SLIPPERY ROCK — Slippery Rock University will host a lecture Thursday on World War I and its impact on the Middle East.

Kent Schull, a professor of Ottoman and Middle East history at SUNY-Binghamton, will present the lecture at 12:30 p.m. in the Vincent Science Center.

“World War I is arguably the single most important event in understanding the contemporary Middle East as we know it,” Schull said in a news release. “The war resulted in the collapse of the two major empires in the Middle East; the creation of the current state system through revolutions, wars of independence and European imperialism; the creation of the Arab-Israeli conflict; and the destruction of nearly 25 percent of the region’s population.”

The lecture is part of the university’s yearlong series on World War I, which stated 100 years ago this year.