Refugees

Gisele Bolton is an inspiration of where a passionate heart for healing the world can lead you. From her home in the Chippewa Valley of Wisconsin, Gisele earned degrees in International Politics and Human Rights and in Global Studies, Human Rights and Justice in the Middle East and Africa. She added languages, including Arabic, to her toolkit, and she volunteered and interned in diverse countries like Lebanon, Kenya, and Honduras.

Diya Abdo is the founder of Every Campus A Refuge, and author of American Refuge: True Stories of the Refugee Experience. Diya was herself of a Palestinian refugee family in Jordan.

Many hands were needed to help in the transition for the immense number of Afghans that fled Afghanistan with the fall of the government there to the Taliban last year. Among those answering the call was Sahar Taman, providing legal assistance to the 13,000 Afghans located to Fort McCoy, Wisconsin, last fall. The personal situations & the legal requirements were complex, demanding deeply dedicated work of both the heart and head.

Leslie Davis is from Milwaukee, WI, where she is a psychologist for the state’s largest free medical clinic, providing services to principally undocumented immigrants. In 2019 Leslie Davis expanded her compassionate outreach by making 4 extended sojourns on the US-Mexican border, starting with the Dilley Detention Center in Texas, attempting to provide much-needed service from both her general energy and compassion, and also from her skills as a clinical psychologist.

Abdisalam Adam, born in Somalia, came to the USA in 1991. He's the director of the Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Civic Center in Minneapolis, MN and works as a Somali Cultural Specialist for St. Paul Public Schools. He'll be one of the featured speakers for Ways of Peace II: Non-violence in the Islamic Tradition on 4/9/11.