Michael Rubin (historian)

Biography

Early life

A native of Philadelphia, Rubin earned both his B.S. in biology (1994) and his Ph.D. in history (1999) from Yale University. His dissertation, The Making of Modern Iran, 1858–1909: Communications, Telegraph and Society won Yale's John Addison Porter Prize.

Career

Rubin has lectured in history at Yale University, Hebrew University, Johns Hopkins University, and worked as visiting lecturer at Universities of Sulaymaniyah, Salahuddin, and Duhok, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. From 2002 until 2004, Rubin served as a staff adviser on Iran and Iraq for the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Between 2003 and 2004, Rubin worked as a political adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad.

Between 2004 and 2009, he was editor of the Middle East Quarterly. He has received fellowships from the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs.

Since 2007 and 2021, he taught senior U.S. Army, U.S. Marine, and U.S. Navy leadership prior to their deployment to Iraq, the Persian Gulf, and Afghanistan as a lecturer at the Naval Postgraduate School.

Rubin is also a Contributing Editor for the online national security website 19FortyFive.

Turkey shut down order

In 2017, Turkey ordered Twitter to shut down the Twitter account of Rubin, accusing him of insulting Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the President of Turkey. Twitter faced potential fines under Turkish law if it failed to comply. Rubin's critical tweets had sparked the legal dispute.