Stephanie Yousef is the MENA Senior Program Coordinator at the Center for Civilians in Conflict (CIVIC), where she leads and supports regional programming related to Syria, Iraq, Palestine, and Yemen.

Her work focuses on monitoring humanitarian and protection dynamics across the region, with a strong emphasis on community-based protection, localisation, and sustained engagement with local partners as key drivers of effective and accountable responses. 

Stephanie has extensive experience working across the Humanitarian–Development–Peace (HDP) Nexus and previously served as Co-Chair of the Global Community of Practice on the Nexus. She has led and contributed to initiatives on humanitarian coordination, contextual and conflict analysis, transitions from humanitarian response to longer-term development, and gender mainstreaming. 

A strong advocate for localisation, Stephanie believes that empowering local actors and communities is essential to building resilience, improving protection outcomes, and ensuring sustainable humanitarian and development interventions. Her professional interests include the intersection of security and humanitarian action, innovative approaches to nexus programming, and advancing the role of women in humanitarian diplomacy, peace and security processes.