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Alex Shams

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Israel Palestine Reporting

New identity law raises fears of Israeli effort to divide Christians

Posted on February 26, 2014 by Alex Shams

Originally published on Ma’an News Agency on Feb. 26, 2014. BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — A new law to create a separate “Christian” nationality for Palestinian citizens of Israel successfully passed through the

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Israel Palestine Reporting

Interview: Ilan Pappe on academic freedom in Israel and BDS

Posted on February 21, 2014 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ma’an News Agency on February 21, 2014. Ilan Pappe is an Israeli historian and political activist. Much of Pappe’s academic work has focused on the 1948 expulsion

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Academic Work Iran Israel Opinion

Next Year in Tehran

Posted on February 20, 2014 by Alex Shams

Originally published on The New Inquiry on Feb. 20, 2014. An Iranian intellectual’s trip to Israel in the 1960s revealed the strange appeal of secular republicanism to religious ethno-supremacists In March

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Reporting

In photos: Rooftop garden flourishes atop Bethlehem refugee camp

Posted on February 16, 2014 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ma’an News Agency on February 16, 2014. In 1948, three-quarters of a million Palestinians were expelled or fled from their homes inside what is today Israel. Since

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Palestine Reporting

Camp on front line of struggle against occupation

Posted on February 11, 2014 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ma’an News Agency on February 11, 2014. Tucked behind the luxurious Intercontinental Hotel in the northern edges of Bethlehem sits the crowded Aida refugee camp. Reacting to

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Iran Opinion

From Tehran to Newcastle: “I Am Nasrine” and the Politics of Telling Migrant Narratives

Posted on February 10, 2014 by Alex Shams

Originally published on February 10, 2014 by Ajam Media Collective. “I Am Nasrine” is the first feature length-film from Iranian-British Director Tina Gharavi. Newly available on DVD, the BAFTA-nominated film

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Israel Palestine Reporting

Ariel Sharon dead at 85

Posted on January 11, 2014 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ma’an News Agency on January 11, 2014. Former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon died Saturday after eight years in a coma, leaving behind a bloody and conflicted

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Palestine Reporting

In photos: Hiking the ruins of Lifta

Posted on January 3, 2014 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ma’an News Agency on January 3, 2014. BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — Lifta is a Palestinian village that was mostly destroyed in 1948. Today, its ruins lie in Jerusalem’s

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Palestine Reporting

FEMEN threatens to ‘cancel’ Christmas in Bethlehem

Posted on December 24, 2013 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ma’an News Agency on December 24, 2013. BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — As Christmas Eve celebrations took over the streets of Bethlehem on Tuesday, rumors swirled of a plot

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Palestine Reporting

Storm disaster in Gaza ‘man-made’

Posted on December 17, 2013 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ma’an News Agency on December 17, 2013. As thousands in the Gaza Strip remain displaced and streets across the coastal enclave are still flooded Tuesday, it is

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About me

Alex Shams is an Iranian-American writer and a PhD student of Anthropology at the University of Chicago.

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Recent posts

  • Iran’s Protesters Are Caught Between State Repression and Foreign Intervention
  • Quiet Solidarity: The Underground Networks that Defied Israel’s War on Iran
  • Our Man For Tehran
  • Israel’s Bombs Have Stopped Falling, But Iranians Still Face an Uncertain Future
  • The Take: How can Iranians rebuild while crackdowns intensify?
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About

Born and raised in an Iranian-American family in Los Angeles, Alex Shams has long been fascinated by the stories that places can tell us. Growing up, he learned Persian and Spanish; in college, he learned Arabic and studied abroad at the American University of Cairo before moving to Beirut after graduation. After receiving his master’s in Middle Eastern Studies from Harvard, he moved to Bethlehem, Palestine, where he was a journalist at Ma’an News Agency, the largest independent Palestinian news organization. He received his PhD. from the University of Chicago in Sociocultural Anthropology. His dissertation, entitled “Constructing Islamic Modernity: Power, Religion, and Masculinity in Post-Revolutionary Iran,” was based on three years of ethnographic research in Iran, Iraq, and Pakistan as well as archival research in the British Library and Ba’ath Party Archives.

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Popular posts

  • Iran's Protesters Are Caught Between State Repression and Foreign Intervention
    Iran's Protesters Are Caught Between State Repression and Foreign Intervention
  • Our Man For Tehran
    Our Man For Tehran
  • Quiet Solidarity: The Underground Networks that Defied Israel's War on Iran
    Quiet Solidarity: The Underground Networks that Defied Israel's War on Iran
  • Inside Mexico's deep and unexpected legacy of Iranians
    Inside Mexico's deep and unexpected legacy of Iranians
  • The Joys of Akitu, the Assyrian New Year
    The Joys of Akitu, the Assyrian New Year
  • Amba: The Iraqi Mango Pickle from India That Tops Palestinian Shawarma
    Amba: The Iraqi Mango Pickle from India That Tops Palestinian Shawarma
  • From Tehran to Newcastle: “I Am Nasrine” and the Politics of Telling Migrant Narratives
    From Tehran to Newcastle: “I Am Nasrine” and the Politics of Telling Migrant Narratives
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    Learning the Language of Jesus Christ
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    Are Iranians People of Color? Persian, Muslim, and Model Minority Race Politics
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    Corona Ya Corona: Arabic Pop Music Takes on the COVID-19 Pandemic

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