Eyad El-Sarraj
إياد السراج
Born: Beersheba, Palestine
Domain: Civil Society & Religion
Recognition: GLOBAL
Biography
Eyad El-Sarraj (1944-2013) was a Palestinian psychiatrist and human rights campaigner who pioneered community mental health care in the Gaza Strip. Born in Beersheba in 1944, his family was displaced in 1948, and he grew up amid the dislocation that would shape his life's work on the psychological consequences of occupation, violence, and dispossession. In 1990 he founded the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme (GCMHP), the first organization of its kind in Gaza, providing psychological and psychiatric services to children, women, and survivors of organized violence and torture. The program combined clinical care with training, research, and human rights advocacy, addressing trauma in one of the most besieged civilian populations in the world. El-Sarraj was an outspoken advocate for human rights and democracy, criticizing abuses by both the Israeli occupation and Palestinian authorities, and he was detained more than once for his candor. His independence earned him broad international respect as a conscience of Palestinian civil society. His work was recognized with major international honors, including the Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders in 1998 and the Olof Palme Prize in 2010, awarded for his struggle for reconciliation and peace. He was also honored by Physicians for Human Rights. When he died in 2013, El-Sarraj was widely mourned as a pioneer who insisted that mental health and human dignity were inseparable from the broader struggle for justice. The GCMHP remains a cornerstone institution of civil society in Gaza.
Why This Person Matters
El-Sarraj built Gaza's first community mental health institution and turned the psychological wounds of occupation into an internationally recognized human rights cause.