Stop Doomscrolling About Israel and Palestine—Read These Books Instead
The Atlantic’s books editor prescribes these titles as antidotes to the quick and dirty ways people are communicating on social media.
This is an edition of the revamped Books Briefing, our editors’ weekly guide to the best in books. Sign up for it here.
The Israeli author Etgar Keret’s fantastical, funny, and very short stories have long offered insight into the anxieties that simmer in his own society. We , and Keret told me that in the past three weeks since between Israel and Hamas, he has been turning to more ephemeral forms of writing, even shorter than his usual work. He calls them “war notes”: short thoughts, observations, and outlines of stories jotted down quickly, as if meant to be shoved deep in a pocket or thrown away. This reflex—to process the violence and the emotion it provokes through writing—is well established when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Many, many bookshelves could be filled
