Experience in policy, diplomacy and public affairs.

Hagar Hajjar Chemali

Hagar Hajjar Chemali’s career has been shaped by senior national security and public affairs roles in which she served in the U.S. government under both Republican and Democratic administrations, including at the White House, the U.S. Department of the Treasury, the U.S. Mission to the United Nations and on Capitol Hill.

During her government service, she was Spokesperson and Communications Director for the U.S. Mission to the United Nations; Director for Syria and Lebanon at the National Security Council; Spokesperson for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence at the U.S. Department of the Treasury; and Senior Policy Advisor for the Middle East and Asia in Treasury’s Office of Terrorist Financing and Financial Crimes.

Hagar writes and comments on national security and foreign policy and appears regularly on CNN, MSNOW and Bloomberg. She is an adjunct associate professor at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, where she also earned her Master of International Affairs, and she holds a B.A. in political science from Barnard College, Columbia University. She serves on the Advisory Council of Concordia and on the Advisory Committee of the U.S.-Israel Opera Initiative.

Hagar is a passionate advocate for peace between Lebanon and Israel. Having worked closely with both countries and their governments throughout her career, she believes a peace agreement would transform both nations and serve the core national security interests of the United States. She was born in Connecticut to Lebanese parents who left Beirut during the civil war, and she comes from both Christian and Jewish heritage.