ABOUT
THE BOOK

Ammine, a surgeon in a Jerusalem hospital, struggles to cope with the mangled bodies of victims of a suicide bombing in a downtown Jerusalem pizza restaurant. He is harassed, well-meaning, utterly dedicated and professional – and a naturalised Israeli Arab.

When the police pin responsibility the suicide attack on Ammine’s wife, he is at first baffled, disbelieving and angry. But his feelings turn to confusion and sorrow when he discovers his wife was indeed behind the attack, as he travels to Nazareth and Gaza, attempting to discover who could have convinced his wife to do such a thing, and why she might have done so. His life, he discovers, is a lie: not only the lie told to him for several years by his wife – a naturalised Arab who slowly became political – but also the lie he has been telling himself, that his place as an Arab in Israeli society is normal: that the intifada is an abberation, that he – educated, civilised, cosmopolitan, with a beautiful house and Jewish friends who come to dinner – is the future of Arabs in Israel.

(From Publisher)