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Israel

Israel Opinion

‘Broad City’ Didn’t Just Go on Birthright — It Spent 21 Minutes Mocking It

Posted on April 18, 2016 by Alex Shams

Originally published on The Forward on April 28, 2016. Written by Alex Shams. When Ilana and Abby from “Broad City” announced last week that they were going on Birthright Israel,

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Featured Israel Palestine Reporting

Learning the Language of Jesus Christ

Posted on November 2, 2015 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Roads and Kingdoms on November 2, 2015. Just a few hundred feet west of the church built atop the site where the Christian faithful believe Jesus was

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Israel Reporting

La langue arabe en tête des charts israéliens grâce à trois sœurs yéménites

Posted on October 20, 2015 by Alex Shams

Le clip de cette chanson a été vu 1,2 million de fois et a attiré des milliers de fans dans tout le Moyen-Orient

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Israel Reporting

Arabic tops Israeli charts as Yemeni sisters take Tel Aviv by storm

Posted on September 24, 2015 by Alex Shams

The music video has amassed 1.2 million hits and has attracted thousands of fans from across the Middle East

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Israel Opinion Palestine

Killings reveal link between homophobia, anti-Arab racism

Posted on August 15, 2015 by Alex Shams

Originally published on the Washington Blade on Aug. 15, 2015. Shira Banki, a 16-year-old girl who was stabbed during a Jerusalem Pride march, succumbed to her injuries on Aug. 2,

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Israel Palestine Reporting

Zionist tour for Muslim-Americans sparks anger in Palestine

Posted on June 25, 2015 by Alex Shams

Originally Published by Ma’an News Agency on June 25, 2015. BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — An all-expenses paid trip to Israel organized for Muslim-American leaders by a Duke University-based imam has set

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Israel Opinion Palestine

Seattle mayor’s Israel trip highlights dangers of ‘pinkwashing’

Posted on June 12, 2015 by Alex Shams

Originally published on the Washington Blade. Ed Murray (Photo by Ryan Georgi; courtesy Wikimedia Commons)   On Monday, Seattle mayor Ed Murray touched down in Israel as part of a

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Israel Palestine Reporting

Armenians in Palestine mark 100 years since Genocide

Posted on April 23, 2015 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ma’an News Agency on April 23, 2015. JERUSALEM (Ma’an) — The Armenian community of the Holy Land this week marks the 100th anniversary of the beginning of

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Israel Palestine Reporting

Israeli filmmaker explores life through the eyes of Palestinian teen

Posted on March 11, 2015 by Alex Shams

Originally Published by Ma’an News Agency on March 11, 2015. JERUSALEM (Ma’an) — The short documentary “Khelil Helwa (Hebron is Beautiful)” follows a young boy from Hebron’s Tel Rumeida neighborhood as

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Israel Palestine Reporting

After police killings, anger simmers in Negev Bedouin villages

Posted on February 5, 2015 by Alex Shams

Originally published on Ma’an News Agency on Feb. 5, 2015. BEERSHEBA (Ma’an) — The killing of two Bedouin youths in southern Israel by police over the last week has shocked the

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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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  • Quiet Solidarity: The Underground Networks that Defied Israel’s War on Iran
  • Our Man For Tehran
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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

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