Shibley Telhami

Shibley Telhami is the Anwar Sadat Professor for Peace and Development at the University of Maryland, College Park,^[1] and a nonresident senior fellow of the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution.^[2]

Life and career

Telhami was born into an Arab family in Israel and has spoken on his experience as an Arab Israeli at the Palestine Center.^[3] He is fluent in Arabic, Hebrew, and English. He is the author of numerous books, including The Stakes, and writes op-ed pieces from time to time in various periodicals. He also appears on radio (often C-SPAN and NPR) and television (often on public affairs programs such as This Week and Nightline).

Before coming to the University of Maryland, he taught at several universities, including Cornell University, the Ohio State University, the University of Southern California, Princeton University, Columbia University, Swarthmore College, and the University of California at Berkeley, where he received his doctorate in political science.

Professor Telhami has also been active in the foreign policy arena. He has served as Advisor to the US Mission to the UN (1990–91), as advisor to former Congressman Lee H. Hamilton, and as a member of the US delegation to the Trilateral US-Israeli-Palestinian Anti-Incitement Committee, which was mandated by the Wye River Agreements. He also served on the Iraq Study Group^[2] as a member of the Strategic Environment Working Group. He has contributed to The Washington Post, The New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times and regularly appears on national and international radio and television. He has served on the US Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy for the Arab and Muslim World, which was appointed by the Department of State at the request of Congress, and he co-drafted the report of their findings, Changing Minds, Winning Peace. He has also co-drafted several Council on Foreign Relations reports on US public diplomacy, on the Arab-Israeli peace process, and on Persian Gulf security.

His best-selling book, The Stakes: America and the Middle East (Westview Press, 2003; updated version, 2004) was selected by Foreign Affairs as one of the top five books on the Middle East in 2003. His other publications include Power and Leadership in International Bargaining: The Path to the Camp David Accords (1990); International Organizations and Ethnic Conflict, ed. with Milton Esman (1995); Identity and Foreign Policy in the Middle East, ed. with Michael Barnett (2002), A Decade of Reflections on Peace, ed. (forthcoming), and numerous articles on international politics and Middle Eastern affairs.

He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations^[4] and serves on the board of the Education for Employment Foundation, several academic advisory boards, and has served on the board of Human Rights Watch ( and as Chair of Advisory Committee of Human Rights Watch/Middle East). He has also served on the board of the United States Institute of Peace.^[5] Professor Telhami was given the Distinguished International Service Award by the University of Maryland in 2002 and the Excellence in Public Service Award by the University System of Maryland Board of Regents in 2006.

References