Greenberg Middle East Series continues with lecture on appeal, influence of Hamas

Nimrod Hurvitz, professor of Middle Eastern Studies at Ben Gurion University of the Negev in Israel, will discuss "Hamas: Appeal and Influence," at 8 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 25, in Davis Auditorium. Admission is free.

The upcoming lecture marks a return to Skidmore by Hurvitz, who served Greenberg Middle East Scholar-in-Residence at the College in 2005.

Hurvitz earned B.A. and M.A. degrees in Middle and Near Eastern studies at Tel Aviv University, and a Ph.D. from Princeton University?s Department of Near Eastern Studies with a dissertation on Islamic Orthodoxy.

He has held several Princeton fellowships, was a Fulbright scholar and a fellow at the Institute of Advanced Studies at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. His main areas of scholarly interest are Islamic religious movements in the medieval period and Abbasid courtly culture. He is the author of The Formation of Hanbalism: Piety into Power (2002), as well as numerous articles on a range of subjects within Islam scholarship.

In his work, Hurvitz makes use of a broadly interdisciplinary approach, focusing particularly on the interplay between social history and the history of ideas. He has been involved in efforts to breach the many gulfs between Israeli and Palestinian politicians and intellectuals. A former chair of the Chaim Herzog Center for Middle East Studies and Diplomacy (a research and conference center), Hurvitz also was part of an Israeli contingent (headed by Dror Ze?evi, the fall 2004 Greenberg Scholar-in-Residence) in second-track talks with Palestinian politicians and intellectuals.