Dr. Samuel Barnai is a Research Fellow at Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism. He is an Adjunct Lecturer at the Department of European Studies and at the Rothberg International School, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Dr. Barnai received his Ph.D. from The Department of Jewish History and Contemporary Jewry at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (dissertation “Soviet Jewry in the Post-Stalin Era, 1953-1964”, advisers Prof. E. Lederhendler, Prof. Y. Ro'i, the late Prof. J. Frankel). He specializes in large-scale studies of historical, socio-demographic, and cultural developments among East European Jewry.

Among his recent works are: "Choreographing Ideology: On the Ballet Adaptation of Peter Abrahams’ The Path of Thunder in the Soviet Union" with Louise Bethlehem and Anton Povzner in: K. Bystrom, M. Popescu and K. Zien (eds.), The Cultural Cold War and the Global South: Sites of Contest and Communitas (2020); “Jews of Soviet Lithuania. Revival after the Holocaust” in: V. Sirutavičius, D. Staliūnas, J. Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė (eds.) Lithuanian Jews: Historical Study (2020, Lithuanian edition in 2012); "Anti-Zionism in Contemporary Russia: Eurasian, Islamic, and Left-populist Trends" in: Robert S. Wistrich (ed.), Anti-Judaism, Antisemitism and Delegitimizing Israel (2016); "Jews in Lithuania: 1945-1990" in: J. Verbickienė and L. Lempertienė (eds.), Lithuanian Jews. History, Culture, Heritage (2009); "Social Trends during the Khrushchev and Brezhnev years: The Jewish Case” in: Z. Gitelman, Y. Ro’i (eds.) Revolution, Repression and Revival: Jews in the Former Soviet Union (2007).