Robert Rabil is professor of political science at Florida Atlantic University. He served as the Red Cross's Chief of Emergency in the Baabda region, Beirut, during Lebanon's civil war and was the project manager of the US State Department-funded Iraq Research and Documentation Project. He has been awarded the LLS Distinguished Faculty Award, LLS Distinguished Professor of Current Affairs, and FAU Scholar of the Year award. He was conferred with an honorary Ph.D. in humanities from the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts.

He is author of Embattled Neighbors: Syria, Israel and Lebanon, Syria, the United States and the War on Terror in the Middle East, Religion, National Identity and Confessional Politics in Lebanon, Salafism in Lebanon: From Apoliticism to Transnational Jihadism, The Syrian Refugee Crisis in Lebanon: The Double Tragedy of Refugees and Impacted Host Communities, and White Heart.