As 2025 comes to a close, we want to thank you deeply for your solidarity and commitment to Palestinian-led, community-based psychosocial support and arts-focused healing for children and caregivers throughout the West Bank. Just today, Anar Executive Director Rami Khader and I were reflecting on all you’ve made possible this year in the movement for hope, healing, and justice.

Thanks to your generosity, we’re now only $18,800 away from our 2025 goal! As 2026 quickly approaches, we hope you’ll consider donating again or for the first time before January 1.

Your year-end, tax-deductible gift will allow us to support the emotional and psychological healing of Palestinian children and caregivers facing political and military violence and occupation throughout the West Bank. Recurring donations especially help us sustain this vital work for years to come.

Because of your support, Healing to Hope has been able to do extraordinary things in our first full year as a U.S. nonprofit:

• Raise over $180,000 to support Anar’s programs with children, caregivers, and communities in Nablus, Tulkarem, Hebron, and in and around Bethlehem.

• Purchase a vehicle that enables Anar staff to move more easily throughout the West Bank in the face of illegal Israeli checkpoints and barriers.

• Host an ambitious month-long educational tour for Anar Executive Director Rami Khader and his family to Atlanta, Chicago, Minneapolis, and the Bay Area/Chico/Sacramento.

• Organize multiple online and in-person events with community and faith groups, most notably our recent Through Their Eyes: Stories of Hope from Palestine.

• Host a second week-long visit for Rami to share the message of Anar with new supporters in Washington, DC and Chicago.

• Welcome our first Board Chair, Rev. Mark S. Hanson, as well as our newest member of the Board of Directors and Fundraising Committee Chair, Monica Asfour Hanson.

• Become an official 501(c)(3) charitable organization!

We would not be here without your support of Palestinian children, caregivers, and communities—and your dedication to the movement for justice and freedom in Palestine. On behalf of all of us at Anar and Healing to Hope, I extend the deepest gratitude.

In solidarity,

Sarah Myers, Healing to Hope ED

Highlights from 2025

Over the past year, we expanded our reach across the West Bank in significant ways:

• In 2025, Anar’s Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (MHPSS) interventions reached over 10,000 direct beneficiaries across the West Bank, 50% of whom were children. Through community-based activities, awareness-building initiatives, and public engagement, we also reached an estimated 80,000 children and caregivers indirectly.

We also strengthened the community-led psychosocial response:

• Anar trained 100 Community-Based Self-Help Facilitators, equipping them with practical MHPSS skills to design and deliver psychosocial activities and community initiatives. Following their training, these facilitators—who come from a range of different backgrounds and commit to supporting their own communities from within—actively responded to locally-identified needs, reinforcing ownership and sustainability.

We also built the capacity of frontline MHPSS workers:

• Anar strengthened the professional capacity of 100 frontline practitioners across the West Bank working in mental health and psychosocial support fields: social workers, psychologists, health workers, emergency responders, teachers, and other professionals. Through training and support, Anar contributed to improved quality of care among these mental health professionals serving highly vulnerable communities.

In the midst of so much expansion, we prioritized staff wellbeing as a core value:

• Recognizing that staff members are directly impacted by ongoing violence and operate as frontline responders themselves, Anar intentionally invested in staff care, stress release, and recreational days. Focusing on staff wellbeing is itself a primary intervention, essential to maintaining ethical, effective, and sustainable MHPSS programming.

We strengthened our commitment to support children who were formerly detained and imprisoned:

• In collaboration with Save the Children, Anar supported the mental health and wellbeing of former child detainees and their caregivers in the West Bank, addressing the acute psychological impacts of detention and imprisonment through specialized and context-responsive MHPSS interventions for children unchilded by violence and occupation.

We reimagined our approach to merging artistic and psychosocial support through Anar’s launch of a new Expressive Arts Unit:

• In summer 2025, Anar officially launched an Expressive Arts Unit, integrating creative and arts-based methodologies into psychosocial work. The unit provides children and communities with alternative, culturally grounded pathways for expression, healing, and resilience.

We expanded geographically to northern areas in the West Bank:

• This year, Anar significantly expanded operations to the northern West Bank, responding to forced and violent displacement of families from Nablus and Tulkarem refugee camps. This expansion enabled Anar to work directly with internally displaced persons (IDPs), addressing urgent psychosocial needs linked to displacement and loss.

Most recently, we further extended our international partnerships:

• Last month, Anar welcomed a delegation from University of Oslo’s Psychology Department and Solidarity Hub. This visit marked the beginning of a collaborative partnership aimed at knowledge exchange and the shared goal of developing methodologies and curriculum to promote resilience, creative expression, and mental health in Palestine through arts-based healing practices.

Ending the Year in Images

Questions About Donations?

Email us at info@healingtohope.org. We accept year-end QCDs, stock donations, contributions from donor-advised funds, online gifts, and donations by check. More information and the link to donate can be found on our website.

Thank You

Thank you for supporting the work of Healing to Hope and Anar to advance the well-being and resilience of Palestinian children and caregivers impacted by violence and oppression. We appreciate our entire community for committing to the movement for justice and healing in Palestine.