Noura Erakat

Noura Saleh Erakat (/ˈnʊərə ˈɛrəkæt/, NOOR-ə ERR-ə-kat; Arabic: نورة صالح عريقات; born (1980-01-16)January 16, 1980)^[1] is a Palestinian-American activist, university professor, legal scholar, and human rights attorney.^[2][3] She is currently a professor at Rutgers University, specializing in international studies.^[4] Her primary focus is the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and she is a vocal critic of Israel.^[5][6][7][8]

Noura Erakat
Erakat in 2014
Born	Noura Saleh Erakat (1980-01-16) January 16, 1980 (age 45) Alameda County, California, U.S.
Occupation	Activist, attorney
Education	University of California, Berkeley (BA, JD) Georgetown University (LLM)
Relatives	Yousef Erakat (brother) Saeb Erakat (uncle) Ahmad Erekat (cousin)
Website
www.nouraerakat.com

Education and career

Noura Saleh Erakat was born on January 16, 1980, in Alameda County, California. She attended the University of California, Berkeley and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 2002, was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and was named a UC-Berkeley Human Rights Center Summer Fellow in 2003.^[9] In 2005, she received her Juris Doctor from the UC Berkeley School of Law and was awarded the Francine Diaz Memorial Scholarship Award.^[10] She completed her L.L.M at Georgetown University Law Center in 2012.^[11]

In 2010, she was a co-founder of Jadaliyya, an online magazine published in English, Arabic, and French, and which is affiliated with the non-profit Arab Studies Institute, operating in Washington, D.C. and Beirut.

Erakat has served as "legal counsel to the House of Representatives Oversight Committee"^[3] and has previously taught at Georgetown University.^[3][11] From 2012–2014, she was a Freedman Fellow with Temple University Beasley School of Law.^[12] Erakat also has taught international studies at George Mason University at Fairfax, Virginia.

She currently serves on the board of the Institute for Policy Studies and serves as an associate professor at Rutgers University,^[13][14] is a member of the Board of Directors for the Trans-Arab Research Institute,^[15] and is a policy advisor with Al-Shabaka: The Palestinian Policy Network.^[16]

In 2019, Erakat published the book Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine at Stanford University Press.^[17]

In May 2023, the Canadian MPP Sarah Jama, a 28-year old, black, disability rights activist, came under criticism for retweeting a tweet that Noura Erakat wrote. The tweet, which the lobby group B'nai Brith Canada described as “unacceptable,” praised Khader Adnan, a Palestinian activist and prisoner in West Bank who died after an 87-day hunger strike in protest against Israel’s systematic and discriminatory use of administrative detention to imprison Palestinians without charge or trial and to "to expose the basic injustice in Israel’s military justice system and its casual denial of basic freedoms".^[18][19][20] His cruel treatment had been condemned by many human rights groups and UN human rights experts.^[21]

Erakat was said to be among three potential Palestinian American running mates for Dr Jill Stein, the left-wing Green Party's nominee for president of the United States in the 2024 election.^[22]

In March 2025 Erakat received the Amnesty International Chair Award from the University of Ghent, Belgium. ^[23]

Personal life

She is the sister of Yousef Erakat, better known by his YouTube moniker, FouseyTube.^[24][25] She is the cousin of Ahmed Erakat, a Palestinian man who was shot and killed by Israeli police after his vehicle rammed into one of the barriers at a military checkpoint near Abu Dis, a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, on 23 June 2020. Noura has disputed the intentionality of this act.^[26]

Selected works

Academic books

• Aborted State? The UN Initiative and New Palestinian Junctures. Co-edited with Mouin Rabbani, 2013.
• Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2019.

Academic papers

• "Palestinian Refugees and the Syrian Uprising: Filling the Protection Gap During Secondary Forced Displacement." Oxford Journal of International Refugee Law, Forthcoming.
• "New Imminence in the Time of Obama: The Impact of Targeted Killings on the Law of Self Defense." Arizona Law Review, Forthcoming.
• "The US v. The Red Cross: Customary International Humanitarian Law & Universal Jurisdiction." Denver Journal of International Law and Policy 41 Denv. J. Int'l L. & Pol'y 225 (Winter 2013).
• "It's Not Wrong, It's Illegal: Situating the Gaza Blockade Between International Law and the UN Response." UCLA Journal of Islamic and Near Eastern Law, Vol. 11, No. 37, 2011–2012.
• "Operation Cast Lead: The Elusive Quest for Self-Defense in International Law." 36 Rutgers L. Rec. 164 (2009).
• "Litigating the Arab-Israeli Conflict: The Politicization of U.S. Federal Courtrooms." 2 Berkeley Journal of Middle Eastern & Islamic Law 27 (2009).

Print media

• "U.S. Should Stop Funding Israel, or Let Others Broker Peace." New York Times, August 5, 2014.
• "Israeli operation not about security: Opposing view." USA Today, July 31, 2014.
• "Five Israeli Talking Points on Gaza—Debunked." The Nation, July 25, 2014.
• "Structural Violence on Trial: BDS and the Movement to Resist Erasure." Los Angeles Review of Books, March 16, 2014.

Interviews

Radio

• Israel's greatest threats are internal, not Hamas or Iran, says former prime minister Ehud Barak CBC, June 5, 2018
• To The Point: "A New Shot at Peace Talks: Will it be Different this Time?" KCRW, July 31, 2013.
• Beyond Beijing: "Palestine seeking statehood bid in UN." China Radio International, November 21, 2012.

Video

• "Gaza in context.", gazaincontext.com, July 2016.
• "Debating the tactics and ethics of warfare on both sides of Mideast conflict." PBS NewsHour, July 24, 2014.
• "Gaza Debate: As Palestinian Deaths Top 100, Who's to Blame for Escalating Violence? What Can Be Done?." Democracy Now!, July 11, 2014.
• Up With Chris Hayes: "Obama wraps up first trip to Israel as president." MSNBC, March 22, 2013.
• Up With Chris Hayes: "What sparked escalation of violence in Israel and Gaza." MSNBC, November 17, 2012.
• "The Law in These Parts: A Discussion." WNET (PBS Thirteen)