Yael was as part of the first cohort of scholars of the Olive Tree Educational Trust, a programme designed to train young Israeli and Palestinian leaders committed to a shared future for the people of the region. Her academic interests build on her extensive involvement in civil society organisations.
She was part of a commune of education-activists for six years and has worked in non-formal education across Israel. She acted as an investigative feature writer for the Israeli education magazine, ‘Echoes of Education’, and a sub-editor for Ma’ariv, an Israeli daily newspaper. Yael also worked as a dialogue-group facilitator at the Givat-Haviva Jewish-Arab Institute for Peace. In 2008, she headed an educational project on Human Trafficking for Amnesty Israel which was aimed at students, teachers and security forces.