Adalah wins international award for emergency legal work during COVID-19 crisis
The World Justice Project announced on 26 May 2021 six winners in the World Justice Challenge 2021: Advancing the Rule of Law in a Time of Crisis competition. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, this year’s World Justice Challenge sought to identify, recognize, and promote good practices and high-impact projects and policies that protect and advance the rule of law in this time of unprecedented crisis.
Selected from a pool of 30 finalists and 425 submissions from 114 countries, each winning project will be awarded $20,000 USD for their work to protect and advance the rule of law in the face of COVID-19 challenges.
The Fundamental Rights and Non-Discrimination prize is awarded to Adalah - The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel's "COVID-19 Project: Demanding Equal Treatment and Non-Discrimination for the Arab Minority Through the Israeli Legal System." The project uses legal action before Israeli courts and state authorities, together with media outreach, to obtain remedies for discrimination faced by Palestinian citizens of Israel.
The project was selected for its effectiveness in using legal remedies to address the discriminatory effects of the pandemic crisis, leading to significant results in the struggle for fundamental human rights and non-discrimination of Palestinian citizens of Israel.
"The COVID-19 pandemic struck the world in the midst of a growing rule of law crisis, as documented in WJP's own research, and has underscored the importance of a just and inclusive recovery," said Elizabeth Andersen, WJP Executive Director.
"That is why we wanted to shine a light on effective and innovative ways to tackle the governance challenges posed and exacerbated by this ongoing pandemic. The promising approaches shown by these six winning projects, and indeed by all 30 Challenge finalists, serve as a guiding light to changemakers the world over. We are honored to recognize their work and pleased to welcome them to the WJP network."
