The Oak Institute for the Study of International Human Rights at Colby College enthusiastically welcomes Hadas Ziv of Israel as its 2009 Oak fellow. Ms. Ziv is the executive director of Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR-Israel). Born in Israel, the daughter of a Jew and a Christian, Ms. Ziv has worked with PHR-Israel for 14 years. She began work at the organization in 1995 as an intervention coordinator where she received appeals from Palestinians in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) whose right to health had been violated by Israeli practices. From 1998 to 2004, she served as Director of Projects at PHR-Israel, when the organization led advocacy campaigns for - among others issues - the right to health for residents in unrecognized Bedouin villages; the prevention of deportation of migrant families of chronically ill children; the prevention of deportation of refugees, children and other migrants from Tel Aviv; prevention of torture; access to health care of Palestinian under Israeli closure system in the OPT; and the right to health of Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem who were threatened with deportation. She was promoted to executive director of PHR-Israel in 2004. As such, she is responsible for guiding the mission of PHR-Israel and managing a full-time staff of 17 and over 1,500 members. Even as executive director, Ms. Ziv continues to be on the front line of human rights work, leading her team in their campaigns including, but not limited to: helping Palestinians under siege in Gaza to gain access to health care; the promotion of health rights of Palestinian women married to Israelis, but denied civil status; the promotion of the rights of migrants living with HIV/AIDS in Israel without health insurance; and perhaps most successful, a campaign to pressure the Israeli Health Ministry to support health care provision for the influx of refugees and migrants from African conflict zones seeking asylum in Israel. We are pleased that Hadas, her husband Sani and their three children will join the Colby Community for the fall of 2009 as the Oak fellow.