I research and interpret the history and politics of the Middle East, contemporary Islam, and modern Israel.

I was the founding president of Shalem College in Jerusalem, Israel’s first liberal arts college, where I continue to teach the modern history of the Middle East. I am also the Koret visiting fellow at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

I earned my undergraduate and doctoral degrees in Near Eastern Studies from Princeton University, where I prepared my thesis under the supervision of Bernard Lewis. I then spent twenty-five years at Tel Aviv University, where I directed the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies. I have taught as a visiting professor at Brandeis University, the University of Chicago, Cornell University, Georgetown University, and The Johns Hopkins University (SAIS). I have also served as a visiting fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington and Harvard University’s Olin Institute for Strategic Studies.

This website is home to my blog Sandbox. Click here to subscribe to new blog posts by e-mail, or subscribe to the feed.

This site also includes a large sample of my published work. My authored and edited books include Islam Assembled; Shi’ism, Resistance and Revolution; Middle Eastern Lives; Arab Awakening and Islamic Revival; The Islamism Debate; The Jewish Discovery of Islam; Ivory Towers on Sand: The Failure of Middle Eastern Studies in America, and The War on Error: Israel, Islam, and the Middle East