Unveiling Equity

Dr. Samah Jabr

Dr. Samah Jabr is a psychiatrist practicing in Palestine, serving communities in East Jerusalem and the West Bank; formally, she was the Head of the Mental Health Unit within the Palestinian Ministry of Health. She is an Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the George Washington University in Washington DC and participates in the Scientific Committee of the Global Initiative Against Impunity for International Crimes and Serious Human Rights Violations—a program co-funded by the European Union—as a member of its Scientific Committee.

Dr. Jabr is a trainer and supervisor in diverse aspects of mental health, with a special focus on cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), the WHO’s Mental Health Gap Action Programme (mhGAP), and the UN’s Istanbul Protocol for investigation and documentation of torture. She frequently consults on program development for international organizations. Her key interests include the rights of prisoners, suicide prevention, and historical trauma.

In addition to her clinical work, Dr. Jabr has dedicated over two decades to advocating on behalf of the mental healthcare and well-being of the Palestinian people, focusing on victims of torture and trauma. She is the author of several books, including Beyond the Frontlines,Sumud, Sumud in Times of Genocide, and The Time of Genocide: Bearing Witness to a Year in Palestine; many of these volumes have been published in several languages. In the summer of 2025, her most recent book became available—Radiance in Pain and Resilience: The Global Reverberations of Palestinian Historical Trauma. Recently, she was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Bergen in recognition of her exceptional contributions.

Dr. Jabr integrates her medical expertise with her activism, often addressing the psychological impact of occupation, historical trauma, and war. She is a founding member of the Sumud Network for Mental Health and a prolific speaker on liberation psychology and the ethical responsibilities of mental health professionals in the context of political violence.

Ghayda Hassan (Ph.D.)

Director and Founder

Dr. Ghayda Hassan is a clinical psychologist and professor of clinical psychology at UQÀM. She has several research, clinical, and community-based national and international affiliations. She is the director of the Canada Practitioners Network for the Prevention of Extremist Violence (CPN-PREV, funded by Public Safety Canada). She also is a UNESCO co-chair on Prevention of Violence Radicalization, as well as a researcher and clinical consultant at the SHERPA-RAPS team and the CIUSSS-COIM. She is a researcher, clinician, as well as a policy consultant in matters of interventions in the context of violence (radicalization, family violence, and war). Her systematic reviews, research, and clinical activities are centered around four main areas of clinical cultural psychology: 1) Social suffering, inter-community relations, radicalization, and extremist violence; 2) Intervention in family violence and cultural diversity; 3) Identity, belonging, and mental health of children and adolescents from ethnic/religious minorities; and 4) Working with vulnerable immigrants and refugees.

Zeina Ismail Allouche

Zeina Ismail Allouche is Rsearch Coordinator at the Centre for the Study of Learning and Performance at Concordia at the director of partnerships and Program development at CPN PREC, See has a PHD in Social Sciences and Arts with over 25 years of experience in the field of child protection, gender-based violence, and child trafficking for illegal transracial/international adoption practices. She has assumed leadership positions within numerous international organizations.

Zeina has contributed to international initiatives promoting family strengthening to prevent separation and lead integrated reform initiatives to reform the child protection sector in many countries. She collaborated with Georgetown University to design and deliver a child protection specialist training program with a focus on interdisciplinary and comprehensive case management. She developed a policy on child protection for media (UNICEF Lebanon).

An oral history/autoethnography storyteller and performer, Zeina is grounded in Indigenous methodologies and decolonized research practice. She contributed to various publications advocating for child protection, with a specific focus on gender-based Violence, transracial/international adoption, child protection in the media, and the rights of children without parental care.