Biography
Walid Phares was born on December 24, 1957 and raised in Beirut, where he studied at the Lebanese and Saint Joseph Universities. After earning degrees in law, political science and sociology, he practiced law in Beirut. He then earned a Masters degree in International Law from the Université de Lyon in France and a Ph.D. in international relations and strategic studies from the University of Miami. He emigrated to the United States in 1990, after Syrian troops invaded the last enclaves of what was known then as the "Free Lebanon".
Phares is a Senior Fellow and the Director of the Future Terrorism Project at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington, D.C., and a Visiting Fellow at the European Foundation for Democracy in Brussels. In 2008 he also became the Coordinator of the Trans-Atlantic Parliamentary Group on Counter Jihadi-Terrorism.
Phares is an expert on Maronite history and affairs, and has served as the Secretary General of the World Maronite Union and also as the Secretary General of the World Lebanese Cultural Union.
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