Muck: Biblical Fiction as Criticism
Rachel Sharansky Danziger
Dror Burstein’s novel skillfully alternates between Jerusalem of the Prophets and the contemporaneous city, offering a fresh engagement with our conventional understanding of both.
The Prime Ministers: Chronicles of Failure
Benjamin Kerstein
Two autobiographies, written by Israel’s only living former prime ministers, are uneven attempts to come to terms with their unremarkable legacies.
‘To Rectify the World You Have to Rectify Yourself’ – Tziporah Heller
Olga Kirschbaum
An interview with Rebbetzin Tziporah Heller, one of the most influential female Torah teacher in the Haredi world, whose eighth book, "Through a Distant Mirror: exploring the paths of women in Tanach" will be out this summer.
The Rising Juggernaut of the Greater Middle East
Noam Backner
A mixture of global ambitions and domestic policies has led China to undermine the “Washington consensus” in the Middle East.
A Tale of Time and Feeling – Amos Oz
Avi Garfinkel
"Judas," Amos Oz's last novel, is in many ways the sum total of the late author's 50-year career.
The Distortion of Palestine
Alex Stein
One principle seems to be guiding "Palestine: A Four Thousand Year History": The minimization and marginalization of the role Jews played in the history of Palestine.
The Parting Gift: A Novel – Evan Fallenberg
Evan Fallenberg
An excerpt from Evan Fallenberg's new novel teasing out a complex narrative of love and betrayal from the narrow channel that separates the most basic—and quite often, the most base—of our emotions.
The Maverick Israeli Intellectual You’ve Never Heard About
Hanan Harif
Boas Evron, who died last year aged 91, held unusual views on the nature of Jewish Nationhood, the State of Israel and its relationship with the diaspora. A new book revisits his unorthodox political thought.
The Cost of a Lie, the Value of Nothing
Batya Shimony
A young woman, a celebrity, a sexual assault, a media storm: all very much part of the #MeToo zeitgeist, no? But Liar by Ayelet Gundar-Goshen takes the reader along a very different path.
Home and Away: The Accidentally Global Scope of Israel’s English-Language Media
Gilad Halpern
While the international media industry came crashing down in the beginning of the 21st century, Israel's English-language media experienced a tremendous renaissance.
Four Centuries of Jurisprudence in Jerusalem
Muhammad Al-Atawneh Sabina Abdulaev
Between the end of Mamluk rule and the start of the British Mandate, Jerusalem evolved a rich tradition of Islamic Jurisprudence, markedly distinct at times from that of the Ottoman Empire.
‘For Your Information’: Twelve Micro-Stories
Alex Epstein
Somewhere, in a parallel universe, there's an Alex Epstein who writes novels," says Alex Epstein - author of the micro-stories we present here – about his chosen literary form.
‘A Translator is First and Foremost a Reader’
Akin Ajayi
An interview with Jessica Cohen, who was awarded, together with David Grossman, the 2017 Man Booker International Prize for her translation of his book "A Horse Walks into a Bar."
Illiberal Neoliberalism
Asher Schechter
Israel's transition into a global economy is a textbook example of how a country can practice globalization without subscribing to any of its stated values.
Eighteen Lashes: A Novel
Assaf Gavron
An exclusive excerpt from the English translation of Assaf Gavron's forthcoming novel.
‘Reading Lolita in Tel Aviv’: Letters from a Kurd
Ofra Bengio
Through the personal experiences of Mariwan, a Kurdish adolescent, Kae Bahar tells the story of the Kurdish nation's struggle for independence.
‘My Identity has Nothing to Do with the Language in Which I Write’
Janan Bsoul
An interview with Jaffa poet Ayat Abu Shmeiss
Global Jewish Identities
Ephraim Meir
Around the world today we find several ways of belonging, of which full conversion is one option. Entire communities see themselves as Jewish without being formally recognized as such.
Ronit Matalon: An Appreciation
Yiftach Ashkenazi
In memoriam of the stellar Mizrahi writer who rejected identity politics
This Time for Africa
Efy Halperin
Dr. Efy Halperin, an Israeli infectious disease specialist, spent several months volunteering in rural Uganda.
A Warm Tale of Human Foibles
Rachel Harris
Yirmi Pinkus reconstructs a 1980s Tel Aviv Ashkenazi enclave that is replete with charming vignettes but detached from the realities it aspires to hark back to.