Sami Michael: A Trumpet in the Wadi

Tue 4 Sep. 3200 California Street, San Francisco, 94118. Michael McKenzie, 415-292-1233. Jewish Community Center of San Franciso - [email][events]

Discussion and film screening Baghdad-born author Sami Michael’s personal odyssey from Iraq to Iran to Israel has deeply informed his writing on the shared fates of Arabs and Jews in the region. It has also made him a natural choice as the president of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, a position he has held since 2001. Michael’s masterfully-crafted novels explore backstreets of Baghdad, life in transit camps during Israel’s formative years, and love and war between political identities. His best known work, A Trumpet in the Wadi, about a romance between an Israeli Arab young woman and a new immigrant from Russia in the Wadi Nisnas neighborhood of Haifa was adapted into a film. The film screening follows a discussion.