July 31, 2014

As a third-year International Studies major with a regional focus on Africa and the Middle East at UC Irvine, Yusra Khafagi is at MPAC this summer with the intention of maximizing her exposure to the American Muslim political process and developing first-hand experience with the fast-paced nature of public relations and policy work. Currently, she is primarily working on a briefing of the most recent audit of the Los Angeles Police Department's Suspicious Activity Reports (SAR), hoping to coordinate community engagement sessions between those affected by SARs and the policy leaders who enforce it.

In an effort to take full advantage of her summer vacation, Khafagi is also a youth development intern at the CAIR-LA office. There, she is fulfilling her dream of educating American Muslim youth on social consciousness by preparing a video on the civil rights of student speech and activism on the university campus. Professionally, she aspires to become an international attorney.

During the school year, Khafagi is the Head of Events for Students for Justice in Palestine and is actively involved in her university’s Muslim Student Union. She has taken on leadership roles that ensure thorough completion of MSU events, including planning the organization’s annual winter retreat. She was also one of the committee heads for MSU’s annual Anti-Zionism Week, which presents an array of events geared towards raising social awareness about Israel's ongoing occupation of Palestinian lands.

Khafagi's professional goal is to work on international policy with the hopes of reshaping American influence abroad. In the words of Albert Einstein, “The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who do not do anything about it.”