Edward L. Peck is an Advisory Board Member for the Center on Peace and Liberty at the Independent Institute. He has been U.S. Ambassador to Mauritania; Executive Secretary of the American Academy of Diplomacy; Deputy Director of the Cabinet Task Force on Terrorism in the Reagan White House; Chief of Mission in Iraq, and was in Jerusalem and the West Bank as an international observer of the presidential elections in 2005, and in Gaza for the Legislative Council elections in 2006. Ambassador Peck has also served as Special Assistant to the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs; Foreign Service Officer in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Egypt; Deputy Director of Covert Intelligence Programs; and Director of the Office of Egyptian Affairs.