I am a post-doctoral research fellow at the Austrian Academy of Sciences, where I work within the ERC project “Persianate Jews: Mobility, Community, Memory”. In 2024, I completed a DPhil in History at the University of Oxford. My dissertation was titled “On Islands of Oil: Jews and Zionism in the Persian Gulf 1880-1948” and dealt with the Persian Gulf’s modern Jewish history. While exploring a hitherto unknown history of Middle Eastern Jews, I took a particular interest in the Gulf region and its relationship to Palestine and the Zionist movement. Drawing on documents and literature in Hebrew, Persian, Arabic, Judeo-Persian and French, the result was a new history of Jewish life in the Gulf and the emergence of the Palestine/Israel-conflict as seen by peoples and states in the Gulf. In our days, this carries particular importance when the Gulf region, long understood as a periphery, has taken center stage in questions relating to Palestine/Israel.
Before my doctoral studies, I completed an MPhil in Modern Middle Eastern Studies (Oxford, 2020) and a BA in Arabic and History (SOAS, 2017).
My academic work has appeared in journals like Past & Present and British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies. I’ve also written commentary for NRK Ytring, Morgenbladet and Stavanger Aftenblad. I was previously Chief Editor of Oxford Middle East Review.
Besides my academic research, I am a prolific public speaker and commentator on matters related to Middle Eastern history and politics. Get in touch at eirik (at) kvindesland (dot) net