organization of problems at their campuses. In turn critics within the discipline such as John Esposito accused him of "McCarthyism". Professors denounced by Pipes as "left-wing extremists" were often harassed with hate speech. Pipes was appointed to the United States Institute of Peace board of directors by George W. Bush, despite protests from the Arab American community. In 2010, foreign policy analyst Mitchell Bard claimed in his 2010 book The Arab Lobby: The Invisible Alliance That Undermines America's Interests in the Middle East that elements of the Arab lobby particularly Saudi Arabia and pro-Palestinian advocates were hijacking the academic field of Middle Eastern studies within several prominent American universities including Georgetown University, Harvard University, and Columbia University. This has involved Saudi Arabia and other Gulf States funding centers and chairs at universities to promote a pro-Arabist agenda. Bard has also accused several prominent Middle Eastern studies academics including John Esposito and Rashid Khalidi of abusing positions by advancing a pro-Palestinian political agenda. In addition, Bard has criticized the Middle Eastern Studies Association (MESA) for adopting a pro-Palestinian standpoint. Bard has also alleged that MESA marginalizes non-Israel-related topics including the Kurdish–Turkish conflict and the persecution of religious minorities like Christians and ethnic minorities that are non-Arabs such as Jews, Kurds, Armenians and Yazidis. Finally, Bard has contended that since the September 11 attacks, the Arab lobby working through Middle Eastern Studies university departments have sought to influence pre-university education by tailoring education programs and resources to reflect a pro-Arabist agenda. Academic centers The Middle East Centre (MEC) at St Antony's College, University of Oxford Department of Near and Middle Eastern Studies at Trinity College Dublin in Dublin, Ireland Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies at the American University of Beirut Centre for Arab & Islamic Studies (Middle East & Central Asia), The Australian National University, Canberra, Australia Center for Contemporary Arab Studies at Georgetown University Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Metropolitan University Prague Center for Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Chicago Center for Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Arizona Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Lund University Middle East Studies Institute at Shanghai International Studies University, China Center for Middle Eastern and North African Studies at the University of Michigan Center for Modern Oriental Studies at Humboldt University in Berlin Center for Near and Middle Eastern Studies at Marburg University Department of African, Middle Eastern,