JINSAProfessional Staff Archives - JINSA

Steven L. Pomerantz

Ethan Pupkin — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 19:59:53 +0000

Mr. Pomerantz is Director Emeritus of the Homeland Security Program at JINSA, which brings high ranking American Law Enforcement Executives to Israel to study best practice counterterrorism methodology. He retired from the FBI in June 1995 after a career spanning twenty-seven years. During that time period he rose from a field investigative Special Agent to the rank of Assistant Director, the third highest position in the FBI at the time. Mr. Pomerantz has represented the FBI and the law enforcement community on numerous occasions in a variety of settings both domestically and internationally. He is an expert in the area of terrorism as well as criminal justice information. In January of 2002, he joined JINSA as Director of Counterterrorism Programs.

Mr. Pomerantz served three separate tours of duty at FBI Headquarters, including as Chief, Counterterrorism Section. In that capacity, Mr. Pomerantz had responsibility for supervision of all FBI counterterrorism investigations both domestically and abroad. He was also involved extensively in law enforcement and intelligence service liaison as part of the worldwide effort to combat terrorism.

Mr. Pomerantz also served as Assistant Director in Charge of the Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) Division, the largest single organizational entity in the FBI. The CJIS Division provides technical and criminal justice information services to virtually every criminal justice agency in the United States as well as having extensive dealings abroad.

He has testified before Congress on both issues and is regularly called upon by the media to comment on issues involving terrorism and law enforcement. Mr. Pomerantz was the recipient of numerous awards and commendations during his career.

Mr. Pomerantz holds a Bachelor of Arts from New York University and attended post graduate school at the University of Southern California and Detroit University. Prior to entering the FBI he served five years in the United States Air Force, attaining rank of Captain.

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Michael Makovsky, PhD

Ethan Pupkin — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 13:09:43 +0000

Michael Makovsky since 2013 has been President and CEO of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA), a leading Washington, D.C.-based policy and educational organization focused on U.S. defense and national security issues in the Middle East.

Makovsky has worked extensively on U.S.-Israel defense ties, U.S. policy toward Iran, Syria, Iraq, Gaza, the Persian Gulf, the role of energy in U.S. national security policy, and the Eastern Mediterranean.

Previously, Makovsky served as Foreign Policy Director for the Bipartisan Policy Center, special assistant in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and an energy market analyst for various investment firms.

Makovsky has written articles, op-eds and editorials for various publications on U.S. national security issues primarily involving the Middle East as well as energy markets.

He is also author of Churchill’s Promised Land (Yale University Press), a diplomatic-intellectual history of Winston Churchill’s complex relationship with Zionism.

Makovsky has a Ph.D. in diplomatic history from Harvard University, an MBA in finance from Columbia Business School, and a B.A. in history from the University of Chicago.

Testimony

Testimony for Hearing, “Implications of a Nuclear Agreement with Iran”
House Committee on Foreign Affairs, July 9, 2015

Testimony for Hearing, “Shifting Sands: Political Transitions in the Middle East”
House Committee on Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Middle East and South Asia, April 13, 2011

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Jonathan Ruhe

Ethan Pupkin — Fri, 03 May 2013 19:08:39 +0000

Jonathan Ruhe is JINSA’s Fellow for American Strategy. Prior to joining JINSA, he worked at the Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC), where he focused on Middle East and Former Soviet Union security issues. His commentary has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Foreign Policy, The Dispatch, and various international media outlets. He holds degrees with honors from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and from the University of Chicago, where he was a fellow with the Program on International Security Policy.

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Harris Vederman

Ethan Pupkin — Thu, 02 Jan 2014 15:54:38 +0000

Harris Vederman joined JINSA in December 2013 with over a decade of high-level Washington D.C. and national outreach experience. In his role as Vice President of Programs, Harris is responsible for forging strong relationships with military persons, program participants, alumni, and JINSA supporters to increase the breadth and impact of the organization. Prior to joining JINSA, Harris was the National Grassroots Director for the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC), where he helped to build the RJC into a grassroots and leadership powerhouse with four regional offices, 40,000 members and 40 chapters across the country.

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John Hannah

Ethan Pupkin — Wed, 26 Sep 2018 17:31:45 +0000

John Hannah is the Randi & Charles Wax Senior Fellow at JINSA’s Gemunder Center for Defense and Strategy.

John served in senior foreign policy positions for both Democratic and Republican administrations, including as former Vice President Dick Cheney’s National Security Advisor from 2005-2009 and as Vice President Cheney’s Deputy National Security Advisor for the Middle East from 2001-2005. Previously, he also served as a senior advisor to Secretary of State Warren Christopher during the Bill Clinton administration, and as a senior member of Secretary of State James A. Baker’s Policy Planning Staff during the presidency of George H.W. Bush. Outside of government, John was Senior Counselor at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Senior Fellow at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and a lawyer practicing in the area of international dispute resolution. Hannah received his B.A. from Duke University, his J.D. from the Yale Law School, and did graduate work in international relations at Stanford University.

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Simcha Lyons

Ethan Pupkin — Wed, 26 Sep 2018 17:52:52 +0000

Simcha G. Lyons is the Founder and Chairman of the John C. Danforth Society. He has been a member of the board of directors of Maiden Holdings Ltd., a Bermuda Reinsurance Co., since June 2007. Mr. Lyons currently serves as Chairman of the Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee and as a member of the Audit Committee and the Compensation Committee. Since 2005, Mr. Lyons has served as a senior advisor to the Ashcroft Group, LLC of Washington, D.C., a strategic consulting firm that was founded by the former Attorney General of the United States, John Ashcroft. Mr. Lyons also serves as a Senior Advisor to the Ashcroft Law Firm and as a Senior Advisor to Banner Public Affairs, a political lobbying/consulting company in Washington DC. In 2017, Mr. Lyons was appointed to the Board of Directors of Better Air Ltd., an Australian biotechnology company, and to BSD Growth Fund PCC Limited, a Gibraltar Experienced Investor Fund. Mr. Lyons previously served by appointment of the President of the United States on the United States Holocaust Memorial Council. In addition, Mr. Lyons has been the chairman of Lyons Global Insurance Services, LLC since 2009. Since 2003, he has also served as chairman of Lyons Global Advisors Ltd., a political consulting firm. Prior to 2002, Mr. Lyons was Vice-Chairman of Raskas Foods of St. Louis, Missouri.

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Meriem Mokhtari

Nolan Judd — Wed, 11 Mar 2026 20:09:35 +0000

Meriem is a JINSA researcher and analyst specializing in Middle East security, Islamist movements, and regional political dynamics. With more than ten years of experience spanning journalism and strategic analysis, her work examines the ideological, organizational, and financial ecosystems of…

Hussein Aboubakr Mansour

Nolan Judd — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 16:02:15 +0000

Hussein Aboubakr Mansour is a Fellow at JINSA’s Gemunder Center, where his work focuses on the intersection of Arab politics, Islamist movements, and regional security architecture. An expert in Arab political thought and shifts within Islamist movements, Mansour analyzes how structural evolution impacts U.S. strategic interests and security. His research provides critical insights into the post-Arab Spring ideological currents and the shifting geopolitical landscape of the Gulf.

A widely published author and commentator, his strategic analysis has appeared in The Free Press, Commentary, Tablet, and the Athens Review of Books. Formerly an assistant professor at the Defense Language Institute, he is a recipient of the 2022 Per Ahlmark Award from UN Watch and the 2024 German Mercator Fellowship.

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Lidia Bernd

Nolan Judd — Wed, 14 Jan 2026 15:45:06 +0000

Lidia Bernd serves as a Senior Program & Development Associate at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA), supporting the organization’s national security programs and institutional development initiatives.

She earned her Master’s in Security Studies with a focus on technology from Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service and holds a Bachelor’s in Political Science from Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Her interests center on U.S. national security, emerging technologies, and transatlantic defense and industrial cooperation.

Lidia has previously worked in defense and tech policy, research, and operational roles in the United States, Europe, and Israel, including with the Representative of German Industry and Trade, Hedera Hashgraph, the German-American Chamber of Commerce of the Midwest, and the Institute for Counter-Terrorism in Herzliya.

Lidia speaks German, Hungarian, English, and French, and has basic proficiency in Hebrew.

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Giran Ozcan

Nolan Judd — Tue, 02 Dec 2025 19:33:38 +0000

Giran Ozcan joined JINSA in December 2025 as Fellow for Kurdish Affairs. Prior to JINSA, Giran was the founding Executive Director of the Kurdish Peace Institute. He has previously worked with the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) in its overseas representative offices and was the HDP Representative to the United States of America between 2017 and 2021. He graduated from the University of Warwick with a sociology degree and worked at the Centre for Turkey Studies in London between 2011 and 2016. He was a founding editor of The Region, an online news outlet covering the Middle East.

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