Issam Michael Fares is a prominent Lebanese businessman, a former member of the Lebanese Parliament and served as Deputy Prime Minister of Lebanon from 2000 to 2005.
Prior to that his career spans four decades in the Persian Gulf, specifically Saudi Arabia, where he began with Abela Catering and then Ballast Needam. By the early 1970s Issam Fares was playing a key role in the infrastructure buildout of Saudi Arabia, including roads and housing.
The Fares Lecture Series, the Fares Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies, both at Tufts University, and the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut (AUB) are named after him.
He operates the Houston, Texas based WEDGE Group.