Chelsi Mueller

Title
Assistant Professor
Email
Department
Security Studies and International Affairs Dept
College
College of Arts & Sciences

Areas of Expertise

​Arab-Iranian relations, Iran’s Persian Gulf policy, the Persian Gulf in history, Gulf security, Nationalism, Tribe and State in the Middle East, Israel and the Gulf Arab states, the Arab-Israeli and Israeli-Palestinian conflict 
Chelsi Mueller

Chelsi Mueller earned her MA and Ph.D. in Middle Eastern and African History from Tel Aviv University. She is the author of The Origins of the Arab-Iranian Conflict: Nationalism and Sovereignty in the Gulf  (Cambridge University Press, 2020). Her scholarly articles have appeared in Iranian Studies, the Journal of Arabian Studies, Middle Eastern Studies, the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, the Asian Journal of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies and History and Memory. She contributed chapters to International Intervention in Local Conflicts: Crisis Management and Conflict Resolution since the Cold War (2010, I.B. Taurus) edited by Uzi Rabi, and Constructing Nationalism in Iran from the Qajars to the Islamic Republic (2017, Routledge) edited by Meir Litvak. She has written policy relevant analysis for the Transatlantic Policy Quarterly, e-IR, Tel Aviv Notes, and the Iran Pulse, and has given interviews to various media organizations.

Her research has been cited in numerous scholarly books and articles as well as by media outlets, and think tanks such as the Washington Institute for Middle East Policy, the RAND Corporation, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the European Union's Institute for Security Studies, Israel's Institute for National Security Studies; The Israel Policy Forum; Spain's Research Unit on International Security and Cooperation; the Center for Strategic Research and Analysis and the al-Jazeera Institute for Studies.

Before joining Embry-Riddle, Chelsi worked for 12 years at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University in Israel. There, she helped to craft, translate and edit publications, and she also served as academic coordinator of the Moshe Dayan Center's Annual 12-day Workshop on Israel and the Middle East. The workshop is an intensive 12-day academic workshop and travel program that focuses on the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict and contemporary issues related to Israel, the Palestinian territories and the broader Middle East. She coordinated the participation of more than 300 scholars from North and South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East. She also coordinated the speaker's program, composed of Israeli and Palestinian academics and a wide variety of practitioners such as lawmakers, civil servants, diplomats, UN officials, journalists, pollsters, activists, co-existence leaders and negotiators.

  • Ph.D. - Doctor of Philosophy in Middle Eastern History, Tel Aviv University
  • M.A. - Master of Arts in Middle Eastern History, Tel Aviv University
  • B.S. - Bachelor of Science in English Education and Christian Studies, Crown College
  • GCS 395: Hist & Politics of Gulf Region
  • SS 140: Intro Middle East Meditrn Wrld
  • GCS 336: Mdrn Middle East World Affairs
  • SS 110: World History

GCS 395 History and Politics of the Gulf

GCS 325 International Studies

GCS 400 Special Topics in Global Conflict Studies

 Book

The Origins of the Arab-Iranian Conflict: Nationalism and Sovereignty in the Gulf between the World Wars (New York: Cambridge University Press, June 2020).

 Articles in Peer Reviewed Journals

“Memory Politics in Bahrain: The Invocation of the Early-Modern Past in the aftermath of the 14 February 2011 Uprising,” History and Memory, Vol. 35, No. 1 (2023).

“Changes, Challenges and Transitions in the Persian Gulf, 1919-1939,” The Journal of Arabian Studies, Vol. 8, Is. 2 (2018).

“The Geopolitics of Sectarianism in the Gulf,” with Uzi Rabi, in The Asian Journal of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies, Vol. 12, No. 1 (2018).

“The Gulf Arab States and Israel since 1967: from ‘no negotiation’ to tacit cooperation,” with Uzi Rabi, The British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 4, Is. 4 (2017).

“Anglo-Iranian Treaty Negotiations: Reza Shah, Teymurtash and the British Government, 1927-1932,” Iranian Studies, Vol. 49, Is. 4 (2016).

“From Arab-Palestine to Arab-Islamic Palestine in the Palestinian Educational Philosophy and Curriculum of the Palestinian National Movement,” Middle East Studies, Vol. 48, No. 3 (2012).

 Chapters in Books

“Nationalist Representations of the Persian Gulf under Reza Shah Pahlavi,” Constructing Nationalism in Iran from the Qajars to the Islamic Republic, edited by Meir Litvak (Routledge, 2017).

“Egyptian and Saudi Intervention in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (2006-09): Local Powers Mediation Compared,” with Joseph Kostiner, in International Intervention in Local Conflicts: Crisis Management and Conflict Resolution since the Cold War, edited by Uzi Rabi (I.B.Taurus, 2010).

 Analysis 

“Saudi-Israeli Relations: Progress, Risks and Opportunities,” Transatlantic Policy Quarterly (Vol. 22, no. 3, 2022).

“The Revolutionary Guards, the Persian Gulf and the Nuclear Deal,” Iran Pulse, The Alliance Center for Iranian Studies, Tel Aviv University, 24 May 2016.

“Arab-Iranian Relations in the Persian Gulf after the Geneva Interim Agreement,” Iran Pulse, The Alliance Center for Iranian Studies, Tel Aviv University, 5 March 2014.

“The Nationalist Value of War Games: Iran's Naval Exercises in the Persian Gulf,” Iran Pulse, The Alliance Center for Iranian Studies, Tel Aviv University, 23 January 2012.

“Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the Syrian Uprising,” with Uzi Rabi, TA Notes, The Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, Tel Aviv University, 10 September 2012.

“Egypt's Recent Achievements in Conflict Mediation,” e-International Relations, 31 October 2011.

“Iranian-Arab Relations in Light of Wikileaks Disclosures,” Iran Pulse, The Alliance Center for Iranian Studies, Tel Aviv University, 16 January 2011.