“Nir Baram is an incorruptible observer and he doesn’t spare himself nor his opposition. He gets very close to the neuralgic points and doesn’t evade potentially politically explosive and delicate confrontations…
Baram’s great achievement is that that he resists condemnations or finger-pointing – despite of desperation on the one hand and cynical indifference on the other side. And he resists to present solutions which no one believes any ways any longer…
On some of the best pages about some of the toughest encounters for which the author has no words he lets you physically experience the absurdity and tragedy of the conflict – a pain that you can tell was the constant companion of the writer during these reportage.”

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“Kann man überhaupt noch einen neuen Blick auf den Konflikt zwischen Israelis und Palästinensern werfen? Es ist doch längst alles gesagt. Die Positionen wirken wie in Stein gemeißelt. Aber sie zeigen mehr und mehr Risse. Nir Baram hat sich die Aufgabe gestellt, sie an der Praxis zu messen. Zu diesem Zweck hat sich der israelische Schriftsteller ein Jahr lang an den neuralgischen Punkten umgeschaut, unter jüdischen Siedlern im Westjordanland und deren unfreiwilligen, palästinensischen Nachbarn.”

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“Nir Baram writes not only a brilliant report. He portrays a very convincing picture of the fact that the concept of strict separation between Israelis and Palestinians that have been devised in Oslo, in Washington and Taba, is long since overtaken by reality.”
Peter Kapern bespricht Nir Barams Reportagenband „Im Land der Verzweiflung“ und sprach mit dem Autor darüber. „Nir Baram schreibt nicht nur glänzende Reportagen. Er lenkt sehr überzeugend den Blick darauf, dass die Konzepte einer strikten Trennung von Israelis und Palästinensern, die in Oslo, in Washington und Taba ersonnen wurden, von der Realität längst überholt sind.“

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Amos Oz: about Nir Baram Non fiction book “Im Land der Verzweiflung”

February 2, 2016EN

The Author Amos Oz about Nir Baram’s book “Im Land der Verzweiflung”: “Baram produced a painful, even shocking travel book. Although I do not share some of his analysis and his ultimate conclusions, I am still impressed by his sharp eye and his fierce sense of the Israeli Palestinian tragedy. ”

picture by :Mariusz Kubik

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Nir Baram’s first Nonfiction book, which describes his one-year journey in the West bank and East Jerusalem will be published in Hebrew this February by Am Oved publishing house, and then later that month in Germany by Hanser Verlag: (“Im Land der Verzweiflung”). Baram began his journey a couple of months before the war in Gaza (summer 2014) and finished it in the end of 2015 after the new wave of violence erupts. Some of the chapters were published in Haaretz newspaper.

Baram meets a variety of people over the course of this journey: Palestinian-Israeli citizens trapped behind the Separation Wall in Jerusalem, a real no man’s land where neighborhoods have no municipal rule; children living in Kibbutz Nirim who experienced the war in Gaza, the rockets raining down on their homes; young Palestinians, the close friends of the Palestinian boy who was murdered by Jews. He experiences things like being held-up at occupation checkpoints with Palestinian laborers; meeting ex-prisoners from Hamas who have started a Hebrew language school in Ramallah, and ex-prisoners from Fatah who spent years detained in Israeli jails and who are now promoting a new peace initiative. He gets into a secluded settlers’ stronghold in the West Bank, and near Nablus he comes across two Palestinian boys tied up by the side of the road after allegedly trying to stab Israeli soldiers, only to find that the truth is something entirely different.

As the reportage is being written, both major and minor events take place throughout region: riots in the Temple Mount, the abduction of three Jewish boys, the murder of an Arab boy in Jerusalem, the war in Gaza, the building of a new Palestinian city, elections in Israel, a new wave of violence. Baram returns time and again to Jerusalem, the city where he was born and raised, discovering a huge, sprawling city that stretches to include places he’d never even heard of as a boy; a city where a hushed civil war is in full swing.

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Nir Baram’s one year journey in the occupied West Bank which documented in the reportage “walking the green line” (Haaretz newspaper) finished in the Palestinian village of Bartta with these words: “In a deeper sense, we need to acknowledge the fact that the situation will not change as a result of a peace deal in the Camp David or Geneva style, and that the problem does not lie in plans for an agreement. Indeed, there are plenty of creative plans, some of which were discussed in this series. In order to create the conditions that are required for a solution of the conflict, in order for us to be able to address all the possible “solutions,” a moral upheaval is required within Israeli society, based on the acceptance of one simple principle: whether in one state, two states or a confederation, Jew and non-Jew must be equal in all respects.The Jewish-Israeli propaganda machinery is dedicated to undercutting that principle, to turning it into a fantastical whisper of the naive. But that is the principle – not two states or one state – that must never be compromised.”

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A.B Yehoshua, one of Israel most celebrated authors, writes to Haaretz about Nir Barams reportage “walking the green Line”: “And even though Baram has firm political and ideological views to which, with civic courage, he voices in every public platform, in these articles he consistently quiets the political and ideological passion within him so as to become a most attentive listener, one who, with noteworthy patience and moderation, records things that under other circumstances would surely make his blood boil. As a writer, he brings a richness and linguistic precision to these articles, which make it impossible to avoid contemplating the absurd situation that we continue to fashion with our own hands.

“At the stage we have now reached, Nir Baram’s effort is of particular importance, as he puts his great literary talent to use in an attempt to break through Israeli denial.”

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Acompanied by a photographer and a desire to hear the voices that are not normally featured in the media, award-winning novelist Nir Baram journeyed extensively around Israel and the West Bank during the past year. The chapters that constitute “Walking the Green Line” paint a complex political picture, as Baram talks to settlers and kibbutzniks, politicians and activists, ex-prisoners and soldiers, those born after the occupation began and those who remember Israel before June 1967. The major events of the past 12 months form a vivid background to “Walking the Green Line.” Over the course of the next few months, Haaretz will be publishing the chapters of “Walking the Green Line,” starting with the author’s visit to Balata refugee camp.

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Nir Baram was chosen as one of the 50 most interesting personalities in the Middle East by the Italian magazine Secolo Nuovo

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Nir Baram published an Article in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung about the war in Gaza: “According to the news in Israel, “The IDF doesn’t kill children for no reason” – and Israelis nod in agreement. Over 1,300 Palestinian children were killed in the last decade, hundreds of civilians died in the current military attack, yet the tired mantra is still recited: the army doesn’t kill without good cause, we never kill children intentionally, we’re alright, we are. This robotic proclamation and the moral superiority most of the Israeli public clings to keep us sheltered from reality and create a false and dangerous sense of victimization and persecution…”

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