Yifat Susskind

Yifat Susskind is the Executive Director of MADRE, an international women's human rights organization. She has worked with women’s human rights activists from Latin America, the Middle East, Asia and Africa to create programs in their communities to address women's health, violence against women, economic and environmental justice and peace building. She has also written extensively on US foreign policy and women’s human rights and her critical analysis has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Foreign Policy in Focus and elsewehere.

Articles by this author

	Views Sunday, August 04, 2019 Not a Straight White Man? U.S. Religious Conservatives Are Coming for You Any schoolchild in the United States knows that the US Declaration of Independence guarantees individuals’ rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. Now, imagine what these principles mean for right-wingers and religious fundamentalists: where “life” refers to fetuses; “liberty”... Read more
	Views Sunday, May 12, 2019 A Mother's Resolve: Organizing for Local and Global Climate Justice A scarred hillside stood before us, a reminder of a 2014 oil pipeline spill. Oil pumpjacks rose and fell relentlessly around us. We had just arrived on the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota, home to the Three Affiliated Tribes of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara nations. MADRE, the... Read more
	Views Thursday, November 29, 2018 Who Benefits When Women Human Rights Defenders Are Targeted? In my work, I have the privilege of partnering with visionary activists who fight each and every day for the rights of women and their communities — and who often face retaliation for their activism. I first met Yanar Mohammed, a prominent Iraqi feminist, just months after she founded the... Read more
	Views Monday, February 26, 2018 Sanctions on North Korea Will Not Lead to Peace. Just Ask Iraqis. As the world turns its attention away from the goodwill of the PyeongChang Olympics, the Trump Administration is doubling down on its hostility towards North Korea — this time in the form of aggressive new sanctions announced on Friday that target that country’s ability to carry out trade. When the... Read more
	Views Tuesday, January 23, 2018 Feminism Will Not Be Weaponized for Trump's War on Immigrants It’s hard to keep up with the cacophony of bigoted expletives and outrages emanating from the White House. So you may have missed the Administration’s latest desperate attempt to justify its xenophobic and racist immigration policies, this time by pretending to care about women’s rights. Last... Read more
	Views Friday, January 20, 2017 A Beginning, Not an End: My Open Letter To You on Inauguration Day Today is the beginning. It may be the start of the Trump Administration, but let it also be the inauguration of something much more powerful: a renewed feminist social justice movement that takes root in each of our lives, throughout the country and around the world. "What did you do to protect... Read more
	Views Tuesday, December 06, 2016 Women the World over Have Shown the US How to Deal with Sexism and Racism Many in the US are emerging from their initial shock at the outcome of the presidential election to confront its likely impacts: a legitimation of right-wing identity politics, worsening climate change and militarism, assaults on women’s rights and LGBT rights , and the gutting of basic public... Read more
	Views Wednesday, July 09, 2014 Under Isis, Iraqi Women Again Face an Old Nightmare: Violence and Repression In a PBS NewsHour video report in June , Isis extremist militants parade through Mosul, Iraq , one of the first cities to fall to their onslaught in early June. The armed men are hanging off the back of trucks, as the crowd films them. One fighter leans out a car window, wagging his finger. The... Read more
	Views Thursday, May 09, 2013 How Not to End the War in Syria As the war engulfing Syria worsens, the Obama Administration must prioritize the needs of civilians and resist the growing pressure for military intervention. Diplomacy and increased humanitarian aid are what’s needed now to alleviate suffering and build peace. Read more
	Views Tuesday, March 19, 2013 A Decade of Occupation for Iraqi Women A decade after the US invasion of Iraq, only one of the straw-man arguments for going to war remains standing: “We did it for democracy and women’s rights." Read more