Patrons and Advisory Board

Bergen, a Russian Mennonite, is a co-founder of FOSNA and program coordinator for the Friends International Center. For 11 years, she was national coordinator of the Middle East Program of the Peacebuilding Unit for AFSC in Philadelphia. She lived in Jerusalem in the 1980s, working in peace education and advocacy for the Mennonite Central Committee. She was also involved in interfaith dialogue, taught courses at the Bethlehem Bible College, and co-organized the first Liberation Theology conference in Palestine.

Archbishop Curtis was the Anglican bishop of Calgary from 1983 to 1999 and metropolitan of Rupert’s Land. Curtis was ordained to the diaconate in 1958 in Ottawa’s Christ Church Cathedral. He was ordained a priest the next year in Smiths Falls, Ontario, was named bishop of Calgary in 1983, and became archbishop and metropolitan in 1994.

Gumbleton is a retired auxiliary bishop of the Catholic Archdiocese of Detroit and founding president of Pax Christi USA. His Sunday homilies from St. Leo’s parish in Detroit are published as “The Peace Pulpit” in the National Catholic Reporter weekly. He traveled to Gaza in 2008. Gumbleton is a member of several peace organizations and a recipient of 47 peace awards.

Haddad is a professor of the history of Islam and Christian-Muslim relations at Georgetown University. A Presbyterian from Syria, she came to the United States with her husband in 1963 and received her doctorate in the history of religion from Hartford Seminary in Connecticut. She is the former president of the Middle East Studies Association and specializes in contemporary Islam. She has edited and authored 

Khalidi, an American of Palestinian descent, is the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University. He holds a D.Phil. from Oxford University. His research covers the history of national identities and the role played by external powers in their development in the Middle East. He also researches the impact of the press and education on new senses of community, political identity, and historical narrative. He has written many award-winning books. 

Safieh is a Palestinian Christian diplomat; former PLO mission representative to the United States; and a former ambassador to the Vatican, the U.K., and the Russian Federation. He was involved in the 1988 Stockholm negotiations that led to the first official American-Palestinian dialogue. He was on the international board of trustees of Bethlehem University and was nominated Palestinian general delegate to the Holy See.

Weaver is a professor of the New Testament at Eastern Mennonite Seminary, where she has taught since 1984. She holds a PhD in the New Testament from the Union Theological Seminary. Her publications are numerous. Weaver co-leads regular Palestine and Israel study tours for EMS and Nazareth and Bethlehem work groups for Virginia Mennonite Missions. She has taught New Testament courses in Beirut, Bethlehem, and Cairo. Weaver is a member of Community Mennonite Church in Harrisonburg.