Birth: 22/10/1948 Death:NULL/NULL/NULL
Born in New York City on 22 Oct. 1948 into a Christian family; received his secondary school diploma from the International School of Geneva, Switzerland, in 1966; went to the US to study and received a BA in Political Science and Journalism from Syracuse University, USA, in 1970; during 1971-73, worked as reporter/columnist for the Daily Star newspaper and Managing Editor for the Middle East Sketch magazine in Beirut, Lebanon; then program administrator of the Division of International Programs Abroad at Syracuse University in 1973-74; returned to Beirut and became Managing Editor of the Middle East Money (MEMO) bulletin; since 1974, writes occasional articles, reports and commentaries for numerous newspapers and radio and TV agencies around the world; from 1975-82, served as Editor-in-Chief of the Jordan Times newspaper; became lecturer in Journalism and Mass Communications at Yarmouk University, Irbid, Jordan, in 1983; served as General Manager of Al-Kutba Publishers, Amman, Jordan, from 1986-2002; served again as Editor-in-Chief of the Jordan Times newspaper in 1987-88; from 1990-2001, also hosted ‘Encounter’, a weekly interview show on Jordan TV and Radio; was a Visiting Scholar at the Global Affairs Institute, Syracuse University, in 1994, then a Senior Associate from 1995-2001; from 1996-2001, was the author of “Jordan Antiquity”, a weekly article on the archaeology and history of Jordan; from 1997-2001, worked as producer-presenter of Jordan: Ancient Cultures, a weekly history/archaeology program on Radio Jordan; has developed media campaigns and strategies in the 1990s for a number of clients, incl. the Welfare Association; National Bank of Kuwait, Arab Bank, Government of Jordan; continued his studies and received an MSc in Mass Communications from Syracuse University, NY, US, in 1999; was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University during 2001-2002; acts as Senior Analyst for the International Crisis Group’s Mideast office in Amman since 2002; was appointed a member of the Brookings Institution Task Force on US Relations with the Islamic World in 2002-03; Board member of the East-West Institute, New York; Advisory Board member of the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, Georgetown University, Washington, DC; Research Associate at the Program for the Analysis and Resolution
of Conflicts, Syracuse University; has received numerous awards and honors; currently serves as Executive Editor of the Beirut-based Daily Star newspaper; also works as media and communications trainer (e.g., at PASSIA) and consultant (e.g., Jordanian professional business associations) and as internationally syndicated political columnist; was appointed as director of the Issam Fares Institute of Public Policy and International Affairs at AUB in Aug. 2006; has written numerous articles, essays and books, incl. The Jordan Valley, Life and Society Below Sea Level (London and New York, 1981), Jerash: A Frontier City of the Roman East (London, 1986), The Antiquities of the Jordan Rift Valley (Amman, 1988), The State of the Jordanian Child (UNICEF, Jordan, 1993), The Ancient Monuments of Jordan (London, 2003), and The Land and River of Prophecy: Jordan in the Bible and Quran (Amman, 2003).
