Azmi Bishara (Arabic: عزمي بشارة listen^ⓘ born 22 July 1956) is an Arab-Israeli public intellectual, political philosopher and author. He is presently the General Director of the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies and the Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies.

Born in Nazareth, Israel, his political activity began when he founded the National Committee for Arab High School Students in 1974. He later established the Arab Students Union when at university. In 1995 he formed the Balad party and was elected to the Knesset on its list in 1996. He was subsequently re-elected in 1999, 2003 and 2006. However, after visiting Lebanon and Syria in the aftermath of the 2006 Lebanon War, Bishara became the subject of a criminal investigation for acts of alleged treason and espionage and was suspected of supplying targeting information to Hezbollah. He fled Israel, denying the allegations and refusing to return, claiming he would not receive a fair trial.

Bishara has since established himself in Qatar at the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies as an academic and researcher. He also helped establish the Al-Araby Al-Jadeed media conglomerate. In 2017 he announced his retirement from direct political work at the beginning of 2017 with the aim of dedicating all his time to "writing and intellectual production".

Bishara was born in Nazareth into a Christian Arab family. His mother was a school teacher and his father a health inspector and trade unionist with connections to the Communist Maki party; his siblings include Marwan (now a political commentator) and Rawia Bishara (a chef, cookbook writer and restaurateur). According to The Guardian, the family's history goes back hundreds of years to a village north of Nazareth.

His political activism started at his Baptist high school, where in 1974, at the age of 18, he established the "National Committee of the Arab High School Students". Bishara stated that he established the organisation because "the general national feeling among Arab students of the need to struggle against racist practices".

During his studies at the University of Haifa, he established the Arab Students Union, as well as being one of the founders of the Committee for the Defense of Arab Lands in 1976. He went on to study at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem between 1977 and 1980, where he chaired the Arab Students Union and was a member of the Front of Communist Students-Campus. After that he went to Berlin and completed his PhD in philosophy at the Humboldt University of Berlin.

Upon completing his PhD in philosophy at Humboldt University of Berlin (then East Germany) in 1986, he joined the faculty of Birzeit University in the West Bank. He headed the Philosophy and Cultural Studies Department for two years, from 1994 to 1996. He has also worked as a senior researcher at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute.

Bishara is one of the founders of the Society for Arab Culture and of Muwatin, the Palestinian Institute for the Study of Democracy founded by a group of scholars and academics in 1992. He also serves on the board of trustees of the Arab Democracy Foundation.