This is a book about Palestine today. It is neither apologetic nor romanticized, but a powerful & brilliantly realized scream of a book, scorching & tender, from a journalist whose anger & empathy burn through every word. Over the past three years, Ben Ehrenreich has shared the laughter, fury & sorrow of people in cities & villages across the West Bank, young & old people, men & women. He has witnessed the extremes to which they are pushed, the daily deprivation & oppression that they face, the strategies they construct to survive it
- stoicism, resignation, rebellion, humour, & a stubborn, defiant joy. In The Way to the Spring, he describes the cruel mechanics of the Israeli occupation & the endless absurdities & tragedies it engenders: the complex & humiliating machinery of the checkpoints, walls, courts & prisons; the steady, strangling loss of lands that have been passed down for generations; the constant ebb & flow of deadly violence. Blending political & historical context with the personal stories of the people Ehrenreich meets, The Way to the Spring is a testimony, a provocation & a vital document. Written with grace & power, it breathes fresh life & urgency to a place & a conflict that too easily disappears in the shouting. This is a necessary book, an unflinching act of witnessing.