Reem Ghunaim

Executive Director for the Rotary Action Group for Peace

Global Peace Index Ambassador for the Institute for Economics and Peace.

Reem is the Executive Director for the Rotary Action Group for Peace. She is a Positive Peace Activator and a Global Peace Index Ambassador for the Institute for Economics and Peace. Reem started in Rotary as a Rotaractor in Ramallah, Palestine.

Later, she earned a Rotary Peace Fellowship at Duke-UNC Rotary Peace Center where she earned her master’s degree in City and Regional Planning and a certificate in International Peace and Conflict Resolution. She is now a Rotarian at the Portland Rotary Club.

Reem serves on the boards of several international organizations including: the Rotary Club of Portland, one of the largest Rotary Clubs in the world; Hands of Peace, an organization that empowers youth to lead the solutions for peace between Israelis and Palestinians; and Peace Village, an organization that creates access to peace education for children worldwide.

Reem has provided leadership through several international projects and events. In 2018, she served on the organizing committee of the Environmental Sustainability and Peace Conference, one of Rotary International’s six Presidential Peace Conferences which was addressed by the Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau. She led the growth of the RAGFP Peacebuilder Club program from 22 clubs in the Pacific Northwest to over 215 clubs in 25 nations in less than two years. Reem is currently co-organizing the Rotary Peace Project Incubator, a gathering that aims to produce 40 international sustainable peace projects. Reem co-designed the 2020 Middle East Peace Education Trip to establish an experience for an international audience to create a fair understanding of the challenges and opportunities for peace in Israel and Palestine. She conceptualized and developed the Activate Positive Peace workbook which was presented at the 2019 Rotary Convention in Hamburg, Geneva Peace Week 2019 at the United Nations, and posted to the Positive Peace Academy by the Institute for Economics and Peace. Reem is the creator and host of the weekly Together for Peace webinar series which was designed to elevate social justice and peace issues. In this series, Reem interviews world-class leaders, including social entrepreneurs, organizational leaders, academics, peace activists, Nobel Peace Prize nominees, and inspiring Rotarians.

Reem is an advocate for Human Rights, economic development, social entrepreneurship, technological innovation, and creative arts. She recently advanced a data-driven study of COVID-19 policies and their impact on vulnerable populations as a machine-learning contributor at Omdena, a global platform that builds innovative and ethical AI solutions. Currently, Reem is leading a Peace Project that builds a social-entrepreneurship hub for Palestinian youth to build innovative technological solutions to peace obstacles in their community.

Previously, Reem created economic development strategies for the City of Shenzhen to advance the city’s livability program. She combined art and innovation for the Planning of Livable Cities project led by the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Reem worked for the United Nations Crisis Prevention Unit in Fiji where she worked with government representatives and religious leaders to foster collaboration between the government and civil society. She organized the 2011 Ramallah Contemporary Dance Festival. This festival was mainly sponsored by the European Commission to promote mutual understanding through the creative arts.  Reem advanced the 2010 International Conference for Human Values in Hamburg by integrating the Muslim community into the conference. This conference was held by the International Association of Human Values where Reem was completing her Yes We Can leadership program in Hamburg, Germany.

Reem is an international public speaker where she has addressed cultural, economic, social, and political topics. Throughout her career, she has been a keynote speaker and led international speaking tours to promote Human Rights, the Global Peace Index, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Reem has presented at several global platforms including the United Nations. As an OneVoice Ambassador, she spoke at Harvard, Brown, and Columbia Universities among several other organizations to support peaceful resolution in the Middle East.

Reem is a thought leader whose writings and ideas have been shared and celebrated internationally. Her mission is to dismantle stereotypes and elevate the voices of the oppressed by cultivating mutual understanding, promoting Positive Peace, and protecting Human Rights for all.