Dr. Assal Rad is the Research Director at the National Iranian American Council, where she works on research and writing related to Iran policy issues and U.S.-Iran relations. Her writing can be seen in Newsweek, The National Interest, The Independent, Foreign Policy and more. She has appeared as a commentator on BBC World, Al Jazeera, NPR, and others. She completed a PhD in Middle Eastern History from the University of California, Irvine in 2018 and has a forthcoming book titled, The State of Resistance: Politics, Culture, and Identity in Modern Iran (Cambridge University Press, 2022).