Ghaith al-Omari is Advocacy Director at the American Task Force in Palestine (ATFP). Prior to that, he served in various positions within the Palestinian Authority, including Director of the International Relations Department in the Office of the Palestinian President, and advisor to former Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas. In these capacities, he provided advice on foreign policy -- especially vis-à-vis the United States and Israel -- and security. He has extensive experience in the Palestinian-Israeli peace process, having been an advisor to the Palestinian negotiating team throughout the permanent status negotiations (1999–2001). In that capacity, he participated in various negotiating rounds, most notably the Camp David summit and the Taba talks. After the breakdown of the Palestinian-Israeli negotiations, he was the lead Palestinian drafter of the Geneva Initiative, an unofficial model peace agreement negotiated between leading Palestinian and Israeli public figures. Mr. al-Omari is a lawyer by training and a graduate of Georgetown and Oxford universities. Prior to his involvement in the Middle East peace process, he taught international law in Jordan and was active in human rights advocacy.

Ronit Avni is an award-winning filmmaker, human rights advocate and media strategist with an expertise in Israeli-Palestinian conflict resolution efforts. Ms. Avni is the Founder and Executive Director of Just Vision, a non-profit organization that researches, documents and creates media about Palestinian and Israeli grassroots leaders in nonviolence and peace building.  Avni directed and produced the documentary film, Encounter Point, which screened in 200 cities worldwide and won 5 major awards. She is the only filmmaker to receive the San Francisco Audience Award for Best Documentary twice, with her colleague, Julia Bacha. Avni's most recent film, Budrus, received the Berlinale’s Panorama Audience Award Second Prize and the Special Jury Mention at the Tribeca Film Festival.  From 2000-2003, Ronit worked for Peter Gabriel’s human rights organization, WITNESS. She co-edited the book, Video for Change: A Guide for Advocacy and Activism (Pluto Press, UK). Her essay, “Inverting the Shame-Based Human Rights Documentation Model in the Context of the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict,” was published in American Anthropologist. Avni's work was also featured on Oprah.com, on CNN's Amanpour, and her op-eds have been published in Ha'aretz and the Washington Post.  Ronit has been recognized with a variety of honors, including a 2009 Young Global Leaders Award sponsored by the World Economic Forum and a Joshua Venture Fellowship for young, Jewish social entrepreneurs. Ronit graduated with honors with a BA in Political Science from Vassar College.

Gershon Baskin is the Co-Director and founder of the Israel/Palestine Center for Research and Information (IPCRI) - a joint Israeli-Palestinian public policy think tank.  Baskin has published books and hundreds of articles in the Hebrew, English and Arabic press about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict including: A Model Interim Agreement, Aspects of Internal Security in During the Interim Period, The Future of Jerusalem , The Future of the Israeli Settlements in Final Status Negotiation, and more.  He served as an outside policy advisor of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process during the Rabin government. Baskin was a member of the Jerusalem Experts Committee established by the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office during the Final Status Negotiations in 2000-2001. Baskin holds a Ph.D. in International Affairs from Greenwich University.  He is a member of the Israeli Council for Peace and Security, Chairman of the Board of Directors of MAKOM – The Israeli Center for Environment Mediation, and was a founding chairman of the progressive Synagogue Kehilat Kol Haneshama in Jerusalem.  Baskin has been awarded the Histadrut Prize for Peace in 1996, the Turkish Foreign Policy Institute Peace Prize in 2004, the Tribute of Honor and Courage from the World Movement for Democracy in 2004 and the Search for Common Ground Journalist Award for Middle East Journalism in 2005.

Skip Cornett is Director of Continuing Education at Trinity Lutheran Seminary, Columbus, OH where he also teaches a course on Jewish-Christian relations and one on the church and public policy advocacy, which includes time in Washington and visits to Capitol Hill.  He is a 1974 political science graduate of Marshall University.  He completed his Master of Divinity at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago (LSTC) in 1979,  and a Master of Sacred Theology (STM) in church and society at Trinity in 1993.  In 2008 he was awarded an MA political science at Virginia Tech.  His thesis was entitled “Israeli West Bank Settlements: Perversion of Realism and Obstacle to Peace.”   He has been ordained for 30 years and has served Lutheran congregations in southwest Michigan, Pittsburgh, PA, the Washington, D.C. area, and Columbus and Dayton, OH.  He is the CMEP GAP organizer for Ohio and Indiana.

Aziz Fahmy Farag is Director of Government Affairs for YesMEP.  Yes We Can Middle East is a group of Christian, Jewish, Muslim and Secular Americans who came together to support President Barack Obama's policies in the Middle East.  Aziz Fahmy is the author of 400 page book: "Deconstructing the Theory of Clash of Civilization and Reintroducing Islam to Western Mind".  He is a veteran journalist of the peace process, covering the Middle East for various American and German media outlets from 1977 to 1990. He covered the first ever Egyptian Israeli talks in Cairo in December 1977 after President Sadat's historic trip to Jerusalem as well as Sadat's  assassination in 1981. After relocating to Washington he covered the American news for the Arab TV Networks from 1991 till present time. Among his high profile interviews are President Bill Clinton, Late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Late President Yasser Arafat.

Lara Friedman is the Director of Policy and Government Relations for Americans for Peace Now (APN).   A former U.S. Foreign Service Officer, Ms. Friedman served in Jerusalem, Washington, Tunis, and Beirut (and briefly in Khartoum).   Widely recognized as an authority on US policy in the Middle East, Congress and the Middle East, Israeli settlements, and Jerusalem, Ms. Friedman meets frequently with Members of Congress and congressional staff, Administration officials, foreign diplomats, and other members of the foreign policy community.  She is a trusted resource for journalists and policymakers, and regularly publishes opinion and analysis pieces in the US and Israeli press.  She also works closely with the Jerusalem expert Danny Seidemann and has participated in Track II peace efforts, including the Jerusalem Old City Initiative.  Ms. Friedman has a BA from the University of Arizona and a Master's degree from Georgetown's School of Foreign Service. She speaks French, Spanish, Arabic, and rather poor Italian.

The Most Rev. Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori was elected Presiding Bishop and Primate of The Episcopal Church in June 2006.  She serves as Chief Pastor and Primate to The Episcopal Church’s members in 16 countries and 110 dioceses.  She joins with other principal bishops of the 38 member Provinces of the worldwide Anglican Communion, seeking to make common cause for global good and reconciliation.  She has been vocal about The Episcopal Church’s mission priorities, including the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, issues of domestic poverty, climate change and care for the earth, as well as the ongoing need to contextualize the gospel.  Bishop Jefferts Schori’s career as an oceanographer preceded her studies for the priesthood, to which she was ordained in 1994. She holds a B.S. degree in biology from Stanford University, an M.S. and Ph.D. in oceanography from Oregon State University, an M.Div. from Church Divinity School of the Pacific, and several honorary doctoral degrees.  She remains an active, instrument-rated pilot – a skill she applied when traveling between the congregations of the Diocese of Nevada, where she was elected bishop in 2000 and ordained to the episcopate February 24, 2001. At the time of her election as bishop of Nevada, she was a priest, university lecturer, and hospice chaplain in Oregon.

His Beatitude, Metropolitan Jonah is the Metropolitan of All America and Canada for the Orthodox Church in America. He was received into the Orthodox Church in 1978 at Our Lady of Kazan Moscow Patriarchal Church, San Diego, while a student at the University of California, San Diego. Later, he transferred to UC Santa Cruz, where he was instrumental in establishing an Orthodox Christian Fellowship. In California, Fr. Jonah served a number of missions and was later given the obedience to establish a monastery under the patronage of St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco. During his time building up the monastic community, Fr. Jonah also worked to establish missions in Merced, Sonora, Chico, Eureka, Redding, Susanville, and other communities in California, as well as in Kona, HI. In the spring of 2008, the Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church in America elevated Fr. Jonah to the rank of Archimandrite and he was given the obedience to leave the monastery and take on the responsibilities of auxiliary bishop and chancellor for the Diocese of the South. He was elected Archbishop of Washington and New York and Metropolitan of All America and Canada at the 15th All-American Council of the Orthodox Church in America, in Pittsburgh, PA on November 12, 2008.  Metropolitan Jonah has a Masters of Theology and a Masters of Divinity from St. Vladimir's Seminary and studied at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, CA.

Brian Katulis is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress where his work focuses on U.S. national security policy in the Middle East and South Asia.  Katulis has served as a consultant to numerous U.S. government agencies, private  corporations, and nongovernmental organizations on projects in more than two dozen countries, including Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Egypt, and Colombia. From 1995 to 1998, he lived and worked in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and Egypt for the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs.  Katulis received a master's degree from Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School for Public and International Affairs and a B.A. in history and Arab and Islamic Studies from Villanova University. In 1994 and 1995, he was a Fulbright scholar in Amman, Jordan, where he conducted research on the peace treaty between Israel and Jordan. Katulis has published articles in several newspapers and journals, including The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Baltimore Sun, and Middle East Policy, among other publications. He is co-author of The Prosperity Agenda, a book on U.S. national security published by John Wiley & Sons in 2008.

Matthew Ley is currently a seminarian at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago (LSTC).  He has been to Israel-Palestine six times since October 2002, having co-led three of these trips.  His interest in Zionism began in college where he wrote his senior thesis on the role Zionism has played in the Jewish and Christian communities.  He has been specifically interested in the historical and theological movement of Christian Zionism and the impact it has on US foreign policy in the Middle East.

Charles P. Lutz serves as Churches for Middle East Peace grassroots coordinator in Minnesota. He has visited Israel/Palestine eight times, five of them as leader of peace-seeking pilgrimage groups. Chuck is co-author (with Robert O. Smith) of “Christians and a Land Called Holy: How We Can Foster Justice, Peace, and Hope” (Fortress Press).  Chuck’s Minneapolis congregation, Lutheran Church of Christ the Redeemer, has had a sister-parish relationship with Christmas Lutheran Church in Bethlehem, Palestine, for more than two decades. In his pre-retirement career Lutz spent 40 years in communication and social-justice assignments with Lutheran and ecumenical agencies.

Rev. Canon Hosam Naoum was Rector of St. Philip's and St. Matthew's Episcopal Churches in the West Bank and Acting Dean at St. George's Cathedral from 2006-2008.  Rev. Naoum served as Residential Canon at St. George's Cathedral from 2005-2009.  Currently he is studying for his Masters in Theological Studies at the Virginia Theological Seminary.  He is married To Rafa Naoum with two children, Wadi (5) and Laurice (3).

Hagit Ofran is the director of the Settlement Watch project of the Israeli Peace Now movement (Shalom Achshav).  Traveling daily throughout the West Bank, examining aerial photos and browsing official Israeli documents, Hagit maintains the most thorough, detailed insight possible into the current state of the settlement enterprise. The "Settlement Watch" project serves as a resource for Israeli politicians, diplomats, international media organizations, and first and foremost – for the Israeli public.

She formerly worked for the Geneva Initiative and was Yossi Beilin’s personal assistant when he was the Minister of Justice. She lives in Jerusalem and received her B.A. in Jewish History from Hebrew University.  

Trita Parsi is founder and president of the National Iranian American Council and an expert on US-Iranian relations, Iranian politics, and the balance of power in the Middle East.  He is the author of Treacherous Alliance: The Secret Dealings of Iran, Israel and the United States (Yale University Press 2007), for which he conducted more than 130 interviews with senior Israeli, Iranian and American decision-makers.  Treacherous Alliance is the silver medal winner of the 2008 Arthur Ross Book Award from the Council on Foreign Relations.  Parsi has followed Middle East politics through work in the field and extensive experience on Capitol Hill and at the United Nations. He is frequently consulted by Western and Asian governments on foreign policy matters.  Parsi has worked for the Swedish Permanent Mission to the UN, where he served in the Security Council, handling the affairs of Afghanistan, Iraq, Tajikistan and Western Sahara, and in the General Assembly's Third Committee, addressing human rights in Iran, Afghanistan, Myanmar and Iraq.  Parsi holds a master's degree in International Relations from Uppsala University, a master's degree in Economics from the Stockholm School of Economics, and a PhD from Johns Hopkins University School for Advanced International Studies.

Joel Rubin is the Deputy Director and Chief Operating Officer of the National Security Network (NSN).  In this capacity, he leads NSN’s policy and congressional relations efforts.  Prior to joining NSN, Rubin was both the  Government Affairs Director and Political Director of J Street and JStreetPAC, the political arm of the pro-Israel, pro-peace movement.  Rubin also worked on Capitol Hill, where he was an aide to two senior Democratic Senators on foreign policy, defense, and appropriations issues, earning a congressional staffer of the year award from the Military Officers Association of America.  In addition, Rubin has also held foreign policy positions at the Department of State in both Near Eastern Affairs and Political-Military Affairs, as well as in domestic policy at the Department of Energy in both renewable energy and climate change, winning numerous awards for his service.   For his academic training, Rubin earned a joint Master’s degree in Public Policy and Business Administration from Carnegie Mellon University and a Bachelor’s degree in Politics from Brandeis University.  Rubin writes a monthly political column on Middle East issues for the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle, blogs on the Huffington Post and Democracy Arsenal, and has appeared on both public radio and television as a commentator on international affairs.  Rubin currently resides in the Washington, DC area with his wife and two children.

Shibley Telhami is the Anwar Sadat Professor for Peace and Development at the University of Maryland, College Park, and non-resident senior fellow at the Saban Center at the Brookings Institution. Before coming to the University of Maryland, he taught at several universities, including Cornell University, the Ohio State University, the University of Southern California, Princeton University, Columbia University, Swarthmore College, and the University of California at Berkeley, where he received his doctorate in political science.  Professor Telhami has also been active in the foreign policy arena. He has served as Advisor to the US Mission to the UN (1990-91), as advisor to former Congressman Lee Hamilton, and as a member of the US delegation to the Trilateral US-Israeli-Palestinian Anti-Incitement Committee, which was mandated by the Wye River Agreements.  He also served on the Iraq Study Group as a member of the Strategic Environment Working Group.  He has contributed to The Washington Post, The New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times and regularly appears on national and international radio and television.

Rev. John H. Thomas is Senior Advisor to the President and Visiting Professor of Ministry Studies at Chicago Theological Seminary.  He began his position at CTS in January, 2010.  Prior to this he was the General Minister and President of the United Church of Christ from 1999 to 2009.  He has also served as ecumenical officer of the United Church of Christ (1992-1999) and as the pastor of two local churches (First Congregational Church, UCC, Cheshire, Connecticut, 1975-1981, and First United Church of Christ, Easton, Pennsylvania, 1982-1991).  John Thomas is a native of Connecticut and is a graduate of Gettysburg College, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania (1972) and Yale Divinity School (1975).  He has received honorary doctorates from Eden Theological Seminary, United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities, and Elmhurst College.  He has served on the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches, the Executive Board of the National Council of the Churches of Christ, USA, and is the author of numerous articles on ecumenical and denominational themes.  He is currently the chair of the Leadership Council of Churches for Middle East Peace.

Florent Vranica is the head of the Gaza office of Catholic Relief Services.  Vranica began his work with CRS in September 1998 as a Field Monitor in the Former Yugoslavia region.  With increase of his responsibilities he was promoted to Field Monitor Coordinator.  In March 1999, following  NATO intervention in Yugoslavia, CRS/Macedonia re-employed him for CRS’ border response at the Blace border crossing, assisting refugees coming from Kosovo.  Later he served as camp assistant in Stankovec 1.  In June 1999, Vranica was included in CRS Kosovo return team and served as Field Officer to establish the humanitarian distribution point in Suhareka region (South Kosovo).  From June 1999, Vranica continued to work in Kosovo, becoming Head of Office in 2005.  In 2008, Vranica served in a short term assignment in India during the Bihar Flood Response, and in 2009 he moved to Gaza.  Vranica received a degree in Civil Engineering from Prishtina University.

Ron Young serves as Consultant for the National Interreligious Leadership Initiative for Peace in the Middle East (NILI), composed of 25 leaders of Jewish, Christian and Muslim national religious organizations.  1982-85 Ron and his wife, Carol Jensen, represented American, British and Canadian Quakers in the Middle East; he wrote a book, Missed Opportunities for Peace; U.S. Middle East Policy 1981-86; he founded the U.S. Interreligious Committee for Peace in 1987; and organized the first National Interfaith Convocation and Congressional Visitation for Mideast Peace in March 1989.  In December 2009, he led an interfaith delegation of 15 national Jewish, Christian and Muslim national  leaders on a trip to Jordan, Israel and the West Bank.  Ron is available to speak at local congregations, on college campuses and in community forums.

Uri Zaki is the U.S. Director of B'Tselem.  Following military service as an officer in the Israel Defense Forces, Zaki embarked on a career that has included party politics and work with organizations promoting peace and challenging the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories.  After completing his law degree at the Hebrew University, he became the media and political advisor to former Justice Minister and peace camp leader, Yossi Beilin.  He took part in the talks that formulated the Geneva initiative, and was a main spokesperson of the initiative.  He later entered party politics and was elected as the chair of Young Meretz – Israel's progressive party, and was a candidate to the Knesset in the party's list in the 2009 national elections. Zaki is an alumnus of the American Council of Young Political Leaders exchange program (2005).  In 2008 Zaki was named among Israel's most prominent young professionals by Forbes Israel magazine.