INTERNATIONALLY RECOGNIZED EXPERTS ON THE PALESTINIAN/ISRAELI ISSUE TO SPEAK AT PITT

PITTSBURGH, Oct. 27 -- In view of the peace agreement signed in Washington, D.C. last Friday, Professor Barry Rubin and Ambassador Clovis Maksoud, leading Middle Eastern experts, will discuss the "Prospects For a Palestinian State," on Friday, Oct. 30, from 2:30 to 5 p.m. in the University of Pittsburgh English Nationality Room, 144 Cathedral of Learning, Oakland.

Each expert will be available to the media from 3:30 to 4 p.m. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Rubin, senior resident scholar of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University, Israel, will speak from 2:30 to 3:30 p.m. and Maksoud, professor of International Relations and director of the Center for the Global South at American University in Washington, D.C., is scheduled to talk from 4 to 5 p.m.

In addition to his position at Bar-Ilan, Rubin is also a senior fellow at Hebrew University's Harry Truman Center, Haifa University's Jewish Arab Center, and the Interdisciplinary Center's International Center for Counter-Terrorism policy.

A prolific writer, Rubin has written several books on U.S. foreign policy and the Middle East. His articles have appeared in The New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Foreign Affairs, and other publications. He has appeared on "Nightline," "Face the Nation," "The David Brinkley Show," "The MacNeil-Lehrer News Hour," and "The Larry King Show."

Maksoud, a Lebanese national, was the chief representative of the League of Arab States to the United States and the United Nations from 1979 until 1990 when he submitted his resignation from the League in the aftermath of Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. He also served as the Arab League Ambassador to India and South-East Asia from 1961-1966.

A lawyer, journalist and diplomat, Maksoud is author of several articles and books on the Middle East and the global South including: "The Meaning of Non-Alignment," "The Crisis of the Arab Left," "Reflections on Afro-Asianism," and The Arab Image." He was senior editor of Al-Ahram and chief editor of

Al-Nahar Weekly.

The lecture is presented by Pi Sigma Alpha (the Political Science Honor Society) in cooperation with Pitt's Nationality Rooms Program and the Consul General of Israel in Philadelphia.

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