PHILADELPHIA, June 30, 2014 – The Middle East Forum is pleased to announce new sponsorships of existing Writing Fellows.
“The Middle East Forum relies on the generous support of private individuals, families and foundations,” said Daniel Pipes, president of the Forum. “We thank the Wax family, Judith Friedman Rosen, the Hochberg Family, and an anonymous donor, for helping to ensure the success of our Writing Fellowship Program.”
The Forum’s Writing Fellowship Program provides timely analysis by specialists on the most pressing problems. Fellows shine a light on controversial and difficult issues others avoid – questioning assumptions, provoking thought, and offering new solutions for policy makers.
The Forum’s newly sponsored fellows:
David Goldman – Wax Family Writing Fellow focuses on economics, demography, and religion. He served as global head of credit strategy for Credit Suisse (1998-2002), global head of debt research for Bank of America (2002-05), and senior editor at the magazine First Things (2009-2011). Mr. Goldman is a regular guest on CNBC’s Kudlow Report and also has frequently appeared on Fox News. He is the author of How Civilizations Die (and why Islam is Dying, Too) (2011). He has contributed to many publications, including the Middle East Quarterly, Commentary, and Wall Street Journal. In September 2013 he joined Reorient Group, a Hong Kong investment bank, as Managing Director and Head of Americas.
Raymond Ibrahim – Judith Friedman Rosen Writing Fellow is a Middle East and Islam specialist who previously served as associate director of the Middle East Forum. He is author of Crucified Again: Exposing Islam’s New War on Christians (2013) and The Al Qaeda Reader(2007). His writings have appeared in a variety of media, including the Middle East Quarterly, Chronicle of Higher Education, Jane’s Islamic Affairs Analyst, Los Angeles Times, Washington Times, and World Almanac of Islamism. He has appeared on Al-Jazeera, C-SPAN, Fox News, MSNBC, NPR, PBS, and Reuters. Mr. Ibrahim regularly lectures, briefs governmental agencies, provides expert testimony for Islam-related lawsuits, and testifies before Congress.
Wolfgang G. Schwanitz – Hochberg Family Writing Fellow is a historian of the Middle East, and a native of East Germany who was raised in Egypt. He holds a Ph.D. in Middle Eastern Studies from Leipzig University. He has taught at five universities, and served as head of Middle Eastern history at the Academy of Science in Berlin. Schwanitz has been a visiting fellow at the French Center in Cairo, Princeton University and the German Historical Institute in Washington, DC. The author of five and the editor of ten books, Schwanitz has published some 150 scholarly articles and over 400 newspaper and magazine pieces on modern Middle Eastern history and international relations. The Middle East Forum supported archival research for his books, Islam in Europe, Revolts in the Middle East(2013); German Middle Eastern Studies after 9/11 (2014); and Nazis, Islamists and the Modern Middle East, with Barry Rubin (2014).
Jonathan Spyer (funded by an anonymous donor) is a Middle East analyst focusing on Syria, Lebanon and Israeli strategic affairs. He is a senior research fellow at the Global Research in International Affairs Center in Israel. Spyer holds a Ph.D. in International Relations from the London School of Economics and an M.A. in Middle East Politics from the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. Author of The Transforming Fire: The Rise of the Israel-Islamist Conflict (2011), Spyer is a columnist at the Jerusalem Post. He has written for the Middle East Quarterly, The Guardian, Ha’aretz, National Post, The Times, Wall Street Journal, Weekly Standard, and appeared on al-Jazeera, BBC World, CNN, Fox News, and Sky News.
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The Middle East Forum promotes American interests in the Middle East and protects Western values at home through intellectual, activist, and philanthropic efforts.
For Immediate Release
For more information, contact:
Amy Shargel, Director, Middle East Forum
Shargel@MEForum.org
