Published Dec. 15, 2017 The Ties That Bind Jerusalem Different religions have their own holy sites in Jerusalem, the city where I've spent my entire adult life. The place I believe to be among the most important, however, is a grubby swath of garages, welding shops and...
In war, the battle today is less on the ground than on social media Dec. 14, 2017 In the 1990s, I served as an infantryman at an obscure Israeli outpost in southern Lebanon whose claim to fame was a curious incident one Saturday morning in 1994: A...
From the Natan Book Award press release: Matti Friedman’s Spies of No Country, which will be published by Algonquin Books in Fall 2018, is the recipient of the 2018 Natan Book Award run in partnership with Jewish Book Council (JBC). The Award, is a pre-publication prize of $25,000 intended to...
JERUSALEM — My most unsettling neighbors here in Jerusalem are Indians: Afzal Hussein Shah, Chulam Muhammad, Mansub Ali. They occupy a lot on a street near my home. You pass No. 22, then No. 24, but instead of No. 26 you find a rectangle of...
Pumpkinflowers was chosen as the winner of the Vine Award for Canadian Jewish Literature in the history category. The awards were presented by the Koffler Center for the Arts at a ceremony in Toronto this week. More from the CBC here....
A short essay on a striking turn to Israel in American Jewish fiction this year, from the latest Jewish Review of Books: Distant Cousins Reading novels published in the last year by some of America’s best Jewish writers, I found myself struck by a recurring character—Israel. That...
A review (The Washington Post, June 23, 2017) of a new collection of essays about the Israeli occupation of the West Bank: What happens when famous novelists ‘confront the Occupation’ in the West Bank By Matti Friedman Last year, the American novelists Michael Chabon, Ayelet Waldman and Dave Eggers led...
A few speaking dates coming up -- for more details click on the date: May 8, 2017: Philadelphia. Jewish Community Services Building, 6:30 p.m. A conversation with Middle East historian Asaf Romirowsky. May 9: Washington, DC. New America (740 15th St NW), 6 p.m. A discussion with Douglas...
"Pumpkinflowers" was published in Hebrew last week by Dvir, an imprint of Kinneret, Zmora-Bitan. The Hebrew title is דלעת: מוצב אחד בלבנון, or "Pumpkin: One Outpost in Lebanon." ...