Just Start: Youth, Displacement and the Art of Global Citizenship

A story about a young Syrian refugee who stopped waiting, started building, and now carries peace education to hundreds of young people. Displacement is not the end of this story. A question that belongs to all of us: what happens when we stop waiting for someone else to fix things — and start building them ourselves?Over 100 million people have been displaced worldwide. Most are told to wait — for papers, for permission, for someone to open a door. This episode sits with what happens when someone refuses.Mohammad Shahadat has started over more than once, in more than one country. Born in Syria, raised in Abu Dhabi, he returned to his homeland one year before the 2011 uprising began. Two decades of displacement followed. Eight scholarship rejections. Limited choices at every turn. And yet, a refusal to stop moving forward. When UNESCO offered him a scholarship, it opened a question: what if young refugees and the communities hosting them could actually understand each other?In 2019, he founded the Youth for Peace Initiative in Amman to find out. They thought it might take years to reach 100 participants. They now have over 300. The name hasn't changed — because the beginning, he says, should always remind you of what's possible when you just start. A place on the Kofi Annan Changemakers Programme brought him to Geneva — and changed everything. He almost didn't board the plane. He got on anyway.This conversation is about peace education and what it actually means — not the absence of war, but the presence of understanding. About global citizenship built through lived experience. And resilience not as inspiration, but as a daily practice of thinking about others, building bridges of trust across every difference that the world tries to make permanent.🔗 LINKS & RESOURCESYouth for Peace Initiative: Instagram, LinkedinUNESCO Intercultural Leadership ProgrammeKofi Annan Foundation Changemakers Programme👤 ABOUT THE GUESTMohammad Shahadat is a Syrian peacebuilder, youth advocate, and founder of the Youth for Peace Initiative. After living a long refugee journey, he transformed his personal struggle into a lifelong mission to advance education, intercultural dialogue, and youth inclusion in peace processes. Selected as a Kofi Annan Changemaker in 2022, he is a UNESCO Youth for Peace Leader and an active member of the UNESCO Global Youth Community, the One Young World Switzerland National Board, and the EU Jeel Connect Network.📋 SHARE YOUR REFLECTIONFive questions. Your responses help us understand what's shifting — and make the case for more stories like this 👉 https://forms.gle/mf8MVX3cUsqYECrL9 💧 JOIN THE CONVERSATIONShare your drops of water: #HummingbirdCollectiveThe Hummingbird Collective is co-produced by the Caux Initiatives of Change Foundation, supported through Sarah Noble's participation in the Youth for Peace: UNESCO Intercultural Leadership Programme (2025–2026). Guests speak from their own experience and perspective, which may not reflect the views of the show or its partners.Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.