Office Holders
Prof. Gad Barzilai
President of IPSA
Professor Gad Barzilai is Professor of Law, Political Science and International Studies. He is a Full Professor of Law at University of Haifa, and its Dean Emeritus of Law and former Vice Provost and former Head of International School. Barzilai is Full Professor Emeritus of Law, Society and Justice and International Studies at University of Washington. He served among other as the President of the Association of Israel Studies and the President of the Israeli Law and Society Association. Barzilai published heretofore around 20 books and edited volumes and more than 100 articles in referred journals and about 80 more chapters and refereed proceedings. He won prestigious grants and prizes on his work in the US, England, Germany and Israel. He is also PI in the Minerva Center for the Rule of Law under Extreme Conditions at University of Haifa.
Professor Osnat Akirav is an associate professor in Political Science at the Western Galilee College, Israel. The head of the Galilee research institute (which she was one of the establishers) at the Western Galilee College. She holds a PhD from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and postdoc from UCSD. In 2016 she was a visiting scholar at Stanford university. Her specialization is in legislative studies, setting the agenda, candidate selection methods, local government, gender and politics, minorities and politics, research methods and Israeli political system. She has many publications on the representative behavior in local government and in parliaments. She served 10 years as local council representative. Prof. Akirav has won several competitive research grants and research awards including ISF and GIF. In 2010 and in 2015 she received a prize for outstanding teaching in political science from the American Political Science Association and in 2012 she received Edmond Safra award for outstanding achievement and excellence. In 2012 and 2016 she received a prize for best article from the Israeli Political Science Association. In 2015, 2018-2022 she received a prize for excellent researcher from the Western Galilee College. Since 2019 she serves as the vice president of the Israel Political Science Association (ISPSA). And, in 2020 she was nominated to the Western Galilee College president' advisor for gender fairness.
Since 2008, Akirav is a voluntary academic advisor and lecturer at WePower – a non-profit, non-partisan Israeli NGO. In March 2018 she delivered a speech about "Women’s Political Participation" at the annual conference organized by the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) of the United Nation in New York city. In 2022 she received the New Pioneers award from the Union Sefaradi Mundial for her contribution to the Israeli society.
Prof. Osnat Akirav
Vice president of IPSA
Dr. Maoz Rozenthal
Secretary of IPSA
Dr. Maoz Rosenthal is a senior lecturer at the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy, and Strategy at Reichman University and the secretary of the Israel Political Science Association. Dr. Rosenthal's research deals with how political actors strive to achieve their goals in parliamentary democracies, emphasizing the Israeli case. His research mainly examines how political elites use institutional arrangements, rhetoric, and rhetoric to transform their political desires into public policy. Along with dealing with political elites, Dr. Rosenthal examines how weakened political groups act in elections to achieve their goals.
Dr. Rosenthal was a guest lecturer in the Israel Fellows program on behalf of the Schusterman Foundation in the Department of Political Science at SUNY Binghamton University in the USA. He was a visiting researcher at the McMillan Center at Yale University. He was the first postdoctoral fellow of the Planning and Budgeting Committee of the Higher Education Council in Israel in the Department of Sociology, Political Science and Communication at the Open University. Dr. Rosenthal studied all his degrees in the Department of Political Science at Tel Aviv University under the supervision of the late Professor Gideon Doron.
Mr. Joseph Ganel. ISPSA CEO since 2021 after serving as secretary for 6 years. First degree in Economics and General History from Tel-Aviv University and M.A. in Public Policy and Administration from Reichman University. Teach and teaching assistant in economics and statistics.
Mr. Yosi Ganel
CEO of IPSA
Dr. Efrat Knoler
Treasurer of IPSA
Dr. Efrat Knoller is the treasurer of the Israel Political Science Association. Her main area of research expertise is center parties. Political commentator on local media channels and in foreign news. Formerly a judge, public representative at the Regional Labor Court, CEO of the Public Council for the Elderly. Currently, head of the human resources track at Safed Academic College.
