Peter Blank is a PhD candidate at the Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, Germany, where he works as a research assistant and lecturer at the Department of Oriental Studies. He holds an MA in Political Science and Islamic Studies from Friedrich-Schiller-Universität and he has also studied at the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Rennes, France. Peter re-joined the OIB for the second part of his fellowship, after completing fieldwork while based at the OIB in 2016/2017.  He was a visiting researcher at the Université Saint-Joseph in Beirut in 2018 and the Department of Peace and Conflict Research at Uppsala University, Sweden, in 2016. He has worked with several political and academic organisations in Germany, Egypt and Lebanon. His research interests include war-to-peace transitions, political parties and power-sharing in divided societies, rebel governance and social change in civil wars.