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Elana Banin

Policy Advisor, International Rescue Committee

Elana Banin is a policy advisor at the International Rescue Committee, where she leads global advocacy and financing strategies focused on women’s empowerment and child development in crisis settings. She is the founder of the MENA2050 Gender Working Group, an initiative promoting cross-border cooperation and gender equity across the Middle East and North Africa. Additionally, Banin serves as a senior advisor at Instant Aid, directing investment strategies to deliver essential care to women and children in Israel and Palestine. She also consults for the World Bank’s Climate Investment Funds, supporting transparency and alignment in global climate finance.

Previously, Banin held roles as an advocacy specialist at UNICEF and as a senior policy associate at PATH, where she influenced major global health investments across multilateral and U.S. government systems. Her work spans over 25 countries, with expertise in fragile state strategy, innovation financing, and institutional reform. Throughout her career, she has helped mobilize more than $1 billion in public and philanthropic capital.

Her research interests have spanned national and human security in Southeast Asia, the role of smart power in U.S. counterterrorism policy, the geopolitics of failing states in the Middle East, and the politicization of humanitarian aid in the Israeli-Palestinian context. She has worked as a research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in Tel Aviv and as a researcher at NGO Monitor in Jerusalem, contributing policy analysis to inform donor strategy and public discourse.

With a foundation in research and evidence-based policymaking, Banin has authored several notable reports addressing global health security, foreign assistance reform, women’s economic inclusion, and humanitarian governance. Her recent work has been featured by the Center for Global Development, Capita, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the World Economic Forum.

Banin holds a Master of Arts in security and diplomacy studies from Tel Aviv University and a Bachelor of Arts from Muhlenberg College. She completed executive training at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Analysis

CLEAR ALL
Security Regional Affairs

Jun 12, 2025

The Next Battlefield: AI, Cybersecurity, and the Evolution of Military Threats

As AI capabilities increasingly converge with cyber warfare, military superiority will depend not on troop numbers or weapons platforms but on algorithmic advantages and digital resilience.

10 min read

Elana Banin
Elana Banin
Sara Bazoobandi
Visitors observe the Iranian Ministry of Defense’s display featuring the Shahed 136 drone during Iraq’s Defense, Security, and Cybersecurity Exhibition in Baghdad, Iraq April 19. (REUTERS/Ahmed Saad)