CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Yossi Klein Halevi, a prominent Israeli journalist and author active in Middle East reconciliation efforts, will speak at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 27 in the auditorium at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, 405 N. Mathews Ave., Urbana.
Halevi’s talk, “Opportunities for Peace Between Israel and the Palestinians After Gaza,” is part of an 11-day visit to the Illinois campus that begins Monday (Oct. 24).
As part of that visit, he also will speak on other issues as they relate to Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including religion, rock music, media coverage and how the conflict has affected women and children.
All of the talks are free and open to the public. The Beckman talk will be followed by a reception.
Halevi, a native New Yorker who has lived in Israel since 1982, is the Israel correspondent for the New Republic magazine and a senior fellow at the Shalem Center, a Jerusalem-based think tank. He has been a columnist for the Jerusalem Post and a regular contributor to the Los Angeles Times.
Halevi also is the author of “At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden: A Jew’s Search for God with Christians and Muslims in the Holy Land” (2001), about his two-year journey as a religious Jew to find a common spiritual language with those of other faiths.
Other scheduled talks:
Oct. 25 – “From Oslo to Gaza,” brown bag lunch, noon, Lucy Ellis Lounge, Foreign Languages Building, 707 S. Mathews Ave., Urbana.
Oct. 26 – “How the Second Intifada has Changed the Lives of Israeli Women and Children,” brown bag lunch, noon, Women’s Studies, 911 S. Sixth St., Champaign.
Nov. 1 – “Understanding Israel Through Its Rock Music,” 6:30 p.m., Hillel Foundation, 503 E. John St., Champaign.
Nov. 2 – “Media Coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict,” brown bag lunch, noon, 336 Gregory Hall, 810 S. Wright St., Urbana.
Nov. 3 – “A Religious Jew’s Journey Into Christianity and Islam,” 8 p.m., Sinai Temple, 3104 W. Windsor Road, Champaign.
Halevi also is scheduled to be appear on WILL-AM (580) at 11 a.m. on Oct. 24, and on WGNJ-FM (89.3) at 3:30 p.m. on Oct. 26.
Halevi will be visiting the campus as a guest of the university’s Program in Jewish Culture and Society, with sponsorship from the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago’s Israel Studies Project.
