Abboud Discusses Syria on WHYY’s ‘Radio Times’
Dr. Samer Abboud, Assistant Professor of History and International Studies at Arcadia University, returned to WHYY’s Radio Times with Marty Moss-Coane on March 6 as a guest during a segment titled “The civil war in Syria: The conflict, U.S. policy and how might it end.” He was joined by Andrew Tabler from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
Last week, for the first time since the civil war in Syria began two years ago, the U.S. announced its support for the Syrian opposition movement. In a major shift in policy, the Obama administration said that aid would include food and medical supplies and not militarized weapons that it fears could fall into the hands of radical groups. Since the fighting began, 70,000 Syrian civilians have been killed by pro-Assad forces and over 1 million refugees have flooded neighboring Turkey, Jordan, Iraq and Lebanon raising concerns that the conflict is escalating throughout the already unstable region.
Listen to the hour-long conversation:
About Dr. Samer Abboud
Abboud received his Ph.D. in Arab and Islamic Studies from the University of Exeter’s Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies, where he conducted research on the political economy of marketization in Syria. In his research and teaching, he explores a range of questions informing the fields of International Political Economy and International Relations, particularly in the context of the non-Western World.
He has written extensively on Syria’s political economy and is the co-author (with Benjamin J. Muller) of Rethinking Hizballah: Authority, Legitimacy, Violence (Ashgate). Abboud also serves as a Fellow at the Center for Syrian Studies in St. Andrew’s Scotland, and in 2013 will be a resident fellow in Berlin at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, where he was awarded a fellowship under their Arab Transformation Fellowship program.
He contributes to the Carnegie Middle East Center, a public policy think tank and research center based in Beirut, Lebanon.
