The Institute for Middle East Understanding (IMEU) is a 501(c)(3) Pro-Palestinian[1] non-profit advocacy organization.
Founded in 2005, it received a grant from the Washington-based Jerusalem Fund for Education and Community Development in 2006 for Education and Community Development, which was used to undertake the first compilation of profiles of Palestinian-Americans in the fields of the arts, literature, academia, business and community service, which were then disseminated to news media and on the Internet.[2] As an example, the IMEU sent a letter to news outlets in November 2007 that provided the names and profiles of Palestinian-Americans who could be contacted to discuss the upcoming Annapolis Conference. The names included Samar Assad, Executive Director of The Jerusalem Fund,[3] Diana Buttu, a Ramallah-based attorney and former advisor to Palestinian negotiators, Omar Dajani, a San Francisco-based law professor and former legal advisor to United Nations Special Envoy Terje Rød-Larsen, and Nadia Hijab, a Senior Fellow at the Washington-based Institute for Palestine Studies.[4]
One of the organization's co-founders is Lena Khalaf Tuffaha, who is also a member of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) Seattle chapter. As Secretary and Treasurer of the IMEU, she and the organization were featured in the Non-Profit Spotlight of the e-magazine The Mideast Connect.[5] Since 2006, the IMEU has also published Letters from Palestine,[6] a collection of first-hand testimonies from Palestinians about their daily lives.[7]