Yonatan Mendel is an associate professor in the Department of Middle East Studies at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. His primary research areas include the place, status, and teaching of the Arabic language in Israel, Jewish-Arab relations, and key issues in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He also serves as an associate editor of the book series Maktoob, dedicated to translating Arabic literature into Hebrew, using a bilingual, binational translation model. Among his research books are “Language Out of Place: Orientalism, Intelligence, and Arabic in Israel” (2020), and “The Latin of the Middle East: Teaching Arabic in Jewish Society from the Turn of the Century until 1948” (2023). Among his literary translations from Arabic are “Walking on the Wind” by Salman Natour (2017), “Goodbye Acre” by Ala Hlehel (2018), and “The Bureau of the Cursed” by Muhammad Ali Taha (2023).
Photo: Tamar Abadi