Conference Dates: October 22 & 23, 2007

Participant Biographies

Participant Biographies will be posted as they are received.

Mustafa Abu Sway is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Islamic Studies, and Director, Islamic Research Center at Al-Quds University in Jerusalem / Palestine. He graduated from Bethlehem University (BA, 1984), Boston College (MA, 1985 & PhD, 1993). Dr. Abu Sway taught at the International Islamic University-Malaysia (1993-96), and joined Al-Quds University since 1996. He was also a visiting Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence at Wilkes Honors College/Florida Atlantic University (2003-4). He is one of the winners, along with Dr. Khaled Salem from Al-Quds Univ., of the Science and Religion Course Award 2001, The Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, Berkeley, CA. He published two books: Islamic Epistemology: The Case of Al-Ghazzali (Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, 1995), and Fatawa Al-Ghazzali (International Institute of Islamic Thought and Civilization, 1996). He also co-authored the Islamic Education Textbook (7th Grade) (2001), and the Islamic Education Textbook (11th Grade, vol. I) (2005) for the Palestinian Ministry of Education. Dr. Abu Sway is active in interfaith dialogue for many years. He contributed a paper “Ibrahim in the Islamic Scriptures” to Abraham in the Three Monotheistic Faiths (PASSIA, 1998), and “Prophet Moses: The Islamic Narrative” to Moses in the Three Monotheistic Faiths (PASSIA, 2003).

Azyumardi Azra is Director of Graduate School, Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University, Jakarta, Indonesia. He was rector of this university for two terms (1998-2006). He is also Honorary Professor at University of Melbourne, Australia (2006-9). He gained his PhD from Columbia University (1992) and was awarded Honorary Doctorate Degree in Humane Letters fro Helena College, Montana (2005). He is member of Advisory Board of UN Democracy Fund (2006-8), New York; IDEA International, Stockholm. He has produced 19 books; the latest is Indonesia, Islam and Democracy (2006).

Ali Banuazizi is Professor of Political Science at Boston College and Codirector of the Program in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies.  After receiving his Ph.D. from Yale University in 1968, he taught at Yale and the University of Southern California before joining the Boston College Faculty in 1971.  Since then, he has held visiting appointments at Princeton, Harvard, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Oxford University, and MIT. Ali Banuazizi served as Editor of the journal of Iranian Studies, from 1968 to 1982.  He is a past President of the International Society for Iranian Studies (ISIS) and of the Middle East Studies Association of North America (MESA). He is the author of numerous articles on society, culture, and politics in Iran and the Middle East, and the coeditor (with Myron Weiner) of three books on politics, religion and society in Southwest and Central Asia, including The State, Religion, and Ethnic Politics in Afghanistan, Iran, and Pakistan (1986), The Politics of Social Transformation in Afghanistan, Iran, and Pakistan (1994), and The New Geopolitics of Central Asia and Its Borderlands (1994). His forthcoming book is tentatively titled, Martyrdom: From Sacred to Profane.

Steven B. Bloomfield is executive director of the Weatherhead Center and a member of the Center's Executive Committee. Previously he has served as the Center's associate director, director for public information, and director of the Center's Fellows Program. While working at Harvard he has also served as program director of the Latin American Scholarship Program of American Universities (LASPAU). He has also had classroom teaching experience in the Boston Public Schools, worked in rural development and education as a Peace Corps volunteer in the Ecuadorean Andes, instructed in the elementary grades in a New York City independent school, and served as a member of a settlement-house staff and as a community organizer in Manchester and London, England. He holds degrees from Harvard's Graduate School of Education and Harvard College.

Benjamin Braude is Associate Professor of History and Codirector of the Program in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at Boston College. His BA, MA and PhD are from Harvard. As a visiting professor he has taught at the École des hautes études en sciences sociales in Paris, Universidad Complutensa de Madrid, Smith College, and Harvard University. He has also been a visiting fellow at Princeton University and the Institute for Advanced Studies, Hebrew University, Jerusalem. The coedited Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire, the Functioning of a Plural Society and Essays on Aggadah and Judaica are two of his works. His articles on the relations between Jews, Christians, and Muslims and ethnic identities have appeared in Annales, the William and Mary Quarterly, and the UNESCO History of Humanity Scientific and Cultural Development, among other publications. Now he is completing two related works on Noah in the Abrahamic tradition, Sex in the Sistine Chapel: the Mysteries of Michelangelo's Noah, and Sex, Slavery, and Racism: The Secret History of the Sons of Noah.

James Carroll is a writer and journalist resident in Boston. His weekly op ed column appears in the Boston Globe. A documentary film adapted from his 2001 book, Constantine's Sword; The Church and the Jews: A History, will soon be released. His book House of War: The Pentagon and the Disastrous Rise of American Power is now available in paperback. He has just finished a work on Catholicism and is planning his eleventh novel.

Jocelyne Cesari has been a research associate in the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University since spring 2001 and also holds teaching positions in the anthropology department and the Harvard Divinity School (where she teaches on Islam in America and Global Islam). She is coordinating the Research Program on Islam in the West (see www.fas.harvard.edu/~mideast/activities/islaminwest/index.html). A major publication Encyclopedia of Islam in America, will be published by Greenwood Press in 2007 under the auspices of this research program. She has published several books and articles in European and American journals. Her most recent books are: When Islam and Democracy Meet: Muslims in Europe and in the United States at Palgrave (2004/2006) and European Muslims and the Secular State at Ashgate (2005). Her areas of expertise include Islam and Globalization, Muslim minorities in Europe and America, and Islam and politics in North Africa. She has received grants to write the reports “Islam and Fundamental Rights” and “The Religious Consequences of September 11, 2001, on Muslims in Europe” for the European Commission. (See the website: www.euro-islam.info).

Joel Cohen is a leading authority in the field of medieval and Renaissance musical performance. He has received widespread acclaim as performer, conductor, and writer/commentator in his chosen field, and his unique style of program building has made the Boston Camerata ensemble famous on five continents. Mr. Cohen studied composition at Harvard University. Awarded a Danforth Fellowship, he spent the next two years in Paris as a student of Nadia Boulanger. He has taught and lectured at many East Coast universities, including Harvard, Yale, Brandeis, and Amherst. Abroad, he has given seminars and workshops at the Schola Cantorum in Basel, at the Royal Opera of Brussels, in Spain, Singapore, and Japan. With soprano Anne Azéma, he has co-directed an annual workshop in medieval song in Coaraze, France. His professional honors include membership in Phi Beta Kappa, the Erwin Bodky award in early music, the Signet Society medal from Harvard, the Goerges Longy Award, and the Howard Mayer Brown Award for lifetime achievement in early music. He is an Officier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres of the French Republic. In 1990, Mr. Cohen founded a new ensemble, the Camerata Mediterranea, devoted to the performance of early-music repertoires from the Mediterranean basin. The ensemble's initial tour season took place in France, Italy, Spain, and Morocco; further tours from 1992 to 2004 brought the group's music to audiences in France, the United States, Morocco, Germany, and Holland. Jointly with the Moroccan musician Mohammed Briouel, Mr. Cohen was awarded the Edison Prize in 2000 for the Camerata Mediterranea's recording of Cantigas by King Alfonso el Sabio. In early 2007, Joel Cohen and a group of associates incorporated the Camerata Mediterranea as a non-profit association located in Chaville, France,  near Paris.  The new institute will devote itself to research, dialogue,  and pedagogy involving the diverse musical civilizations of the Mediterranean basin,  Christian,  Jewish,  and Muslim.

Mark R. Cohen, the well known historian of the Jews in Arab lands in the Middle Ages, is Professor of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University. His books include: Jewish Self-Government in Medieval Egypt; Al-mujtama` al-yahudi fi Misr al-islamiyya fi al-`usur al-wusta; The Autobiography of a Seventeenth-Century Venetian Rabbi: Leon Modena’s Life of Judah; Under Crescent and Cross: The Jews in the Middle Ages, which has been translated into Hebrew, Turkish, German, and Arabic; Poverty and Charity in the Jewish Community of Medieval Europe; and The Voice of the Poor in the Middle Ages: An Anthology of Documents from the Cairo Geniza. Cohen has held Fellowships or has taught as a visiting professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem; its Institute for Advanced Studies; Ain Shams University in Cairo; the Free University in Berlin; the Guggenheim Foundation; the Central European University in Budapest; the Wissenschaftskolleg in Berlin; and the National Endowment for the Humanities. He has lectured widely in the U.S., Europe, Israel, Japan, Qatar, and Egypt, before both scholarly and general audiences.

Harvey Cox, Hollis Professor of Divinity, has been teaching in FAS and the Divinity School since 1965. Author of The Secular City and other books, he specializes in the interaction of religion, politics and culture. For several years he has taugfht a course on Jerusalem (where he has lectured at Christian, Jewish and interfaith institutions), as a test case of inter-religious conflict and cooperation. He now teaches a course on "Religion and Politiics in Current 'Fundamentalist' Movements."

Diane E. Davis is Professor of Political Sociology in the Department of Urban Studies and, until July 2007, was associate dean of the School of Architecture and Planning at MIT. Editor of the research annual Political Power and Social Theory, Davis is also co-director the DUSP-MIT Project called Just Jerusalem: Visions for a Place of Peace. She is the author of Urban Leviathan: Mexico City in the Twentieth Century (Temple University Press 1994; Spanish translation 1999) and Discipline and Development: Middle Classes and Prosperity in East Asia and Latin America (Cambridge University Press, 2004) as well as co-editor of Irregular Armed Forces and their Role in Politics and State Formation (Cambridge University Press, 2003). Her research interests include local governance in the developing world, leftist mayors, urban political economy, and the politics of urban policy in cities in conflict. Current research focuses on the social, spatial, and political transformations of cities of the developing world as a consequence of globalization, police impunity, and illegal commerce and trade. She is completing a manuscript titled Policing Transitions that examines the tensions between public and private police in the developing world.

Richard Deckelbaum received a B.Sc. and M.D. from McGill University. He directs the Institute of Human Nutrition at Columbia University. In addition to a long professional involvement with basic research in the cell biology of lipids and issues of human nutrition, he has also been active in translating basic science findings to practical application in different populations. He has chaired taskforces for the American Heart Association, the March of Dimes, and has served advisory committees of the National Institutes of Health, the RAND Corporation, and the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. Early in his medical career he helped establish the first children’s hospital in the West Bank of Jordan and then continued later to organize research programs among Egyptian, Palestinian, and Israeli populations; projects funded by the United States Agency for International Development and the National Institutes of Health. He founded the Medical School for International Health, a collaborative distinct medical school of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and Columbia University. Currently, he continues in projects related to health and science as a bridge between different populations in the Mideast.

Diana L. Eck is Professor of Comparative Religion and Indian Studies at Harvard University. She chairs the Committee on the Study of Religion in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and is also a member of the Department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies. She received her B.A from Smith College (1967) in Religion, her M.A. from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (1968) in South Asian History, and her Ph.D. from Harvard University (1976) in the Comparative Study of Religion. Diana Eck's work on India includes a study of the sacred city of Banaras entitled Banaras, City of Light and a study of the uses of images in Hindu worship, Darsan: Seeing the Divine Image in India.  Her book Encountering God: A Spiritual Journey from Bozeman to Banaras  explores the question of religious difference in the context of Christian theology and the comparative study of religion It won the 1995 Louisville Grawemeyer Book Award in Religion, given for work that reflects a significant breakthrough in our understanding of religion. Since 1991, Diana Eck has been heading a research team at Harvard University to explore the new religious diversity of the United States and its meaning for the American pluralist experiment. The Pluralism Project, funded by the Ford Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation, has been documenting the growing presence of the Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Sikh, Jain, and Zoroastrian communities in the U.S. The Project has produced an award-winning CD-ROM, On Common Ground: World Religions in America and Diana Eck has published  A New Religious America: How a "Christian Country" Has Become the World's Most Religiously Diverse Nation which addresses the challenges of the  complex religious landscape of the post-1965 period of renewed immigration.  In 1998, Eck received the National Humanities Medal from President Clinton and the National Endowment for the Humanities for her work on American religious pluralism. In 2002, she received the American Academy of Religion Martin Marty Award for the Public Understanding of Religion and in 2006, Diana served as President of the American Academy of Religion.

Jamal J. Elias is Professor and Chair of Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania where he holds the Class of 1965 Term Professorship in the School of Arts and Sciences. He is the author of a number of books and articles on a wide range of subjects dealing with Islamic cultural and intellectual history.

Leila Farsakh is assistant professor of political scientist at University of Massachusetts in Boston and co-director of the Just Jerusalem Competition at MIT, Cambridge. She holds a PhD in political economy from the University of London (2002), and an MPhil from the University of Cambridge in the UK (1990). She has worked with a number of international organizations, including the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris (1993-1996) and the Palestine Economic Policy Research Institute in Ramallah (1998-1999). Between 2003-2004 she undertook a post-doctoral research at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. She has published various articles and studies on issues related to the Palestinian economy and the Oslo Process, international migration and regional integration. Her book, Labor, Land and Occupation: The Political Economy of Palestinian Labor Migration to Israel, 1967-2004, was published by Routledge Press, UK in 2005. In 2001 she won the Peace and Justice Award from the Cambridge Peace Commission, in Cambridge Mass.

Reuven Firestone is Professor of Medieval Judaism and Islam at Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles. His books include Journeys in Holy Lands: The Evolution of the Abraham-Ishmael Legends in Islamic Exegesis (SUNY Press), Jihad: The Origin of Holy War in Islam (Oxford University Press), Children of Abraham: An Introduction to Judaism for Muslims (Ktav), Jews, Christians, Muslims in Dialogue: A Practical Handbook, with Leonard Swidler and Khalid Duran. New London, CT: Twenty-Third Publications, 2007, An Introduction to Islam for Jews (JPS, forthcoming), and is currently writing The Revival of Holy War in Modern Judaism (forthcoming). His articles appear in The Journal of Semitic Studies, The Journal of Near Eastern Studies, The Journal of Religious Ethics, The Journal of the American Academy of Religion, The Journal of Jewish Studies, Jewish Quarterly Review, Judaism, Studia Islamica, The Muslim World, The Journal of Ecumenical Studies, The Encyclopaedia of Islam, The Encyclopaedia of the Qur’an, and the Encyclopedia of Religion.

Nathan C. Funk (Ph.D., American University, 2000) is Assistant Professor of Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Waterloo’s Conrad Grebel University College, with previous appointments at American University and George Washington University. His writings on international conflict resolution and the role of cultural and religious factors in peacemaking include two co-edited volumes, Peace and Conflict Resolution in Islam (2001) and Ameen Rihani: Bridging East and West (2004), and the forthcoming book, Making Peace with Islam (2008). His doctoral dissertation focused on the role of unofficial dialogue in Middle East peacemaking efforts. He has lived in the Middle East and South Asia, designed internet courses on peace and conflict resolution, and contributed to research and training projects at the United States Institute of Peace.

Michelle I. Gawerc is a PhD Candidate / Presidential Fellow in the Department of Sociology at Boston College. Her areas of specialization include the sociology of world conflict; and society and mental health. She is currently a Visiting Research Fellow at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where she is conducting the research for her dissertation titled: "Peace-building through People-to-People Initiatives: Israel and Palestine." Gawerc is the recipient of the 2006 Graduate Student Fellow Award of the Peace, War, and Social Conflict Section of the American Sociological Association, an award created to commemorate those UN officials who have lost their lives in the effort to reduce violence. Prior to her doctoral studies, she received an MA in International Peace Studies from the University of Notre Dame, and was a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Haifa and the Jewish-Arab Center. She also served as a consultant for UNESCO-Washington. She has recently published an article titled: “Peace-building: Theoretical and Concrete Perspectives” in Peace and Change: a Peace Journal, 31(4), 435-478 (Oct. 2006).

David M. Gordis is President and Professor of Rabbinics at Hebrew College, a transdenominational institution that promotes Jewish literacy through graduate and undergraduate study of Judaism; preparation for the rabbinate, cantorate, Jewish education and communal professions and lifelong learning opportunities. He is Director of the National Center for Jewish Policy Studies and an Executive Committee member of the Interreligious Center on Public Life, both affiliates of Hebrew College. Among his many publications, he is the co-author of The Abraham Connection. Dr. Gordis has been involved in a wide range of leadership positions, both in the Jewish and Interreligious arenas. He has lectured throughout the United States and in Israel and has written extensively on Jewish life. He holds Doctor of Philosophy in Talmud degree from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America where he was ordained.

William A. Graham is Murray A. Albertson Professor of Middle Eastern Studies in Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences and John Lord O'Brian Professor of Divinity and Dean at Harvard Divinity School. He has been an Arts and Sciences faculty member since 1973. In 2002 he also joined the Faculty of Divinity to serve as its dean. At Harvard, he has served as director of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies and chaired the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, the Committee on the Study of Religion, the Committee on Middle Eastern Studies, and the Harvard College Core Curriculum Subcommittee on Foreign Cultures. He is a former chair of the Council on Graduate Studies in Religion (U.S. and Canada). His scholarly work has focused on early Islamic religious history and textual traditions and problems in the history of world religion. In 2000 he received the quinquennial Award for Excellence in Research in Islamic History and Culture from the Research Centre for Islamic History, Art and Culture (IRCICA), the research institute of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has held John Simon Guggenheim and Alexander von Humboldt research fellowships. He is the author of Beyond the Written Word: Oral Aspects of Scripture in the History of Religion (1987, 1993) and Divine Word and Prophetic Word in Early Islam (1977--American Council of Learned Societies History of Religions Prize, 1978); co-author of The Heritage of World Civilizations (7th rev. ed., 2005) and Three Faiths, One God (2003); an associate editor of the Encyclopaedia of the Qur’an (1998-2006); co-editor of Islamfiche: Readings from Islamic Primary Sources (1982-87); and author of numerous articles and reviews. He received his A.B summa cum laude and an honorary D.H.L. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his A.M. and Ph.D. degrees from Harvard.

Mohamed Hawary is a faculty member at Ain Shams University, Cairo, where he completed his dissertation in 1983 on The Divinity Among the Children of Israel From the Period of ERIOD OF Moses until the Exile of Babylon. He is Director of the Center for Study of the Contemporary Civilizations (CSCC), Ain Shams University, and Professor Of Religious Jewish Thought and Comparative Religions, Department of Hebrew Studies, Faculty of Arts, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt.Among his publications are: BOOKS: Circumcision In Judaism, Christianity, And Islam, Comparative Religions, (in Arabic) Cairo, 1987; Sabbath And Friday in Judaism And Islam, Comparative Religions, (in Arabic) Cairo, 1988; Fasting In Judaism, Comparative Study, (in Arabic) Cairo, 1988; The Commentary On The Ten Commandments In The Judaeo-Arabic Manuscripts, (in Arabic) Cairo, 1993; The Differences Between The Karaites And The Rabbanites In The Light Of Genizah MSS, (In Arabic) Cairo, 1994; The Jewish Polemics Against Christianity In The Light Of The Cairo Genizah, (in Arabic) Cairo, 1994; Medical Vocabulary From The Cairo Genizah, (In Arabic) Cairo, 1994.

Wolfhart P. Heinrichs is the James Richard Jewett Professor of Arabic in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, where he teaches Classical Arabic language and literature. His main research interests are medieval Arabic poetics and Islamic legal theory, with Neo-Aramaic as a sideline. Recent publications in these three fields include: “Na≠d al-shiÆr” [Criticism of poetry], in Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Ed., Supplement (forthcoming, 2004); "QawåÆid as a Genre of Legal Literature," in: Bernard Weiss (ed.): Studies in Islamic Legal Theory (Leiden: Brill 2002), pp. 365-384; and “Peculiarities of the Verbal System of Senåya within the Framework of North Eastern Neo-Aramaic (NENA)," in Werner Arnold & Hartmut Bobzin (eds.): Festschrift für Otto Jastrow zum 60. Geburtstag  (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2002), pp. 237-268. Prof. Heinrichs received his training in Islamic studies, Semitic languages, and philosophy at the universities of Cologne, Tübingen, London (SOAS), Frankfurt, and Giessen. He received his doctorate at Giessen in 1967 and taught there until 1978, when he went to Harvard, first as Professor of Arabic, and since 1996 in the Jewett chair. He is co-editor of the Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Edition.

 

Herbert C. Kelman is Richard Clarke Cabot Professor of Social Ethics, Emeritus, and co-chair of the Middle East Seminar at Harvard University. A pioneer in the development of interactive problem solving—an unofficial third-party approach to the resolution of international and intercommunal conflict—he has been engaged for more than 30 years in efforts toward the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. His writings on interactive problem solving received the Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order in 1997. His major publications include International Behavior: A Social-Psychological Analysis (editor and co-author, 1965), A Time to Speak: On Human Values and Social Research (1968), and Crimes of Obedience: Toward a Social Psychology of Authority and Responsibility (with V. Lee Hamilton, 1989).

Yehezkel Landau is Faculty Associate in Interfaith Relations at Hartford Seminary, a position underwritten by the Henry Luce Foundation. After earning an A.B. from Harvard University (1971) and an M.T.S. from Harvard Divinity School (1976), Landau made aliyah (immigrated) to Israel in 1978. A dual Israeli-American citizen, his work has been in the fields of interfaith education and Jewish-Arab peacemaking. He directed the OZ veSHALOM-NETIVOT SHALOM religious Zionist peace movement in Israel during the 1980's. From 1991 to 2003, he was co-founder and co-director of the OPEN HOUSE Center for Jewish-Arab Coexistence in Ramle, Israel. (See the Web site www.friendsofopenhouse.org) He lectures internationally on Jewish-Christian-Muslim relations and Middle East peace issues, has authored numerous journal articles, co-edited the book VOICES FROM JERUSALEM: JEWS AND CHRISTIANS REFLECT ON THE HOLY LAND (Paulist Press, 1992), wrote a Jewish appraisal of Pope John Paul II’s trip to Israel and Palestine in 2000 for the book JOHN PAUL II IN THE HOLY LAND: IN HIS OWN WORDS (Paulist Press, 2005), and authored a research report entitled “Healing the Holy Land: Interreligious Peacebuilding in Israel/Palestine” (United States Institute of Peace, Sept. 2003, accessible at www.usip.org/reports). At Hartford Seminary, Prof. Landau coordinates an interfaith training program for Jews, Christians, and Muslims called “Building Abrahamic Partnerships” (see www.hartsem.edu or e-mail ylandau@hartsem.edu).

Moshe Ma’oz is Professor Emeritus of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies,Hebrew University, Jerusalem. He is currently a Visiting Scholar at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University. He has published widely on political and social history of the modern Middle East, notably Syria, Palestine, Arab-Israeli relations, as well as religious and ethnic communities. He has participated in many Israeli-Palestinian dialogues and headed, for years, the Truman Institute for the Advancement of Peace, Hebrew University.

Everett Mendelsohn is Professor of the History of Science, Emeritus at Harvard University.  His involvement with the Middle East began through work with the American Friends Service Committee where he chaired their Middle East Panel and in work with the American Academy's Committee on International Security Studies where he chaired their panel on the Israeli Palestinian/Arab conflict.  Two books emerged from these efforts: A Compassionate Peace, A Future for Israel, Palestine and the Middle East, 1982, 1989 and (jointly authored) Israeli-Palestinian Security; Issues in the Permanent Status Negotiations 1995.

Elie Podeh is an Associate Professor, Head of the Department of Islam and Middle East Studies, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem; editor of The New East (Hamizrah Hehadash) – the Hebrew journal of the Middle East and Islamic Studies Association of Israel (MEISAI); and senior research fellow at the Harry S. Truman Institute for the advancement of Peace. He has published several books and articles on inter-Arab relations, the Arab-Israeli conflict and education. Among his publications: The Quest for Hegemony in the Arab World: The Struggle Over the Baghdad Pact (1995); The Decline of Arab Unity: The Rise and Fall of the United Arab Republic (1999); The Arab-Israeli Conflict in Israeli History Textbooks, 1948-2000 (2002; Arabic version, 2006); Rethinking Nasserism: Revolution and Historical Memory in Modern Egypt (edited with Onn Winckler, 2004); Arab-Jewish Relations: From Conflict to Resolution? Essays in Honor of Professor Moshe Ma'oz (edited with Asher Kaufman, 2006); and Britain and the Middle East: From Imperial Power to Junior Partner (edited with Zach Levey, forthcoming). His current research deals with the ways in which the Arab states celebrate and commemorate their national holidays.

Ronit Ricci is currently a post-doctoral fellow at Columbia University's Institute for Comparative Literature and Society. During 1994-1997 she worked as a group facilitator at Neve Shalom/Wahat al Salam School for Peace. She received a Ph.D in Comparative Literature in 2006 from the University of Michigan. Her work focuses on Islamic literature in Javanese and Tamil with a special interest in translation histories and narratives of conversion to Islam.

Abdul Aziz Said is the senior ranking professor at American University and the current occupant of the Mohammed Said Farsi Chair of Islamic Peace. He founded the International Peace and Conflict Resolution Program at American University, currently directs the American University Center for Global Peace, and serves on the board of directors of Global Education Associates, International Center for Religion and Diplomacy, IREX, Jones International University-University of the Web, and Search for Common Ground. Professor Said is a frequent lecturer and participant in national and international peace conferences. He has been a consultant to the U.S. Department of State, the Department of Defense, the United Nations and the White House Committee on the Islamic World. Dr. Said has written, co-authored, and edited eighteen books, most recently, “Making Peace with Islam” (Lynne Rienner Publishers, forthcoming 2007) and “Contemporary Islam – Dynamic, Not Static” (Routledge Publishers, August 2006).

David Salomon, Chairman, FATTOC LLC. Salomon co-founded EWT LLC and Madison Tyler, two of the most successful algorithmic-based trading companies in the securities industry. He also recently co-founded FATTOC LLC, a trading company and developer of next-generation trading-related applications for major financial institutions. Mr. Salomon began his career in finance in the risk arbitrage department at Goldman Sachs, where he ran the equity strategy group and reported directly to Robert E. Rubin. In that role, he introduced the first PCs and many new early algorithmic techniques to be used on the equity trading floor at Goldman Sachs. Mr. Salomon spent 15 years as a trader in the energy markets where he helped to found the oil-trading department at J. Aron and the energy derivatives business at both Banker’s Trust and AIG. In 1978, Mr. Salomon received his B.S. degree in politics and psychology from Princeton University graduating summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa. In 1982 Mr. Salomon graduated with distinction from the Wharton School.

Rachel Salomon is a junior at Yeshiva University High School of Los Angeles where she participates in a dual curriculum that incorporates both Hebrew and secular studies.  The Hebrew curriculum includes the study of Prophets, commentaries on the Bible and Jewish Law.  Ms. Salomon has been in a dual curriculum school for eleven years and is fluent in Hebrew.  Over the course of the summer, she interned with Dr. Moshe Ma’oz to expand her knowledge on the various topics of Islam.  In addition to her studies, Ms. Salomon has been an active member in AIPAC (American Israel Political Actions Committee).  Most recently, she traveled to Prague on a Zionistic youth program called Bni Akiva (sons of Akiva) and toured Israel for six weeks.  She is looking forward to the opportunity to expand her knowledge by participating in this conference.

Muhammad Shafiq is a visiting professor of Islamic and Religious Studies in the Department of Religion, Nazareth College, Rochester, NY. He is Executive Director and a founding member of the Center for Interfaith Studies and Dialogue (CISD) www.naz.edu/dept/cisd. He is a member of the Rochester Interfaith Forum and a founding member and current chair of the Muslim-Catholic Alliance of Rochester. He is also Executive Director/Imam of the Islamic Center of Rochester. Born in Karak, Pakistan, he received a Islamic as well as Western education.  He graduated from Peshawar University with an MA in Islamic Studies (1394/1974).  He was awarded the Presidential Gold Medal Award, and in (1396/1976) Pakistan's Quaid-i-Azam merit scholarship for higher studies.  Shafiq studied at Temple University under Isma`il Raji al Faruqi. He completed his MA and Ph.D. in Religion at Temple. He was awarded a Fulbright post-doctoral fellowship in (1408/1988) to conduct research on Isma`il al Faruqi's thought. Afterward, he served as professor and chair of the Islamic studies department at Peshawar University until 1997. Shafiq has published over forty articles and several books, among them: Interfaith Dialogue: A Guide for Muslims (co-author); Islamic Concept of Modern State: A Case Study of Pakistan; Growth of Islamic Thought in North America; Islamic Da`wah; Islamic Way of Life (translated into Pashto from the Urdu original by Mawlana Maududi); and Al Mustaqbil Lihaza al Din (translated into Pashto from the Arabic original by S. Qutb).

Meena Sharify-Funk (Ph.D., American University, 2005) is an Assistant Professor of Religion and Culture at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, Canada. She specializes in Islamic studies with a focus on contemporary Muslim thought and identity. She is particularly interested in modern Muslim engagement with classical debates in Islamic intellectual history as well as with recent developments in Western thought and culture. Her research interests include debates about the status of women in the Muslim world, transnational networking among Muslim activists, patterns of interpretation among North American Muslim thinkers, and Islamic mysticism’s impact on Muslim social values. Dr. Sharify-Funk has written and presented a number of articles and papers on women and Islam, Islamic hermeneutics, and the role of cultural and religious factors in peacemaking. She has co-edited two books, Cultural Diversity and Islam (2003) and Contemporary Islam: Dynamic, Not Static (2006). Her next book, Encountering the Transnational, explores the impact of transnational networking on Muslim women’s identity, thought, and activism (forthcoming, Fall 2007). She has also coordinated three international conferences: one at the Washington National Cathedral, entitled “Two Sacred Paths: Islam and Christianity, A Call for Understanding” (Fall 1998); one at American University in Washington, DC, entitled “Cultural Diversity and Islam” (Fall 1998); and another at the Library of Alexandria in Egypt, entitled “Contemporary Islamic Synthesis” (Fall 2003).

Muzammil H. Siddiqi born in India in 1943, he received his Islamic education at Darul Uloom Nadwatul Ulama, Lucknow, India. Siddiqi graduated from the Islamic University of Madina in Saudi Arabia in 1965 with a higher degree in Arabic and Islamic Studies. He received an M.A. in Theology from Birmingham University in England and a Ph.D. in Comparative Religion from Harvard University in the USA. Dr. Siddiqi worked with many Islamic organizations in Switzerland, England and the United States. He was Chairman of the Religious Affairs Committee of the Muslim Students Association in US and Canada. Siddiqi also served as Director of the Islamic Center of Washington, D.C. He served two terms (1997-2001) as President of the Islamic Society of North America with Headquarters in Indiana. Since 1981, he is serving as the Director of the Islamic Society of Orange County in Garden Grove, California. He is also the Chairman of the Shura Council of Southern California, an organization representing the Islamic centers, masajid and organizations in Southern California. He is the Chairman of the Fiqh (Islamic Law) Council of North America and the Chairman of the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT). He is a founding member of the Council of Mosques in US and Canada.

M. Hakan Yavuz is an associate professor of political science at the University of Utah. Yavuz received his earlier education in Ankara, Turkey, graduated with B.A. from Siyasal Bilgiler Fakultesi, Ankara. He received his M.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and spent a semester at the Hebrew University, Israel (1990) and received his Ph.D. from University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1998 in political science. Yavuz published a number of books: Islamic Political Identity in Turkey (Oxford University press, 2003/2005); with John Esposito, Turkish Islam and the Secular State (Syracuse University Press, 2003); The Emergence of a New Turkey: Democracy and the AK Parti Yavuz also carried out an extensive fieldwork in Fergana Valley, Uzbekistan to examine the relationship between Islam and nationalism and the preservation and dissemination of Islamic knowledge under socialism. He is an author of more than 40 articles on Islam, nationalism, Kurdish question, and modern Turkish politics. He published in Comparative Politics, Critique, SAIS Review, Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, Central Asian Survey, Journal of Islamic Studies, and Journal of Palestine Studies. He is an editorial member of Critique, Silk Road, Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs. (The University of Utah Press, 2006).