A classroom full of students fueled on coffee, barely able to finish their final late night class, sits quietly before the professor comes in and gives his famous speech.

“Everyone breathe in, relax and smile.”

Robert G. Rabil, Ph.D. teaches political science at FAU and specializes in politics concerning the middle east. The topic of the day’s lecture: radical Islam and politics.

The next slide projects the word “Salafism,” a term used to describe the ideology behind Islamic fundamentalist groups like Islamic State. It is also the topic of his most recent book, Salafism In Lebanon, where Rabil explains the origins of Salafism and its revival in Lebanon.

“It [Salafism] is a Sunni religious movement where some Islamic groups want to recreate their golden age,” said Rabil.

Sunni Muslims consider their golden age to be A.D. 632-661 during the first three Muslim generations when the “four rightly guided caliphs” ruled.

Rabil was born in Lebanon and spent a significant portion of his life familiarizing himself with Arabic culture, which, combined with his historic knowledge of the Middle East allows him to trace islamic fundamentalism back to its origin.

“You have to know that when you want to translate Arabic to English you lose the nuisances, whether political or cultural…Arabic has many dialects, colloquial or standard, all of this,” said Rabil.

“I read many primary sources, it is very important to me…every night I go home and do research on these topics…it’s what I love to do.”

He spent the past summer in Lebanon where he observed the Syrian refugee crisis in person, prompting an informative presentation at FAU’s Carole and Barry Kaye Performing Arts Auditorium.

“You can tell that he knows a lot about the political situation in the Middle East by how he describes it,” said Aundria Harvellone, a computer engineering major who attended his presentation on the Syrian refugee crisis.

In a packed lecture hall, using photographs and personal commentary, Rabil guides his audience through the refugees’ impoverished living conditions and their lack of clean water and adequate food. Living in these encampments has become so downtrodden that it is not uncommon for men at the head of families to prostitute women out for food and supplies, in what Rabil says is referred to as “survival sex.”

He visited many refugee camps throughout Lebanon and was escorted by the Lebanese Christian Federation to isolated refugee encampments located on the eastern border. In Lebanon, the government does not attempt to enter its own eastern border region because of the area’s hostility, lawlessness and the constant skirmishes between Hezbollah and the Islamic State.

Rabil continues by detailing the refugees’ economic situation. He shifts focus toward the United Nations’ relief efforts in Lebanon where many of its members countries have failed to fulfill their financial commitments.

Particular emphasis is placed on the urgency of their predicament. Rabil suggests that if something is not done soon, many people will die “trying to get out of their situations.” The overall effect may be Syrians “losing a generation” of people.
Rabil has been featured on CNN, BBC and in the New York Times as an expert on various matters concerning the middle east.