The Simon Fraser University School for International Studies, the Centre for Comparative Muslim Studies at SFU, and the Program on Arab Reform and Development at Stanford's Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law invite you to a talk by Hossam El-Hamalawy, Maher Hamoud, and Waleed Salem, in discussion with Hesham Sallam.

In-Person: SFU Harbour Centre, room 2270 (Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, BC)
Online: Via Zoom

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Hossam el-Hamalawy is an Egyptian journalist and scholar-activist based in Germany. His work focuses on Egypt’s military, security services, political economy, and counterrevolution. He publishes State & Barracks, a weekly newsletter examining the nexus of military power, money, and the state in Egypt. It features reporting, analysis, and military history, usually published twice a week.

Maher Hamoud is a lecturer and researcher in Political Economy of Development. He received his PhD in Political Sciences at Ghent University in 2017, Department of Conflict and Development Studies, where he also held a postdoctoral position until January 2022. He received his MA in Economic Development at the American University in Cairo in 2009. He was also the editor-in-chief of the Cairo-based Daily News Egypt. Within the domain of political economy of development, his current research focuses on the intersectionality between development politics, value chains, industrialisation, and international trade with and within the Global South.

Waleed Salem is an Egyptian scholar and journalist. He writes about authoritarian politics, comparative judicial politics, and the politics of the Arab Gulf states. Waleed earned his PhD in political science from the University of Washington with a dissertation entitled "Seeing Like a Court: Judicial Agency in Autocratic Regimes and Transition Politics – The Case of Egypt." His previous research affiliations, alongside the University of Washington, include the International Relations Department at the Central European University in Vienna, the Political Science Department at the American University in Cairo, and the Centre d'études et de documentation économiques, juridiques et sociales (CEDEJ), also in Cairo. His journalistic work appeared in Nature magazine, The New Atlantis, New Lines Magazine, and Al Jazeera, among others.

ABOUT THE DISCUSSANT

Hesham Sallam is a Senior Research Scholar at CDDRL, where he serves as Associate Director for Research. He is also Associate Director of the Program on Arab Reform and Development. Sallam is co-editor of Jadaliyya ezine and a former program specialist at the U.S. Institute of Peace. His research focuses on political and social development in the Arab World. Sallam’s research has previously received the support of the Social Science Research Council and the U.S. Institute of Peace. He is author of Classless Politics: Islamist Movements, the Left, and Authoritarian Legacies in Egypt (Columbia University Press, 2022), co-editor of Struggles for Political Change in the Arab World (University of Michigan Press, 2022), and editor of Egypt's Parliamentary Elections 2011-2012: A Critical Guide to a Changing Political Arena (Tadween Publishing, 2013). Sallam received a Ph.D. in Government (2015) and an M.A. in Arab Studies (2006) from Georgetown University, and a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Pittsburgh (2003).

When did Russia lose its chance of freedom? 1990: As a new openness sweeps Russia, a talented young physicist, Boris Nemtsov, begins his career in politics. Charismatic, confident, liberal and vehemently opposed to corruption, he swiftly rises to prominence. For the first time, another future seems possible. 2015: Putin holds the country in the grip of tyranny once more. Nemtsov, now his fiercest and most unrelenting opponent, is assassinated on a Moscow bridge. This is the story of how a nation's dreams of democracy died. Drawing on buried archives and off-the-record interviews, exiled journalist Mikhail Fishman gives a gripping insider account of the tragedy of modern Russia, told through many lives of Boris Nemtsov — activist, playboy, leader-in-waiting, dissident and, finally, victim. From the economic reforms under Boris Yeltsin to Vladimir Putin's oligarchy, through two wars in Chechnya and the invasion of Ukraine, this is the story of a man fired by the belief that Russia could, still, have another future.

What defines Israel Studies as an academic discipline today, and where might the field be heading in view of the profound changes shaping Israel, diaspora Jewry, and Israel's international standing? How has the aftermath of October 7 impacted academic research and university teaching about modern Israel in American academia? Join Amichai Magen and Ori Rabinowitz in conversation with Professor Donna Robinson Divine, former President of the Association for Israel Studies (2017-2019), and Dr. Asaf Romirowsky, executive director of Scholars for Peace in the Middle East.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Donna Robinson Divine is the Morningstar Family Professor of Jewish Studies and Professor of Government, Emerita at Smith College, where she taught a variety of courses on Middle East Politics. Her writing includes Women Living Change:  Cross-Cultural Perspectives; essays from the Smith College Research Project on Women and Social Change; Politics and Society in Ottoman Palestine: The Arab Struggle for Survival and Power; Postcolonial Theory and The Arab-Israeli Conflict; Exiled in the Homeland: Zionism and the Return to Mandate Palestine; Word Crimes: Reclaiming the Language of the Israel-Palestinian Conflict; and October 7: The Wars Over Words and Deeds. Named the Katharine Asher Engel lecturer at Smith College for the 2012-2013 academic year in recognition of her scholarly achievements, she was also designated as Smith's Honored Professor for the excellence of her teaching. She was president of the Association for Israel Studies from 2017-2019, is an affiliate professor at Israel's University of Haifa, and was named to Algemeiner’s 2019 list of the top 100 people “positively influencing Jewish life."

Asaf Romirowsky, PhD, is the Executive Director of Scholars for Peace in the Middle East (SPME) and the Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa (ASMEA). Romirowsky is also a senior nonresident research fellow at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies (BESA)  and a Professor [Affiliate] at the University of Haifa. Trained as a Middle East historian, he holds a PhD in Middle East and Mediterranean Studies from King's College London, UK, and has published widely on various aspects of the Arab-Israeli conflict and American foreign policy in the Middle East, as well as on Israeli and Zionist history. Romirowsky is co-author of Religion, Politics, and the Origins of Palestine Refugee Relief and a contributor to The Case Against Academic Boycotts of Israel. His latest book is entitled, October 7: The Wars Over Words and Deeds. Romirowsky’s publicly-engaged scholarship has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The National Interest, The American Interest, The New Republic, The Times of Israel, Jerusalem Post, Ynet, and Tablet, among other online and print media outlets.

Virtual Event Only.

Six days before Israelis head to the polls—for what is perhaps the most dramatic and consequential national election in the country's history—what do the latest public opinion surveys tell us about the contending parties and possible outcomes of the elections? Is the Netanyahu bloc likely to win or lose the elections, or are we heading towards a possible stalemate or some new political constellation in Israel? Join Amichai Magen and Ori Rabinowitz for a conversation about the upcoming elections with expert public opinion researcher and political strategist Dr. Dahlia Scheindlin. 

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Dr. Dahlia Scheindlin is a political strategist and public opinion researcher who has advised on nine electoral campaigns in Israel and worked in 15 other countries over 25 years. She is a columnist at Haaretz newspaper and a policy fellow at Century International. Dahlia conducts public opinion research for civil society organizations, including joint Israeli-Palestinian surveys. She holds a PhD in political science from Tel Aviv University, and her writing has appeared in The New York Times, Financial Times, The Guardian, Foreign Affairs, and Foreign Policy, among other publications. She is the author of The Crooked Timber of Democracy in Israel: Promise Unfulfilled (2023), and in 2025, she was a Distinguished Middle East fellow at the University of Pennsylvania.

Virtual Event Only.

Three years after the October 7, 2023, invasion and massacre, the questions and consequences surrounding the worst security failure in Israel's modern history continue to reverberate. With no National Commission of Inquiry established by the Netanyahu government to investigate how Israel was caught off-guard and no definite end to the multi-front war that followed the Hamas attack (in Gaza, Lebanon, Iran, and Yemen), how can we make sense of October 7 and its aftermath? Join Amichai Magen and Or Rabinowitz in conversation with Amos Harel as, three years on, they seek to understand the causes and consequences of the day that forever changed Israel, the Middle East, and the world.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Amos Harel is one of Israel's most accomplished and respected journalists and authors in military and defense affairs. As the military correspondent and then senior defense analyst for Haaretz for nearly three decades, Harel has covered Israeli security and published four books including, most recently, 06:29 - Anatomy of a Failure (published in Hebrew in May 2026), which examines the intelligence misses, military responses, and political context surrounding the October 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks. Previously, he coauthored, with journalist and screenwriter Avi Issacharoff, The Seventh War (2004), about the second Intifada, and 34 Days (2008), about Israel's second Lebanon War. Both books received the Chechic Award, given annually by the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in Tel-Aviv. Harel's The New Face of the IDF, was published in Hebrew in 2013. In 2015, Amos Harel won the Sokolov Award, Israel's most prestigious prize for excellence in journalism.

Virtual Event Only.

Protest and Politics in Turkey in the 1970s: Echoes of Dissent offers the first comprehensive academic study of Turkey’s protest cycle during the 1970s. Drawing on an original dataset, the book examines the interaction between collective action and state repression, tracing the development of leftist, nationalist, and Islamist movements throughout the decade. The book also analyzes how the 1980 military coup suppressed organized political activity and reshaped the political arena, contributing to the subsequent rise of political Islam and the country’s broader rightward shift. By connecting the political struggles of the 1970s to contemporary debates over authoritarianism, democracy, and protest, the study contributes to scholarship on social movements, repression, and political change.

This event is co-sponsored by CDDRL's Program on Turkey and the Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies.