Zahra Al Hilaly

Zahra Al Hilaly is an advocate and campaigner working to prevent child abuse and neglect through systemic reform. Her work sits at the intersection of grassroots mobilisation and institutional change, driven by a conviction that the systems meant to protect children too often fail the communities most exposed to harm.

Zahra led National Child Protection Week in Australia in 2024 and 2025, the largest campaign of its kind in the country, reaching communities, practitioners, and policymakers with a shared message: preventing abuse and neglect is everyone's responsibility. Under her leadership the campaign grew its reach and sharpened its focus on the structural conditions that put children at risk. She has worked on Senate inquiries and presented evidence on matters central to child safety and dignity, including youth incarceration and raising the age of criminal responsibility, child marriage, and the treatment of children within justice and welfare systems. She brings lived understanding to this work alongside technical fluency in how policy is made and contested.

On the 2026 Global Survivor Council, Zahra wants to keep pushing for prevention that is early, structural, and survivor-informed, ensuring the people closest to harm shape the responses meant to address it.