Samuel W. Lewis, former U.S. ambassador to Israel, will join the Hamilton College faculty this spring as the Sol M. Linowitz Visiting Professor of International Affairs. He previously held that position at Hamilton in 1997.
Lewis is a retired career diplomat whose most recent government post was director of the State Department's policy planning staff for the Clinton administration during 1993 and 1994. Prior to that he had served for more than five years as president and CEO of the United States Institute of Peace, an independent federal institution created by Congress to promote peaceful resolution of international conflicts.
Lewis' 33-year diplomatic career spanned assignments in Italy, Brazil, Afghanistan, Israel and Washington. During his last overseas assignment as ambassador to Israel, Lewis played a prominent role in Arab-Israeli relations. He participated in the 1978 Camp David Conference with President Carter and in subsequent negotiations which produced the historic peace treaty between Israel and Egypt as well as the eventually aborted 1983 Israel-Lebanon peace agreement. Lewis has been affiliated with the Brookings Institution, the Johns Hopkins Foreign Policy Institute, the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and the Council on Foreign Relations.
He co-authored Making Peace Among Arabs and Israelis, has contributed chapters to three edited volumes on the Arab-Israeli conflict and the Society-American rivalry in the Middle East; and has published articles on Israeli-American relations and the American role in Middle East peacemaking in Foreign Affairs Quarterly, the Middle East Journal, The New York Times and The Washington Post.
Lewis is a retired career diplomat whose most recent government post was director of the State Department's policy planning staff for the Clinton administration during 1993 and 1994. Prior to that he had served for more than five years as president and CEO of the United States Institute of Peace, an independent federal institution created by Congress to promote peaceful resolution of international conflicts.
Lewis' 33-year diplomatic career spanned assignments in Italy, Brazil, Afghanistan, Israel and Washington. During his last overseas assignment as ambassador to Israel, Lewis played a prominent role in Arab-Israeli relations. He participated in the 1978 Camp David Conference with President Carter and in subsequent negotiations which produced the historic peace treaty between Israel and Egypt as well as the eventually aborted 1983 Israel-Lebanon peace agreement. Lewis has been affiliated with the Brookings Institution, the Johns Hopkins Foreign Policy Institute, the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and the Council on Foreign Relations.
He co-authored Making Peace Among Arabs and Israelis, has contributed chapters to three edited volumes on the Arab-Israeli conflict and the Society-American rivalry in the Middle East; and has published articles on Israeli-American relations and the American role in Middle East peacemaking in Foreign Affairs Quarterly, the Middle East Journal, The New York Times and The Washington Post.
