Middle East Forum

The Middle East Forum is a right-wing think tank founded in 1990 by Daniel Pipes. According to its website, the MEF seeks to: "define and promote American interests in the Middle East, fight radical Islam, work for Palestinian acceptance of Israel, reduce energy dependence on the Middle East and counter the Iranian threat." In addition it seeks to "...help shape the intellectual climate in which U.S. foreign policy is made." 

Its committee and boards include such right-wing Zionists as David Steinmann and Dalck Feith (father of Douglas Feith). MEF is closely linked to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, where Pipes was an adjunct scholar.

MEF publishes the Middle East Quarterly (MEQ), edited by Michael Rubin of the American Enterprise Institute. Patrick Clawson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and Martin Kramer, previously the director of Tel Aviv University's Dayan Centre are its senior editors.

Anders Breivik
Anders Breivik, the confessed Norway right-wing terrorist who planted a bomb in Oslo that killed eight people and shot and killed 68 people (mostly teenagers) at a youth camp in July 2011, cited Pipes and the Middle East Forum eighteen times in his 1,500 page anti-Islam manifesto.

Funding
According to the Center for American Progress, the Middle East Forum "received millions of dollars in funds over the past decade, thanks to generous donors such as Donors Capital Fund, which gave $2,300,000; the Bradley Foundation ($305,000); the Russell Berrie Foundation ($273,000); the Becker Foundation ($355,000); the Anchorage Fund and William Rosenwald Family Fund ($2,320,299).

Forum Activities

 * Campus Watch
 * Middle East Quarterly
 * Middle East Intelligence Bulletin
 * Washington Project
 * danielpipes.org (web site of the Forum's director, Daniel Pipes)
 * Islamist Watch
 * Legal Project: Protects researchers and analysts who work on the topics of terrorism, terrorist funding and radical Islam.
 * Research and Publications
 * Lectures and Briefings
 * Public Outreach
 * Student Internship Program

Personnel
As of July, 2013:

Board of Directors

 * Daniel Pipes, Director, Middle East Forum; Bio.
 * Ziad Abdelnour, President & CEO, Blackhawk Partners, Inc..
 * Mitchell G. Bard, Executive Director, American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise (AICE); Bio.
 * Ilan Berman, Vice President for Policy, American Foreign Policy Council
 * Patrick Clawson, Deputy Director, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy; Bio.
 * Gil Elan, Associate Director, Northwest Region, Middle East Forum; Bio.
 * Khalid Durán, Director, Council on Middle Eastern Affairs; Bio.
 * John Eibner, Director of Human Rights, Christian Solidarity International (CSI); Bio.
 * Joseph Farah, Editor and Chief Executive Officer, WorldNetDaily.com; Bio]
 * Gary Gambill, Editor, Middle East Intelligence Bulletin; Bio.
 * Martin Kramer, Editor, Middle East Quarterly; Bio.
 * William Kristol, Editor, the Weekly Standard; Bio.
 * Habib Malik, Professor of history, Lebanese American University; Bio.
 * Laurent Murawiec, Analyst, Hudson Institute
 * Robert Satloff, Director of Policy and Strategic Planning, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy; Bio.
 * Jonathan Schanzer, Soref Fellow, Washington Institute for Near East Policy; Bio.
 * Tashbih Sayyed, Editor and Publisher, Pakistan Today; Bio.
 * Meyrav Wurmser, Director, Center for Middle East Policy, Hudson Institute; Bio.
 * Judith Miller, NY Times Columnist.

Board Members
Source: Juan Cole, Informed Comment, Dec. 8, 2004. (Comments below by Cole)


 * David P Steinmann, Chairman, Steinmann is also President of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA), a pro-Likud warmongering organization that seeks "total" war against Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinians, and which helped drag the United States into its current Iraq quagmire. The Pentagon's Douglas Feith is a long-time JINSA activist.
 * Daniel Pipes, President
 * Jack Bershad, (here identified as legal adviser to Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs).
 * Irwin Hochberg, (Irwin Hochberg, national campaign chair of Israel Bonds, chairman of the International Commission of the Anti-Defamation League, and former chairman of the Jewish Federation of New York; Board Member of the Zionist Organization of America, which has steadfastly supported Israeli colonization of the West Bank and the dispossession of its Palestinians. Of the recent proposed peace plan worked out by Israeli and Palestinian doves at Geneva, Morton A. Klein, the president of ZOA said: "It is outrageous for individuals acting in opposition to the democratically-elected government of Israel to negotiate an 'accord' that undermines Israel's security by putting pressure on Israel to retreat to indefensible borders and divide its own capital, Jerusalem.")
 * Albert Wood, (Prominent philanthropist connected to the Zionist Organization of America)
 * Steven Levy
 * Scott Rosenblum, (Member, Golden Circle of far rightwing U.S. Committee for a Free Lebanon that unites Likud supporters and Phalangist brownshirts)
 * Lawrence Gould
 * Lawrence Grodman
 * Jerry Sorkin

Contact Details
1500 Walnut Street Suite 1050 Philadelphia, PA 19102 TEL: (215) 546-5406 FAX: (215) 546-5409 E-Mail: info@meforum.org Website: http://www.meforum.org/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Middle.East.Forum Twitter: https://twitter.com/meforum

Other Related SourceWatch Resources

 * Neoconservative
 * Orna Shulman - board member