Radwan Ziadeh

Biographical Information
"Dr. Radwan Ziadeh is a Prins Global Fellow at Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies at New York University and a Visiting Scholar at The Center for Contemporary Arab Studies (CCAS) at Georgetown University.

"He is the founder and director of the Damascus Center for Human Rights Studies in Syria and co-founder and executive director of the Syrian Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Washington, DC. He is a frequent political commentator on several U.S., European, and Middle Eastern media outlets such as Al-Jazeera, Al-Arabiya, B.B.C. and Al-Hurra. "

His most recent book is Power and Policy in Syria: Intelligence Services, Foreign Relations and Democracy in the Modern Middle East (to be published by I.B.Tauris in 2010).

Blankfort on Ziadeh
Jeffrey Blankfort reports:
 * [The NED] is currently involved in Syria where the Damascus Center for Human Rights Studies, headed by Radwan Ziadeh, has served as a front for its activities. Ziadeh is also the director of the Syrian Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Washington DC, and has served as a spokesperson for the Syrian National Council, an organization of Syrian living abroad who have been calling for Western military intervention in Syria, a move that has been so far opposed by the opponents of the regime within the country.  This has endeared him both to the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and the Foreign Policy Intiative, two pro-Israel neocon think tanks that are the successors to the Project for the New American Century.  A less well-known connection to Ziadeh is to the Fikra Forum (Fikra meaning "idea" in Arabic), which describes itself as "an online community that aims to generate ideas to support Arab democrats in their struggle against authoritarians and extremists, and to provide a platform for those in the region seeking to shape the future of their countries, and US-based decision makers and opinion leaders who are trying to understand and support those efforts." What the site doesn't say is that the Fikra Forum is a project of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), arguably the most influential Capitol Hill think tank on Middle East issues.  It was founded by AIPAC in 1985, and it has served as a vehicle to push Israel’s agenda ever since – a fact that the mainstream media never mentions.  The presence of 18 Fellows or Associates of WINEP, including several of its leading officials, as Fikra’s list of contributors alerted me to what pretends to be an independent forum.   But to understand to what is happening in Syria today it is necessary not only to consider the repressive history of the Syrian regime under Hafez El Assad, and now under his son Bashir, but also the outside forces represented by the likes of Radwan Ziadeh, that have co-opted what initially started as a peaceful non-violent protest for a democratic reordering of Syria society in the spirit of the Arab spring. Prior to the peaceful protest, those outside elements soon began to use them as a cover for armed attacks on government forces with the obvious intention of provoking the Assad regime with heavy military force, as it has – thereby leading for external demands for foreign intervention and the demand for Assad’s ouster.  Who is behind it? Well, the US, the British, the French, the Turks, the Saudis, Qatar and Israel.

Swimming with Sharks
On 17 February 2012, Ziadeh co-signed a letter requesting the Obama administration to intervene in Syria. Ziadeh was the only Syrian signatory, all the other 55 signatories are notorious neocons, e.g., Max Boot, Paul Bremer, Elizabeth Cheney, Eric Edelman, Jamie Fly, John Hannah, William Inboden, William Kristol, Michael Ledeen, Clifford May, Robert McFarlane, Martin Peretz, Danielle Pletka, John Podhoretz, Stephen Rademaker, Karl Rove, Randy Scheunemann, Dan Senor, James Woolsey, Dov Zakheim...

Affiliations

 * American Political Science Association (APSA) – member
 * Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy (CSID) – member of the board of directors
 * Damascus Center for Human Rights Studies – founder / director
 * Fikra Forum – Contributor
 * International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) – member
 * International Political Science Association (IPSA) – member
 * International Studies Association (ISA) – member
 * Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA)– member of the Advisory Group.
 * Islamic World Initiative at USIP – member of the Advisory Board
 * Middle East Studies Association (MESA) – member
 * Syrian Center for Political and Strategic Studies – director
 * Syrian National Council – spokesperson

Criticism

 * Julien Teil, "Justifying a "Humanitarian War" against Syria? The Sinister Role of the NGOs", La Guerre Hunanitaire, November 16, 2011.

Related Sourcewatch

 * Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies

External Resources

 * Syrian Center for Political and Strategic Studies: profile