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New FCNL Legislative Secretary for Foreign Policy Jim Fine Will Lead
Hill Lobbying on Iraq for Quaker Lobby
For immediate release - December 4, 2006
The Friends Committee on National Legislation is pleased to announce that Jim Fine joins our staff today as the Legislative Secretary for Foreign Policy. A long-time Middle East scholar and peace activist, Jim has extensive knowledge about sources of conflict and cooperation within the region. Jim's firsthand experience in the Middle East will strengthen FCNL's Iraq Peace Campaign and enable the organization to build on the successful efforts to promote legislation barring the U.S. from building permanent military bases in Iraq.
Jim has lived in Beirut, Jerusalem, Ramallah, and, briefly, in Baghdad. For over three decades he has traveled extensively throughout the region meeting with political, social, and religious leaders and developing relationships of trust and confidence. He has served as the American Friends Service Committee's (AFSC) International Affairs representative in the Middle East traveling to Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Palestine, and Israel. He has also worked with a Quaker high school in Ramallah, and with the Middle East Council of Churches.
Jim’s knowledge of the Middle East and his work in post-conflict reconstruction and peace-building allowed him to travel in 1991 to post-war Iraq as a consultant to the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) and Quaker Peace and Service (London). In the past fifteen years, Jim has made frequent visits to the Middle East, including a year-long stay from 1998 to 1999 and a month-long tour through Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza in 2002. Jim speaks and reads Arabic.
We at FCNL are delighted to welcome Jim to our staff. His expertise and commitment to building peace in the Middle East will add a valuable new perspective to our dialogue with Congress. FCNL's current program is focused on working with Congress to create a commitment for the withdrawal of U.S. military troops from Iraq, to support negotiations to bring armed groups fighting the Iraqi government back to the negotiations table, to establish and participate in a regional peace process involving all of Iraq's neighbors, and to fund the reconstruction of Iraq.
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The Friends Committee on National Legislation, the oldest registered religious lobby in Washington, is a non-partisan Quaker lobby in the public interest. FCNL works with a nationwide network of tens of thousands of people from every state in the U.S. to advocate for social and economic justice, peace, and good government. For more information: http://www.fcnl.org
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