Omar Al-Nidawi is a nonresident senior fellow with the Iraq Initiative in the Atlantic Council’s Middle East programs. Al-Nidawi is also the director of programs at the Enabling Peace in Iraq Center, where he co-develops and leads research and field initiatives focused on governance, peacebuilding, and climate action in Iraq. 

He previously managed the Iraq portfolio at Gryphon Partners, a Washington-based strategic advisory firm, where he advised clients on political risk, market opportunities, and the oil and gas sector in Iraq. From 2015 to 2023, he served as a guest lecturer on Iraq’s modern history and politics at the US Department of State’s Foreign Service Institute. Earlier in his career in Iraq, he was a pioneer of internet journalism and a vocal advocate for freedom of expression, earning recognition by World PC Magazine in 2007 as one of the “50 most important people on the web.” His analysis on Iraqi political, security, and energy affairs has appeared in Foreign Affairs, War on the Rocks, and the Wall Street Journal. 

He earned a BDS from Baghdad University and a master’s degree from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.