Barghuthi, Mustafa (1954–)
BARGHUTHI, MUSTAFA (1954–)
Palestinian physician and human rights activist. Mustafa Barghuthi, a medical doctor trained in Moscow, was for some years a member of the Palestinian People's Party and director of the Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees, which has provided health care for 100,000 Palestinians living in rural areas of the Occupied Territories. As of 2004, he is the director of the Health, Development, Information, and Policy Institute in Ramallah, an independent nongovernmental organization established in 1989 to improve the status of Palestinian health care through research, planning, and development. It has also become an advocacy organization for better public policy in regard to such groups as women, children, and the disabled. It provides information and training programs in health care, development policy, and system management. It also publishes the Palestine Monitor, an important source of news on political and human rights issues. Barghuthi was one of the principal promoters, with Haydar Abd al-Shafi and Ibrahim Dakkak, of the Palestinian National Initiative (al-Mubadara), an organization that seeks to mobilize Palestinian society for the formation of a "national emergency leadership," democratic elections at all levels, and institutional reform to achieve Palestinian national rights and a "durable, just peace."