Whoever wins the White House in November will take office at a time of unprecedented crisis in the Middle East. Regional conflicts, and the American response to them, will have significant implications both for the regions of Kurdistan that have won autonomy from the central governments of Iraq and Syria and for Kurdish struggles for rights and self-determination in Turkey and Iran. In this conversation, hear from Ambassador James Jeffrey, Ambassador William Roebuck, and Cohen Professor of International Relations (Emeritus) Henri J. Barkey on the region about the implications of the US elections for US policy towards the Kurds and Kurdistan, how Kurdish actors and regional states may respond, and what pathways to peace may look like.

The panel discussion will be moderated by SIS Barzani Scholar In-Residence and Director of the Global Kurdish Initiative for Peace Yerevan Saeed.

The event will be followed by a selection of Kurdish cuisine and a networking opportunity.

Bios:

Henri J. Barkey is an adjunct senior fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and the Bernard L. and Bertha F. Cohen chair in international relations at Lehigh University. At CFR he works on the strategic future of the Kurds in the Middle East. Previously he was the director of the Middle East Center at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars (2015-2017). Barkey served as chair of the Department of International Relations at Lehigh University for thirteen years. He served on the State Department Policy Planning Staff (1998-2000) working on the Eastern Mediterranean, the Middle East and intelligence-related issues. He was a non-resident senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (2008-2011). Currently, he also serves on the board of trustees of the American University in Iraq, Sulaimani. He has written extensively on Turkey, the Kurds and other Middle East issues.

Ambassador James F. Jeffrey joined the Wilson Center in December 2020 as Chair of the Middle East Program. Ambassador Jeffrey served as the Secretary’s Special Representative for Syria Engagement and the Special Envoy to the Global Coalition To Defeat ISIS until November 8, 2020. He is a senior American diplomat with experience in political, security, and energy issues in the Middle East, Turkey, Germany, and the Balkans.

He has held senior assignments in Washington, DC, and abroad, including as Deputy National Security Advisor (2007–2008); United States Ambassador to Iraq (2010–2012); United States Ambassador to Turkey (2008–2010); and United States Ambassador to Albania (2002–2004). In 2010 Jeffrey was appointed to the highest rank in the US Foreign Service, Career Ambassador. From 1969 to 1976, Jeffrey was a US Army infantry officer, with service in Germany and Vietnam.

Ambassador William “Bill” Roebuck is the executive vice president of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington. He most recently served as the deputy special envoy to the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS and a senior advisor to the Special Representative for Syria Engagement Ambassador James Jeffrey. Prior to his appointment, Roebuck served as a senior advisor to Special Presidential Envoy Brett McGurk from January to December 2018.

Roebuck served as ambassador to Bahrain from 2015-17. He was appointed deputy assistant secretary for Maghreb Affairs in January 2013 and assumed additional responsibility for Egypt Affairs in January 2014. He served as Chargé d’Affaires in Tripoli, Libya from January to June 2013, earning the Ryan C. Crocker Award for Outstanding Leadership in Expeditionary Diplomacy. From September 2010 to December 2012, he served as director for the Office of Maghreb Affairs in the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. Roebuck served as deputy political counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad from July 2009 to August 2010, covering Iraq’s external relations and leading the embassy’s and the resident international community’s efforts to support the critical March 2010 national elections.

Roebuck served as the deputy office director for Arabian Peninsula Affairs from 2007-09. From 2004-07, he served as the political counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Damascus. In his last year of that assignment, Roebuck served as the acting deputy chief of mission. Prior to his assignment in Syria, he covered political issues in Gaza, while assigned to the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv from 2000-03. He served in Washington as staff assistant to the Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs from 1997-98.

Prior to joining the State Department, Roebuck worked as an English teacher and school administrator in Taif, Saudi Arabia from 1982-87. He served as a Peace Corps volunteer teaching English in Cote d’Ivoire from 1978-81.

Roebuck speaks French and Arabic. He hails from Rocky Mount, North Carolina and received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English literature from Wake Forest University in 1978 and 1981, respectively, and his law degree from the University of Georgia in 1992.

Yerevan Saeed (moderator) is the Barzani Scholar in Residence at American University’s School of International Service and a non-resident fellow at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington He is a TEDx speaker and former lecturer at the University of Kurdistan Hewler. Saeed previously was a visiting scholar and research associate at AGSIW. Saeed is a political analyst who researches and writes on security, political, and energy issues in the Middle East, focusing on Iraq, Turkey, Iran, the Gulf, and the Levant. He has served as White House correspondent for the Kurdish Rudaw TV, and his work has been published in the Washington Institute’s Fikra Forum, the Diplomatic Courier, The New York Times, the London-based Majalla magazine, Rudaw, Global Politician, and several Kurdish newspapers. In addition, he has been interviewed by Voice of America, NPR, CNN, Voice of Russia, and Kurdish television programs and newspapers. From 2009-13, Saeed worked with Stratfor; additionally, he worked for several media outlets, including The New York Times, NPR, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe, BBC, and The Guardian, as a journalist and translator in Iraq from 2003-07.

Co-Sponsored by SIS Department of Politics, Governance, and Economics, the Global Kurdish Initiative for Peace, and the Kurdish Peace Institute.

The Implications of the US Elections for the Kurds in the Middle East