Before joining Sciences Po in 2006, Filiu was a career-diplomat who served as a junior officer representing France in Jordan and the US, before becoming the French Deputy Chief of Mission (DCM) in Syria (1996–99) and in Tunisia (2002-2006). Filiu was also diplomatic adviser to the French minister of Interior (1990–91), the minister of Defense (1991–93) and the Prime Minister (2000-2002). He was one of the ten independent experts that PresidentFrançois Hollande designated to contribute to the 2013 White Book for National Defense and Security[citation needed].
Filiu authored or co-authored some twenty books, including "The Arab Revolution, ten lessons from the democratic uprising",.[1] He later authored "Gaza, a history" (2014, Palestine Book Award) and "From Deep State to Islamic State, the Arab counter-revolution and its jihadi legacy" (2015), "Revisiting the Arab uprisings, the politics of a revolutionary moment" (2018).
His previous research focused on the multi-faceted adaptation of Islam to globalized modernity. He described the conflictingdialectics between local and globaljihad. And he highlighted how radical movements try to "modernize" traditional concepts, giving them a new meaning previously unknown in Islam, for instance in the case of thecaliphate.[2] His "Apocalypse in Islam"[3] was awarded the main prize (Augustin-Thierry) by theRendez-vous de l'Histoire, held every October in the city ofBlois.
In Dezember 2024 Filiu was permitted to travel within Gaza for one month.[7] The results of his experience were published in a book appearing in French in May 2025, and later in the same year in English translation.[8]
Filiu has been interviewed byChristiane Amanpour,[9] BBC/The World,[10] andAl Jazeera,[11] and has been a guest to the English-speaking branch ofFrance 24.[12] He also published five graphic novels and wrote the lyrics of two songs, one about the conflict of the Gaza strip and the latter about theSyrian civil war.
L'Apocalypse dans l'Islam, Fayard, 2008 (Grand prix des Rendez-vous de l'histoire)
Apocalypse in Islam, University of California Press, Berkeley, 2011
Les Neuf Vies d'Al-Qaida, Fayard 2009, réédition La véritable histoire d'Al-Qaïda, Pluriel Hachette, 2011
Les Meilleurs Ennemis - Une histoire des relations entre les États-Unis et le Moyen-Orient, avec David B., Futuropolis (roman graphique) :
Best of Enemies: A History of US and Middle East Relations, Harry N. Abrams, 2012–
Première partie 1783-1953, 2011 (Part One, 2012)
Deuxième partie 1953-1984, 2014 (Part Two, 2014)
Troisième partie 1984-2013, 2016 (Part Three, 2018)
La Révolution arabe : Dix leçons sur le soulèvement démocratique, Fayard, 2011 (prix Ailleurs 2012)
The Arab Revolution: Ten Lessons from the Democratic Uprising, Oxford University Press, 2011
Le Printemps des Arabes, avec Cyrille Pomès, Futuropolis (roman graphique), 2013
Histoire de Gaza, Fayard, 2015 (Palestine Book Award 2015)
Gaza: a history, Hurst, London, 2014; second edition, 2024
Les Arabes, leur destin et le nôtre, La Découverte, 2015 (prix Augustin-Thierry 2015)[19].
Qui est Daech?, avec Edgar Morin, Régis Debray, Gilles Kepel, Michel Onfray, Olivier Weber, Jean-Christophe Rufin et Tahar Ben Jelloun, Philippe Rey, 2015
La Dame de Damas, avec Cyrille Pomès (roman graphique), Futuropolis, 2015
Le miroir de Damas, La Découverte, 2017
(Editor, with Stéphane Lacroix)Revisiting the Arab Uprisings: The Politics of a Revolutionary Moment, Hurst & Company, 2017
Généraux, gangsters et jihadistes : histoire de la contre-révolution arabe, La Découverte, 2018
Main basse sur Israël : Netanyahou et la fin du rêve sioniste, La Découverte, 2019.
Algérie, la nouvelle indépendance, Le Seuil, 2019.
Le Milieu des mondes – Une histoire laïque du Moyen-Orient depuis 395, 384 pages, Le Seuil.
The Middle East: A Political History from 395 to the Present, Polity, 2023
Stupéfiant Moyen-Orient, une histoire de drogue, de pouvoir et de société, 224 pages, Le Seuil, 2023.
Comment la Palestine fut perdue : Et pourquoi Israël n'a pas gagné. Histoire d'un conflit (XIXe – XXIe siècle), Le Seuil, 2024, 432 p. (ISBN 978-2-02-153833-5)[20].
Un historien à Gaza, Paris, Les Arènes, 28 mai 2025, 203 p. (ISBN 1037513789)
A Historian in Gaza. Hurst, (forthcoming November 2025)
