page_title: Itzchak Weismann
section_title: Biography
hierarchical_section_title: Itzchak Weismann / Biography
caption_attribution_description: English: Itzchak Weismann
context_page_description: Itzchak Weismann is an Israeli historian and associate professor in the Department of the History of the Middle East at Haifa University. He was director of the Jewish-Arab Center in 2010-2013 and a member of the university Senate in 2012-2014. Weismann's work focuses on modern Islam and his research interests include the Salafis, the Muslim Brothers and the Sufis in the Middle East and South Asia, religious preaching and interfaith dialogue. He is scientific editor of the Crescent Series of Islamic Thought of Resling Press and a board member of the Journal of Sufi Studies. His photo exhibition Travels in the World of Islam has been displayed in various places since 2014.
context_section_description: Itzchak Weismann was born and raised in Haifa. He completed his three academic degrees with distinction at the University of Haifa. He obtained his B.A. degree in the university program for distinguished students and the History of the Middle East Department. His M.A. thesis, under the direction of Professor Butrus Abu-Manneh, was dedicated to the life and teachings of Said Hawwa, the principal ideologue of the Syrian Muslim Brothers under the rule of Hafez al-Assad. His Ph.D. dissertation, under the guidance of Butrus Abu-Manneh and Nehamia Levtzion, dealt with the new religious reformist trends that emerged in late Ottoman Damascus in response to the modernization processes initiated by the central government and to the encounter with modern Western thought. Upon completion of his studies in 1998 he continued to post-doctoral research at Princeton University and Oxford University.
  Weismann has taught at Haifa University since 1989, where he was promoted to Associate Professorship in 2010. He was guest lecturer at Dickinson College Pennsylvania in 2008-2009. As head of the Jewish-Arab Center he worked for the promotion of mutual understanding and connections between the communities through many conferences that brought together Israeli government ministers and Members of Knesset, academics, men of religion and leaders of social organizations. Among his projects were "Classmates," which brought together Jewish and Arabs students on campus, and "Acre as a Shared Space,"  which aimed at creating a model of living together in a shared city in respect of local government, education and welfare.  Following that he was invited to take part in international interfaith and intercultural events in Vienna and in Kosovo.  Weismann has published eight books (research, editing and translation), dozens of articles in professional journals in English and Hebrew, and more than ten encyclopedic entries. His writings have been translated into German, French, Italian, Turkish and Indonesian.
  Itzchak Weismann is married to Gerda and father of Tomer, Maya and Shay.
caption: Itzchak Weismann
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