Mohamad Bazzi is a fellow with the Council on Foreign Relations, where he is working on a project about Hezbollah and the Shiite community in Lebanon. He is the former Middle East bureau head for (New York) Newsday and is based in New York City.

Jon B. Alterman is director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. He is an expert on Middle East politics and was an adviser to the Iraq Study Group.

Yesim Arat is a professor of political science and international relations at Bogazici University in Istanbul, Turkey. She is the author of Rethinking Islam and Liberal Democracy: Islamist Women in Turkish Politics.

Bulent Aliriza is director and senior associate of the Turkey Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. He is an expert in Turkish politics and foreign relations.

Haim Malka is a fellow and deputy director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. He is an expert in Islam and politics, especially in the Middle East and North Africa.

Princeton Lyman is an adjunct professor of foreign service and an adjunct senior fellow in Africa policy studies at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, D.C. He is a former ambassador to South Africa and Nigeria and is an expert on democratization in sub-Sahara Africa.

Naomi Sakr is a reader in communication at the University of Westminster in London, England. She is the author of Arab Media and Political Renewal: Community, Legitimacy and Public Life, which looks at the impact of Arab media on politics.

Orayb Najjar is a professor of journalism at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Ill. She argues that the three Middle East news stations – Al Jazeera, Al Arabiyya, Al Manar – organize coverage around the question, “How should the Middle East be organized?” and that, as a result, they disseminate political news differently than other news […]

Dale Eickelman is a professor of anthropology and human relations at Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H. He and Jon Anderson are the editors of New Media in the Muslim World: The Emerging Public Sphere, which, in part, looks at how new media such as the internet influence politics in Muslim countries.