The New Humanitarian

The backlash against women's and LGBTIQI+ rights is growing – part of an organised movement that goes beyond one country or one president. But as Saskia Brechenmacher says on the latest episode of Rethinking Humanitarianism, concerned people – including civil society and non-governmental organisations – can take steps to counter the threats.

Guests:

Saskia Brechenmacher, senior fellow in the Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. ____

Got a question or feedback? Email [email protected] or post on social media using the hashtag #RethinkingHumanitarianism. ____

SHOW NOTES

• The New Global Struggle Over Gender, Rights, and Family Values
• Rethinking Humanitarianism | The aid sector's LGBTQI+ blindspot

Global funding cuts are worsening emergency aid's weaknesses when it comes to the LGBTQI+ community. The Trump administration is explicitly targeting trans people. And gender-related programming is among the first to be cut as humanitarian groups scale back. But there are steps humanitarians can take today – even amid widespread budget cuts – to better respond to the needs of LGBTQI+ people in emergencies.

Guests:

Emily Dwyer, co-founder of the humanitarian and development organisation, Edge Effect.

Jasmin Lilian Diab, director of the Institute for Migration Studies at the Lebanese American University. ____

Got a question or feedback? Email [email protected] or post on social media using the hashtag #RethinkingHumanitarianism. ____

SHOW NOTES

Edge Effect

The moral imperative to protect Lebanon's LGBTIQ+ displaced

Institute for Migration Studies

Remaking humanitarianism: Dispatches from the future

How can we reimagine the international humanitarian system so that it builds on – rather than undermines – the response communities are already creating? What would it take to align funding and infrastructure? And what is standing in the way?

The New Humanitarian and Refugees International have taken these questions around the globe, producing a series of dispatches from the future that highlight the strategies, values, and visions guiding community-driven responses to crisis – and show what's possible.

We brought these dispatches to the heart of UNGA to grapple with what it will take to remake humanitarianism – and what must change for the system to have any future at all.

The 80th UN General Assembly should be consequential given all that's happening: the genocide in Gaza, spiralling emergencies, aid cuts, the crisis of trust in the UN system. But does the rhetoric in New York match the urgency we see across the globe?

From UNGA's high-level week in New York, producer Levi Sharpe and host Tammam Aloudat unpack events, contrast the Gaza flotilla with the suits at UN headquarters, and discuss what it all says about where humanitarian action is heading.

Guest:

Tammam Aloudat, CEO of The New Humanitarian, and host of the Rethinking Humanitarianism podcast. ____

Got a question or feedback? Email [email protected] or post on social media using the hashtag #RethinkingHumanitarianism. ____

SHOW NOTES

United States of America - President Addresses United Nations General Debate, 80th Session

Brazil - President Addresses United Nations General Debate, 80th Session

Colombia - President Addresses United Nations General Debate, 80th Session

Syria - President Addresses United Nations General Debate, 80th Session

Remaking humanitarianism: Dispatches from the future

As world leaders gather for the 80th UN General Assembly, we're digging into the past to illuminate the present. What UN reforms are needed? Historian Thant Myint-U talks about how the UN became sidetracked from genuine multilateralism, where it should focus, and why the selection of the next secretary-general in 2026 is crucial.

Guest:

Thant Myint-U, historian and author of "Peacemaker: U Thant and the Forgotten Quest for a Just World." ____

Got a question or feedback? Email [email protected] or post on social media using the hashtag #RethinkingHumanitarianism. ____

SHOW NOTES

• Peacemaker: U Thant and the Forgotten Quest for a Just World.
• Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, the Cold War, and the Roots of Terror
• UN 80
• UN General Assembly High-level Week 2025

As the genocide in Gaza continues, humanitarian organisations face mounting pressure and unprecedented constraints. Famine has been declared, access remains heavily restricted, and international mechanisms have failed to prevent mass civilian suffering. Frustration is growing across the sector – with some questioning whether traditional humanitarian approaches are fit for purpose in the face of atrocity crimes.

This event brought together humanitarian leaders, legal experts, and Palestinian voices to reflect on the urgent question: What should humanitarian actors do to stop the genocide in Gaza? The discussion examined the limits and responsibilities of humanitarian action, what humanitarian efficacy means in this context, the risks and consequences of different forms of engagement, and the potential for alternative strategies when established mechanisms appear paralysed.

Ahead of the UN General Assembly, this event provided a critical space for reflection and debate.

The event was moderated by TNH CEO Tammam Aloudat, who was joined by:

• Freddie Carver, Director of the Humanitarian Policy Group, ODI Global
• Dr Shahd Hammouri, Palestinian-Jordanian lecturer in International Law and Legal Theory, University of Kent
• Dr Philip Proudfoot, Research Fellow, Institute of Development Studies, and Co-founder of The Accountability Archive

When is the UN a force for good, and when is it a fig leaf? CEO Tammam Aloudat speaks with Mark Leon Goldberg and Anjali Dayal – hosts of the podcast To Save Us From Hell – about the global rise in illiberalism. They discuss the crisis of how liberalism is practiced, what it means for the future of humanitarianism, and what a better way forward might look like.

Guests:

Mark Leon Goldberg, editor-in-chief of UN Dispatch, host of Global Dispatches and co-host of To Save Us From Hell

Anjali Dayal, author, assistant professor of international politics at Fordham University, and co-host of To Save Us From Hell

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Got a question or feedback? Email [email protected] or post on social media using the hashtag #RethinkingHumanitarianism.

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SHOW NOTES

• UNDispatch

• Global Dispatches

• To Save Us From Hell

• UN chief on Ukraine: Military offensive by Russia is wrong | United Nations

"It's not just our finances that are under attack, but it's also our morale and our legitimacy."

In a fresh season of the podcast, TNH CEO Tammam Aloudat, our new host, sits down with people who have something important to say about the future of aid. In this episode, he's joined by the UN's emergency aid chief, Tom Fletcher, to discuss the humanitarian reset, the need for more mental health support given "enormous amounts of trauma", and whether he should be the last white British man in the role.

Guests: Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, United Nations

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Got a question or feedback? Email [email protected] or post on social media using the hashtag #RethinkingHumanitarianism.

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SHOW NOTES

• If not a humanitarian "reset", then what?
• Reset, reform, or repeat? Humanitarianism's reboot searches for the right script
• Inklings | Why a reset is not reform
• My husband was nearly killed trying to get aid from the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation
• What's Unsaid | Aid worker trauma is preventable
• So…Yalla, Bye

On 7 October 2023, Rita Baroud was a 20-year-old in Gaza thinking about doing a master's degree. Today, evacuated to France after surviving nearly 20 months of genocide, she's a journalist who recently met with Macron and told him, "You have to stop this bloodshed".

In a special What's Unsaid episode, she speaks to Eric Reidy, our editor managing coverage of Gaza. They have been working together for the past year on a series of first-person articles about how lives in Gaza have been torn apart. These have now been collected into a series titled "Don't look away". Please take a moment to read them.

What's Unsaid is a podcast by The New Humanitarian, where we explore open secrets and uncomfortable conversations around the world's conflicts and disasters.

Power Shift is an experiment in dialogue that puts decision-makers in aid and philanthropy and those affected by their decisions in honest, one-on-one conversations about the aid sector's inequalities. ___

In the latest episode of Power Shift, Hafsar Tameesuddin, a stateless Rohingya refugee and LGBTQ+ rights activist, and Raouf Mazou, one of the UN refugee agency's highest-ranking officials, navigate the complex dynamics of global refugee protection, the righteous anger of refugees and stateless people, and the challenges of supporting the more than 122 million people around the world forced to leave their homes.

Although their conversations took place before USAID's dismantlement sent the humanitarian sector into a tailspin, both Mazou's and Tameesuddin's proposals for a better refugee response strike right at the heart of the international aid system's current limitations, calling for more equitable cooperation between global and grassroots organisations, more support for refugee self-reliance, and, consequently, for less reliance on a sector facing major cuts.

"I'm a believer of collective leadership," Tameesuddin reflected. "In a lot of ways, I feel there is goodwill from UNHCR, from the communities, and all of us. We all want to do good things and want to accomplish something great.

"What is missing from my observation is that human interaction and relationship, and really building relationships with the grassroot."

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Are you or anyone you know interested in participating in future Power Shift conversations? Email us with the subject line 'POWER SHIFT".