Emily Harris
International Correspondent Emily Harris is based in Jerusalem as part of NPR's Mideast team. Her post covers news related to Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip. She began this role in March of 2013.
Over her career, Harris has served in multiple roles within public media. She first joined NPR in 2000, as a general assignment reporter. A prolific reporter often filing two stories a day, Harris covered major stories including 9/11 and its aftermath, including the impact on the airline industry; and the anthrax attacks. She also covered how policies set in Washington are implemented across the country.
In 2002, Harris worked as a Special Correspondent on NOW with Bill Moyer, focusing on investigative storytelling. In 2003 Harris became NPR's Berlin Correspondent, covering Central and Eastern Europe. In that role, she reported regularly from Iraq, leading her to be a key member of the NPR team awarded a 2005 Peabody Award for coverage of the region.
Harris left NPR in December 2007 to become a host for a live daily program, Think Out Loud, on Oregon Public Broadcasting. Under her leadership Harris's team received three back to back Gracie Awards for Outstanding Talk Show, and a share in OPB's 2009 Peabody Award for the series "Hard Times." Harris's other awards include the RIAS Berlin Commission's first-place radio award in 2007 and second-place in 2006. She was a John S. Knight fellow at Stanford University in 2005-2006.
A seasoned reporter, she was asked to help train young journalist through NPR's "Next Generation" program. She also served as editorial director for Journalism Accelerator, a project to bring journalists together to share ideas and experiences; and was a writer-in-residence teaching radio writing to high school students.
One of the aspects of her work that most intrigues her is why people change their minds and what inspires them to do so.
Outside of work, Harris has drafted a screenplay about the Iraq war and for another project is collecting stories about the most difficult parts of parenting.
She has a B.A. in Russian Studies from Yale University.
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World leaders meeting at the United Nations in New York this week face potentially dramatic changes to arms control in the Middle East. Syria may give up chemical weapons. Iran is signaling it could negotiate with the West over its nuclear plans. How might this affect Israel, and its own weapons programs?
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Not all the victims of the chemical attack in Syria on Aug. 21 were Syrian. The al-Hurani family in the West Bank city of Jenin counts 11 members of its extended clan among the dead. -
President Obama's decision to delay military action against Syria caused consternation among Israeli officials, but also sparked an impassioned debate over whether a negotiated settlement could be had, and what's really best for Israel. All, of course, under the cloud of Iran. For ordinary people, Obama's decision slowed the rush on gas masks as people believe now they can have a quiet New Year holiday — and think about war again next week.
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After nearly 30 years, the program that brought thousands of Jews from Ethiopia to Israel has come to an end. -
Spas and beauty products have long touted the health benefits of floating in the buoyant Dead Sea waters and slathering its thick black mud on your skin. Now an Israeli company is promoting Dead Sea salt as a healthful gourmet product, in part because of its high mineral content. -
Regardless of what you call them — kibbeh, kubbe, kobeba — bulgur-and-wheat dumplings are a beloved staple across the Levant. And as with hummus, there are local varieties from Iraq to Egypt. In Jerusalem, kids at a cooking camp learn to make the lemony kubbeh hamusta from Kurdistan. -
Ruth Calderon's first speech in parliament led some to call her the leader of a Jewish renaissance. But others view her as a real threat — to Judaism itself. -
Rawabi, a privately developed Palestinian community, sits in the West Bank. The first residents are due to move in later this year, but its developer is worried about water. To get a pipe laid, Rawabi needs Israeli permission. Israel has cooperated, but the Palestinian developer says the cooperation has been "very slow and always incomplete." -
Israeli settlers turned the area near the spring into a picnic spot. A local Palestinian says the land has been in his family for generations. The fight is symbolic of the much larger battle over West Bank land. -
Over the past six weeks, Egypt's military has cracked down on the smuggling tunnels that bring many goods into Gaza. One official estimates that Gaza's GDP has lost $230 million and thousands of jobs over the past six weeks. Israel tightly controls construction materials going into Gaza.
