Our People

Executive Director

Mara joined UNRWA USA in February 2020 as its new Executive Director. In this role, Mara leads a team of 8 in the United States to educate the American public about the plight of Palestine refugees and raise funds for UNRWA’s critical programs in the Middle East.

Having focused most of her career on international development, Mara has over 15 years of experience designing, implementing, and leading youth development programming in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. Mara has extensive leadership experience in youth development with a strong focus on program design and development, organizational capacity strengthening, and multi-sectoral partnership cultivation and collaboration.

Mara previously served as Regional Director of MENA and Eurasia programs at the International Youth Foundation (IYF) where she worked for over a decade. She earlier held positions at AMIDEAST and the American University in Cairo. At AMIDEAST, Mara managed corporate, foundation, and individual fundraising efforts and managed the Fulbright scholarship program for students from the MENA region. Mara was a U.S. Fulbright grantee to Syria herself between 2001 and 2003 and while in Syria, managed a U.S. State Department-funded teacher training project and UNRWA’s English Language Club for Palestinian vocational students.

Mara holds a Masters Degree in Near Eastern Studies from New York University and a Bachelors Degree in Anthropology from Stanford University.

Ask Mara about: being likely the only person on earth to have torn her anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) both on the Nile Hilton Dance floor (1997) and while climbing the Baalbek ruins (2002). Also about how she is eager, if not yet fully equipped, to sew her own throw pillow covers. Besides breaking her knee often, trying to sew, and being a mom to twins, Mara is eager to bust media-created myths about the Middle East region and particularly about its young people.

Director of Philanthropy

Born in the Emirates, Hani's family fled to the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the first Gulf War. It was tough adjusting to the harsh conditions in Gaza during the First Intifada, but his family was made whole again when his dad got a job at an UNRWA school teaching English to refugees. A child of an educator, Hani was raised with the mantra of school being the top priority, and in this pursuit, he eventually found his way to the United States, thanks to a university scholarship from the LDS Church. After earning both his Masters in Public Administration and his BA in International Studies and Latin American studies from Brigham Young University, Hani settled in Washington, DC where he fell into the world of fundraising for various causes that spoke to him, including civil rights and social justice groups for Muslim and Arab Americans and charities that serve the Palestinian people and other marginalized communities in the Middle East. Now, after more than a decade in fundraising, he's thrilled to bring this experience into his role as UNRWA USA's Director of Philanthropy.

In his free time, Hani volunteers with a number of education, health, and professional organizations. He lives in Alexandria, Virginia with his family, including his two little princesses, Zayna and Mariam.

Ask Hani about: ideas for fundraising events, Palestinian food and music, standup comedy, Arabic pop music, and his opinions on donuts and world peace.

Director of Strategic Programs

Growing up in Soddy-Daisy, Tennessee (near Chattanooga), Jason started doing Model UN in seventh grade, so he’s been committed to conflict resolution and human rights advocacy since before he could tie a tie. A first-generation college student, Jason earned his bachelor’s degree at Guilford College and a master’s degree in international peace and conflict resolution at American University.

Jason comes to UNRWA USA after a 14-year career in international education and exchange. He was most recently at Global Ties U.S., working his way up to director of exchange programs, responsible for exchanges serving over 1,500 participants annually in-person and virtually, as well as overseeing new business development. He started his career in the CEO’s office at NAFSA: Association of International Educators, honing his nonprofit management skills along the way. In these roles, Jason nurtured a passion for helping people see beyond the world immediately around them.

Alongside his career, Jason has been a grassroots LGBTQ+ rights activist, with a particular emphasis on violence prevention and community safety. For these efforts, he was recognized by the Obama Administration as an LGBTQ+ emerging leader. A mildly unruly Quaker, lately Jason has shifted his efforts from the streets to the world of poetry, hoping to offer encouragement and empowerment to queer Appalachian youth.

Ask Jason about: trying to vegetarianize Southern U.S. cuisine, baking from decades-old family recipes, the healing power of hiking to waterfalls, treating pet bunnies like royalty, and boiling your poems down to their purest essence.

Director of Communications

Born and raised in the suburbs of Washington DC to a family active in civil and human rights, some of Laila’s earliest memories involve carrying signs at demonstrations demanding social justice.

Her family’s activism gene inspired Laila’s involvement in community organizing throughout her younger years and her desire to study the Middle East at the university. Laila went on to earn a BA in Global Affairs (concentrated in the Middle East and North Africa) and a minor in Music (piano) at George Mason University.

Today, Laila brings more than a decade of experience in public relations, creating and managing nonprofit communications, and raising funds for a variety of progressive organizations. Prior to joining UNRWA USA as its Communications Officer in 2013, she managed the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC)’s communications and outreach efforts. Her current role and that at ADC illustrate Laila’s passions: humanitarian concern for the people of Palestine and the fight for social justice.

Laila has proudly served her local Arab American community as a board member of the Network of Arab American Professionals DC Chapter (NAAP-DC), the DC Palestinian Film and Arts Festival (DCPFAF), and the ADC DC Chapter. She currently acts as the DC ambassador for afikra, and is board president of Open Roads Media Foundation, which focuses on conflict transformation, intercultural dialogue, and education through the innovative use of alternative media.

Ask Laila about: connecting, communications, social media, apps, technology, music/piano, her love for all things Spanish, or the law of attraction!

Communications Manager

Being raised in seven countries for the first 18 years of her life, it is no surprise that Diala found herself drawn to communications, international affairs, and diplomacy. Similar to her upbringing, Diala's career spanned across different regions, particularly the US, Jordan, and Lebanon.

Diala has held positions in the United Nations Department of Global Communications, non-governmental organizations, and social impact businesses. Through communications and advocacy, her roles focused on bridging the gap between multilateral institutions and civil society organizations operating in crisis-affected countries. She has also interned at the Jordanian Mission to the UN and the Jordanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Diala is the cofounder of Arabs in International Affairs, an Instagram platform meant to connect, support, and highlight the professional journeys of Arabs in international affairs. As a contributing writer for multiple platforms, Diala's writing is focused on the inclusion of minority groups in US politics, women of color in foreign policy, and economic development in the Levant countries. She holds a BA in Middle Eastern Studies from Rutgers University.

Ask Diala about: the role of social media in narrative shifts, books, grandmothers' food recipes, the arts, yoga, Levantine music, and all things foreign affairs.

Advocacy and Operations Manager

Lein is a Palestinian American born and raised in North Carolina to Palestinian refugee parents fleeing the Gulf War in Kuwait. She holds a Masters in Public Health with a Global Health concentration and a Bachelors in Biology with a Marine Science concentration from the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill.

Lein spent the first seven years of her career as a marine biologist, managing a sea turtle research lab at UNC after working as an ocean outdoor educator in San Diego.

Lein’s transition to global health was inspired by her experience growing up as a first-generation American in a Palestinian refugee family, ingraining a sense of global connectivity and a responsibility to advocate for her people. Lein is passionate about the connections between the environment, animals, and health and hopes to bring an environmental justice lens to her advocacy work at UNRWA USA.

Ask Lein about: sea turtles, cage diving with Great White Sharks, biking, Buy Nothing, and salt lamps.

Development Manager

Born to Palestinian refugees from Gaza, politics and poetry run deep through Nahed’s bloodline. He grew up in Ottawa, Amman, then Melbourne, before going to Canberra for a Bachelor of Music (BMus) on the Margaret Schofield Composition Scholarship, and Bachelor of Politics, Philosophy and Economics (BPPE), at the Australian National University.

In 2018, Nahed went to Cairo, copy-editing for Egypt Independent while studying Arab classical music. The next year he returned to study at the University of Melbourne, where his thesis on Bourdieusian Lebanese history earned the WM Ball Prize for best graduate essay in International Relations. In the meantime, he took on digital fundraising for the Australia Youth Climate Coalition as its Content Team Coordinator, marketed and toured in the refugee-themed theatre production THEM, and composed A Lover from Palestine – a project in collaboration with dozens of Palestinians from Gaza to Istanbul. Fundraising for UNRWA USA is a joy for Nahed, being his only way to give back to the millions of Palestinians who cannot live in freedom and safety.

Nahed has two life dreams: to finish a symphony for Palestine, and to find out what Kanye meant by “I keep it 300, like the Romans”.

Ask Nahed about: History, his Spotify playlist, Russian literature, Hadestown, yoga, and music jams.

Development Associate

Zaina was born and raised by Palestinian refugees in Seattle, WA. She sometimes refers to herself as a “renaissance woman” having finished Pre-Medicine, Theatre, and Islamic Studies at Swarthmore College with Triple Honors. She has always been fascinated by storytelling and community building as a method for radical empathy and political change. Her major background comes from her work as a Palestinian director and producer. Her work has been in support of the de-radicalization of American thought towards Muslims and Palestinians. One of her recent and more upbeat projects included directing “R3TURN: A Palestinian Pop-Punk Musical”. Most recently, she worked as the Audience Engagement and Development Manager at Theatre Horizon in Philadelphia, PA where she worked on several fundraisers including a Third-Space Campaign which seeks to create inclusive social and artistic environments separate from the two usual social environments of home and the workplace, a cornerstone of democracy and social change.

Zaina thanks UNRWA for her existence here today as her mother—and greatest inspiration—was an alumnus of the UNRWA schools in Jordan. In her minimal free time, Zaina loves to teach herself how to embroider, plan out holiday gifts with her loved ones, and daydream about how her cats are doing back in Seattle!

Ask Zaina about: weightlifting, skin care, Arabi food (specifically making it!), Arthur Miller, video games.