Abdalhadi Alijla is a social and political scientist. From January 2020, he is based at the Orient Institute in Beirut (OIB) as Max Weber Stiftung postdoctoral fellow. Abdalhadi has a Ph.D. in political studies from the State University of Milan and an MA in Public Policy and Governance from Zeppelin University-Friedrichshafen, Germany. He has been granted several awards and scholarships, including DAAD (2009), RLC Junior Scientist (2010), UNIMI (2012), ICCROM (2010), Saud al-Babtin (2002) among others. He is the author of the forthcoming book The Missing Virtue: Trust in Divided Societies (Bloomsbury Academics and I. B. Tauris UK). Abdalhadi is writing his first novel, and “The Son” is a chapter from this, his first literary work.