Powerful human stories from no-man’s land

Dion NissenbaumWhere but in Jerusalem would the UN declare a cease-fire so that nuns could search for the lost dentures of a dying woman? Where else would installing a toilet become an international incident? Where else would an Arab on one side of the barbed wire fetch flowers from the Jordanian side for a Jew on the Israeli side? While most books on the Arab-Israeli conflict focus on politics and war, Dion Nissenbaum tells about life along the cease-fire line that divided Jerusalem for 19 years and that was supplanted by ever more daunting cultural, emotional and political barriers separating Arab and Jew in his book “A Street Divided: Stories From Jerusalem’s Alley of God.”

Nissenbaum takes readers straight into the human heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This 300-yard dead end street has been the home to priests, prostitutes, poets and spies, where snipers could open up without warning. It has been the stage for an improbable flirtation between an Israeli girl and a Palestinian boy living on opposite sides of the barbed wire that separated enemy nations. It has even been the scene of an unsolved international murder. If some people have their way, this old dividing line will one day become the border separating Israel and Palestine. In a beautiful narrative, “A Street Divided” offers an intimate look at the remarkable Israeli and Palestinian families living on one of the world’s most contentious pieces of land.

Dion Nissenbaum is an award-winning national security reporter in Washington for The Wall Street Journal. Previously, Nissenbaum served as a senior correspondent in Afghanistan, where he traveled around the country on his own and with the U.S. military. His book, “A Street Divided,” retells stories from along “Barbed Wire Alley,” which was also the home for four years to this winner of the National Press Club award for diplomatic correspondence. The book was published on Sept. 22. You can find his interview online from that day with Renee Montagne, who quizzed him about the book on NPR’s Morning Edition.

Nissenbaum will speak Nov. 14, at An Evening of Jewish Renaissance: Redesigned, brought to you by the Judge Marjorie Yashar and Dr. James Yashar Fund of the Jewish Federation Foundation. Copies of “A Street Divided: Stories From Jerusalem’s Alley of God” will be available for purchase at the event.