Esteemed human rights lawyer and Director of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, Raji Sourani, will deliver the Edward W. Said London Lecture 2024 examining the current war on Gaza and its implication on International Humanitarian Law (IHL). By unpacking the legal principles of IHL, Sourani confronts the ramifications of Israel’s action on the integrity of this legal framework.

Raji Sourani (Gaza, 1953) is a human rights lawyer who has dedicated his career to defending the rights of Palestinians and to the promotion and protection of human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. He is the co-founder and director of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), which has worked since 1995 to document the impacts of the Israeli occupation. Since October 2023, all three offices of the human rights centre in the Strip have been destroyed. Sourani fled Gaza in late 2023 when his home was bombed. He and his family are currently based in Cairo. Sourani is a member of the South African delegation on the genocide case against Israel before the U.N. International Court of Justice (ICJ).

The Edward W. Said London Lecture is supported by The Mosaic Rooms/A. M. Qattan Foundation.