Abed Awad is a founding partner of Awad & Khoury, LLP located in Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey. His practice in the New Jersey / New York area focuses on complex matrimonial law, estate planning (including Sharia-compliant estate planning and the Islamic law of inheritance), Islamic law and business law. Awad is AV rated by Martindale and is a fellow of the International Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers. Awad has native fluency in Arabic and is an international expert in Islamic law and the laws of the Middle East.
Awad regularly provides services as an expert witness in Islamic Law and culture, Middle Eastern law. He testified, consulted and provided expert reports for courts and attorneys throughout the United States, Canada and England concerning the interpretation and application of: Shari’a (Islamic law), Egyptian law, Syrian law, Qatar law, Kuwaiti law, United Arab Emirates law (Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Ras Al-Khimah), Palestinian law, Jordanian law, Lebanese law, Djibouti law, Saudi Arabian law, Omani law, Moroccan law, Iraqi law, Iranian law, Libyan law, Singaporean law, Pakistani law, Mali law, Indonesian law, Gambian law, Bangladesh law, Ja’fari (Shia), Jewish law (Morocco and Egypt), and Canon law (Coptic Orthodox, Catholic, Greek Orthodox, and Protestant).
Awad is an adjunct law professor at Rutgers Law School, Newark, and has taught at Pace Law School and Seton Hall Law School. Courses taught include Matrimonial Litigation, Islamic Banking & Finance, and Islamic Jurisprudence. Awad was also a contributor and U.S. Editor for Harvard Law School’s Islamic Legal Studies Program ShariaSource portal (2016-2019).
As a frequent public speaker at bar associations, universities, conventions, and political events, Awad lectures on subjects ranging from law, politics, gender, religion, and culture internationally, and he has more than 200 television and radio appearances as a political and/or legal commentator for numerous media outlets, including The New York Times, ABC, CNN, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Al-Jazeera, BBC, NPR, Dream TV, French 24 (Arabic), and Al-Arabia.
Awad has published extensively in various publications, among them The Star Ledger, Oxford Encyclopedia of Islam and Women, New Jersey Law Journal, ShariaSource.blog, CNN.com, National Law Journal, North Carolina Lawyers Weekly, Daily Journal (California), The Nation and the Bergen Record. Awad is a regular continuing legal education lecturer nationally, a public speaker at bar associations, universities and conferences. Awad has more than 200 television and radio appearances and has been frequently quoted by national and international media outlets as a political and/or legal commentator, including The New York Times, ABC, CNN, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Al-Jazeera, BBC, NPR, French 24 (Arabic), Al-Arabia, Washington Post, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, The Village Voice, and Chicago Lawyer.
In 2002, Awad was selected as one of ten “Lawyers of the Year” by the Lawyers Weekly (USA) for his groundbreaking decision enforcing the mahr provision in a Muslim Marriage Contract. Awad was a member of the New Jersey Electoral College (2004) and has been the recipient of numerous awards, most notably the Community Activism Award, Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) (2007); the Vision & Achievement Award, Mental Health Association in Passaic County (2010); Avenue Magazine’s Legal Elite (2010), and Corporate International’s Islamic Law Firm of the Year (2017), Scholar of the Year, New Jersey Muslim Lawyers Association (2018), Pro Bono Lawyer of the Year, Unchained (2018) among others. Awad earned a juris doctorate from Pace Law School and an MA in Islamic Studies from the University of London (School of Oriental & African Studies) with a focus on al-Muʻtazilah’s methodology to authenticate hadith. Prior to entering private practice, Awad clerked for Hon. George E. Sabbath, NJ Superior Court.
