirds in The Trenches was nominated for Amazon’s 2019 All Voices Film Festival.

Layla lives in Bethlehem in the West Bank. In 2002, her 6 months old son, Qussay, became ill and Israeli soldiers prevented Layla from taking him to the hospital for more than five hours. Qussay soon died from the lack of timely treatment. Layla joined the Parents Circle in 2016. Following her son’s death, she never thought of revenge, but rather has devoted her time and energy to ensuring a better, more peaceful future for her children.

Mali Obomsawin is a citizen of the Odanak Abenaki First Nation. She is an activist, educator, and consultant doing Indigenous and anti-racist advocacy, working both independently and with the Bangor-based organization Racial Equity and Justice. Mali is the president and founder of Bomazeen Land Trust, a Maine-based intertribal organization devoted to facilitating the return of Wabanaki land to Wabanaki peoples. Mali is also a contributor to Smithsonian Folklife Magazine and The Boston Globe. As a scholar, she is involved in several historical recovery and translation projects, and received Gedakina's Dawnland Fund grant for her work in 2020. She is a professional musician, tours internationally with her band Lula Wiles (Smithsonian Folkways Recordings), and teaches music at camps and festivals across the US. Mali graduated from Dartmouth College in 2018 with a B.A in Government and Comparative Literature.

Mandar is the Executive Director of Cities4Peace - an initiative of the International Association for Human Values. Until 2016, Mandar worked at Shell for 17 years at Shell International. In his last role, he managed Shell’s prestigious GameChanger social innovation program investing in ideas that create shared value – business value and social impact. For over a decade, Mandar has taught leadership programs using meditation practices volunteering for the International Association for Human Values and the Art of Living Foundation.

Mandar also started the From India With Love initiative to reinvigorate the ancient message of nonviolence (or Ahimsa) in the world. Aligned with this mission, in Oct 2018, Mandar hosted the inaugural World Summit for Countering Violence & Extremism that brought together peace activists and law enforcement executives to promote peace and compassion in the world.

Mduduzi (Mdu) Ntuli works as an Education Officer and facilitator at the Johannesburg Holocaust & Genocide Centre in South Africa. He is pursuing his doctorate at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa. Mr. Ntuli is now involved with Holocaust and genocide education for seven years; prior to joining the Johannesburg Holocaust & Genocide Centre he worked at the Durban Holocaust & Genocide Centre for five years. He presented in national and international conferences and workshops including a TED talk in 2020.

Naomi Kikoler is the director of the Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide. As the Center’s deputy director she led Center’s policy engagement with the United States government and work on Bearing Witness countries, including undertaking the documentation of the commission of genocide by ISIS. Previously she served as the policy and advocacy director for the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, leading its work on populations at risk and engaging the United Nations Security Council. She has for Amnesty International Canada, the UN Office of the Special Advisor on the Prevention of Genocide, the Office of the Prosecutor at the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, the Brookings-Bern Project on Internal Displacement at the Brookings Institution, as an election monitor in Kenya with the Carter Center and as an adjunct professor at the New School University. She is a graduate of McGill University’s Faculty of Law, Oxford University, where her masters thesis was on the Rwandan genocide, and the University of Toronto. She is a board member of the Canadian Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, the Free Yezidi Foundation, is a Fellow at the Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies, and was called to the Bar of Upper Canada.

Nick Haberman is a 4th generation teacher from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 2018, he was named the Holocaust Center of Pittsburgh’s “Holocaust Educator of the Year,” the Pennsylvania Council for the Social Studies “Secondary Teacher of the Year,” Incline Magazine’s “Who’s Next in Education,” “Master Teacher of the Holocaust” by the Jewish Foundation for the Righteous, and he is a 2019-2020 Unites States Holocaust Memorial Museum teacher fellow. In addition to creating and managing the Light Education Initiative, Nick teaches “The Holocaust: Background, Tragedy, and Aftermath” and “Multiculturalism, Genocide, and Human Rights Violations” at Shaler Area High School.

Peter Mousaferiadis is an internationally recognised thought leader of culture as a driver of peace and innovation. Before founding Cultural Infusion in 2002, Peter had an extensive career in the arts as a creative director, producer, artistic director, music director, composer and a champion of intercultural dialogue. He produced major intercultural productions for the United Nations, the Parliament of World Religions, and the United Religions Initiative.

In 2013, Peter produced the winning slogan of the United Nations Alliance of Civilisations’ Do One Thing For Diversity campaign, “Diversified We Grow”, which was presented at the World Forum on Intercultural Dialogue in Baku, Azerbaijan. In 2014 Peter was elected as Global Trustee to the United Religions Initiative, and in 2015 was appointed an associate of Gary Bouma, UNESCO Chair for Intercultural and Interreligious Relations in the Asia-Pacific region.

Peter was appointed Chair of the Lahore International Conference on Culture in Pakistan in both 2016 and 2017. As of 2017, Cultural Infusion is a formal partner of the Australian National Commission for UNESCO.

Rachel Brown is the Founder and Executive Director of Over Zero, an organization that merges research and practice to build long-term societal resilience to identity-based violence and other forms of group-targeted harm. She is a recognized expert on confronting hateful and dangerous rhetoric, and for the past decade has worked to address the role of communication in violent conflict. She is the author of Defusing Hate: A Strategic Communication Guide to Counteract Dangerous Speech and a former Fellow at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide. Rachel’s work has been profiled at conferences, events, and publications globally, including on CBS and at the United States Institute for Peace, United States Airforce Academy, UN Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs, the Harvard Institute of Politics, and the Stavros Niarchos Foundation International Conference on Philanthropy.

Rachel previously founded and was the CEO of Sisi ni Amani-Kenya (SNA-K), an internationally recognized organization that pioneered new strategies to build local capacity for violence prevention and civic engagement in Kenya. This work has been profiled in a documentary film, articles, academic reports, and global conferences. Rachel has also provided trainings and strategy support to organizations and programs in the U.S., Europe, Asia, and Africa and consulted for organizations including the World Bank, DAI, and Internews.

"Rebecca is the Founder and Executive Director of MindLeaps, a not-for-profit organization advancing the education of vulnerable children around the world through the creative arts. Prior to MindLeaps, Rebecca worked for The Carter Center, Stage Holding Russia, and Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. She ran a professional dance company and a pre-professional training program in Philadelphia for five years that produced six full-length original narrative

works (Antigone, Helen Keller, DARFUR, Greed: The Tale of Enron, Van Gogh, and Braving The New World). Rebecca graduated summa cum laude with a Bachelors of Business Administration in

Entrepreneurship from Temple University, and she holds a Masters in International Relations with a concentration in Peacekeeping from American Military University. She received a post- graduate certificate in Ballet and Choreography Studies during her Fulbright year in Russia."

Robi is the Israeli spokesperson and the Foreign Relations Director of the Parents Circle – Families Forum (PCFF), a group of 600 Israeli and Palestinian families who have lost close family members to the conflict and who work together for reconciliation and a just resolution to the conflict. Robi Damelin's son, David, was killed by a Palestinian sniper in March of 2002 while he was guarding a checkpoint near a settlement during his army reserve service. Since becoming active in the Parents Circle, Robi has spoken to hundreds and thousands of Israelis and Palestinians and people all over the world to demand that reconciliation be a part of any peace agreement. Robi was named as a 2015 Woman of Impact by Women in the World. In 2014, Robi was selected by the Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice as one of four Women PeaceMakers. She is the protagonist featured in the International Prize winning documentary, One Day after Peace.

Rushan Abbas started her activism work while she was a student, participating in the pro-democracy demonstrations at Xinjiang University in 1985 and 1988. Since her arrival in the United States in 1989, Ms. Abbas has been an ardent campaigner for the human rights of the Uyghur people and has worked closely with members of Congress since the 1990s. Ms. Abbas was a co-founder of the California-based Uyghur Overseas Student and Scholars Association in 1993, the first such Uyghur association in the United States, and served as that organization’s first Vice-President. The charter co-drafted by Ms. Abbas later served as the blueprint and played an important role in the establishment of the Uyghur American Association (UAA) in 1998. Ms. Abbas was subsequently elected Vice President of UAA for two terms. When Radio Free Asia launched Uyghur service in 1998, Ms. Abbas was the first Uyghur reporter broadcasting daily to the Uyghur region.

Ms. Abbas has also provided linguist and translator services for several federal agencies including the Department of Defense, and President George W. Bush and former First Lady Laura Bush. From 2002 Ms. Abbas worked with the US Department of Defense, Department of Justice, State Department and US administration with their efforts on resettlement of 22 Uyghurs from Guantanamo Bay to Albania, Sweden, Bermuda, Palau, Switzerland, El-Salvador, and Slovenia.

In 2017, Rushan Abbas founded Campaign for Uyghurs to advocate and promote human rights and democratic freedoms for Uyghurs, and mobilize the international community to act to stop the human rights atrocity in East Turkistan. Under her organization, Ms. Abbas introduced and led the “One Voice One Step” movement and successfully organized a demonstration on March 15th, 2018, in 14 countries and 18 cities on the same day to protest China’s detention of millions of Uyghurs in concentration camps.

Rushan Abbas has almost 20 years of experience in global business development, international relations, and government affairs throughout the Middle East, Africa, CIS regions, Europe, Asia, Australia, North America, and Latin America.

Ms. Abbas frequently briefs US lawmakers and officials on the human rights situation in East Turkistan. She regularly appears on media outlets to advocate for the Uyghur cause and gives public speeches in universities and think tanks. She currently resides in Herndon, Virginia."

Sadia is Founder and Executive Director of Thought Partnerships and has spent the last twenty years deeply engaged in field-building. Through working strategically with a range of diverse human rights organizations, identifying and inviting new stakeholders into conversations, Sadia serves as a thought partner who seeks to identify and create opportunities, connections, and collaborations that help the global peacebuilding and conflict prevention fields to thrive and grow.

Prior to Thought Partnerships, Sadia served as the Managing Director of The Nexus Fund where she oversaw the organization’s global programmatic teams and interventions. She pioneered grantmaking approaches and technical support programs to seed and support local to global network and locally led peacebuilding initiatives to help prevent mass atrocities.

Before joining Nexus, Sadia worked as the Program Officer for Wellspring Philanthropic Fund’s Atrocities Prevention and Response Program. During this time, in addition to grantmaking, Sadia founded a number of working groups including the Global Working Group to Prevent Identity Based Violence and the U.S. Working Group to Counter Hate and Division, which she continues to convene. Sadia has also worked as a practitioner to prevent and respond to international conflicts in South Asia, Myanmar, Syria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, Sudan, South Sudan and Nigeria through a variety of roles with organizations including Amnesty International, Oxfam America, Center for American Progress and Human Rights First.

Sadia serves on the Board of Directors for Invisible Children, the Steering Committee for the Peace and Security Funders Group where she is also a member of their Committee on advancing Diversity Equity and Inclusion in philanthropy. Sadia is also a member of an Experts Committee for Preventing Mass Violence convened by the Protection and Prevention Working Group at the Friends Committee for National Legislation.

Sadia earned her MA in International Development in 2003 from American University’s School of International Service, and holds a BA Honors in Political Science and Economic Development as well as a professional certification in International Human Rights Laws and Practice.

Shannon Foley Martinez, a former violent white supremacist, has two decades of experience in developing community resource platforms aimed at inoculating individuals against violence-based lifestyles and ideologies. Foley Martinez has worked in at-risk communities teaching and developing dynamic resiliency skills. She has worked for school systems, nonprofits, and community organizations. She has participated in programs with such organizations as the UN Office of Counter Terrorism, the National Counterterrorism Center, Hedayah, The Center for the Prevention of Radicalization Leading to Violence, UN Women, and the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine. Her story has been featured globally, including: The TODAY Show, NBC's "Left Field," the Atlanta Journal Constitution, the Associated Press, the Washington Post, Marie Claire magazine, Quartz, Al Jazeera America, and Georgia Public Broadcasting’s “On Second Thought" program. She has been a commentator on such news outlets as HLN, CNN, Canada One and BBC radio. Foley Martinez has also assisted in training law enforcement officers, building programs for educators, and collaborating with tech companies like Google and Twitter. As the mother of seven children, she feels passionately about building empowered families and communities. She believes that we all have the power to enact profound and fundamental change in our lives.

Shantay McKinily is the Director of the Positive Schools Center (PSC) at the University of Maryland School of Social Work and the founder of Inspire Education Trust. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in English from Morgan State University in 1998. a Master’s of Science in Adult Education from Coppin State University in 2007, and is currently pursuing he doctorate in Urban Education Leadership from Morgan State University. Ms. McKinily worked for Baltimore City Public Schools for the last 19 years, 8 of those years were spent serving as the principal of the “Wonderful” Walter P. Carter Elementary/Middle School. At the PSC, she now works to train and support principals, leadership teams, and district office staff to create nurturing, holistic racially equitable learning environments. In addition to providing leadership coaching, she provides training in Restorative Practices, Trauma informed Care and Healing approaches and implementing successful alternatives to punitive discipline methods in schools. Most recently she has been supporting teachers, leaders, parents, and communities on how to become “Competent Adults” on their path to wholeness.

Sigall Horovitz is a Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice Officer at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. She was previously a Legal Officer at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and the Special Court for Sierra Leone.

She headed the Human Rights Education Department at the International Nuremberg Principles Academy, and held positions at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv University and other academic institutions. Her interests include transitional justice, international law, and justice education. She publishes and lectures on these topics as an active academic alongside her UN position. Horovitz holds a Master of Laws from Columbia University, and a PhD in Law from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her views expressed during the Virtual Global Allyship Summit are her own views and do not reflect the position of the United Nations.

Wai Wai Nu is a former political prisoner and the founder and Executive Director of the Women's Peace Network in Burma. She spent seven years as a political prisoner in Burma. Since her release from prison in 2012, Nu has dedicated herself to working for democracy and human rights, particularly on behalf of marginalized women and members of her ethnic group, the Rohingya.

Through the Women's Peace Network, Nu works to build peace and mutual understanding between Burma’s ethnic communities and to empower and advocate for the rights of marginalized women throughout Burma, and particularly in Rakhine State. Her work also aims to reduce discrimination and hatred among Buddhist and Muslim communities and to improve the human rights of the Rohingya people through documentation, convenings, and policy advocacy among key leaders in Burma and high-level international fora.

To engage youth in the peacebuilding process, Nu founded the Yangon Youth Center—a space where young people from diverse backgrounds can come together to learn, share, and explore their ideas and promote leadership in social, political, and peacebuilding policymaking.

Nu organized the My Friend Campaign with youth from different communities to promote tolerance and to reduce discrimination among diverse groups. Through her work, she has been recognized as a Champion of Prevention by the United Nation’s Office of the Prevention of Genocide and Responsibility to Protect.

In 2014, Nu Co-Founded Justice for Women in Yangon, a legal and advocacy organization that works with victims of gender-based violence and provides pro bono legal consultation.

Nu is the recipient of numerous awards including the N-Peace Awards (2014), Democracy Courage Tributes (2015), World Movement for Democracy (2015), the Hillary Rodham Clinton Award (2018), and Impact Hero (2019).

Nu was named among ""100 Top Women,"" BBC (2014); among 100 inspiring women, Salt Magazine (2017); among 100 World Thinkers, Foreign Policy Magazine (2015); Next Generation Leader, Time Magazine (2017); and among Women of the Year, Financial Times (2017).

Nu received her bachelor’s degree in law from the University of Yangon in Burma and her master’s degree in law from the University of Berkeley.

She previously served as a visiting scholar with the Human Rights Center at the University of Berkeley, the University of Michigan’s Center for the Education of Women, and Columbia University. Nu was also a Draper Hills Summer Fellow at Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law.

Dr. Yolanda Chavez Leyva is a fronteriza, born and raised on the U.S.-Mexico border. She has dedicated her career to documenting the stories of people on the border. She teaches border and Mexican American history as an associate professor at the University of Texas at El Paso and directs the Institute of Oral History. Her most recent oral history project is "Seeking Refuge," a collection of interviews with asylum seekers and their advocates in which she is assisted by her doctoral research assistants, Kimberly Sumano Ortega and Ligia Arguilez. She is also a founding member of Paso del Sur, a grassroots organization that works with barrios facing demolition and displacement.