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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Fifty years ago, Title IX banned discrimination based on sex in educational institutions. College sports had to change. This is the story of how four women fought to make that happen. -
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has named hard-liner Avigdor Lieberman his new defense minister, a move that has ignited a fierce debate inside Israel and beyond.
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A young Israeli grew up on stories of the Holocaust, determined to enter Israel's army and not let Jews be victims again. But his encounter with a small Palestinian girl would change his outlook.
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Israel's holocaust memorial and research center honors a U.S. soldier for the first time for his role in protecting Jewish prisoners of war in a German camp in World War II.
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A Palestinian from Gaza lost his family in a shipwreck in the Mediterranean last year. He says smugglers rammed his boat and should be prosecuted, but prospects for justice so far seem unlikely. -
After a Palestinian prisoner's hunger strike, Israel's parliament passed a law permitting the force-feeding of prisoners to keep them alive, but doctors made it clear they wouldn't participate
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In the 1990s, Israelis and Palestinians made temporary arrangements in the West Bank as they worked toward a peace deal. The talks are now in the deep freeze, but the arrangements are entrenched. -
A U.N. spokesman said Israeli tank shells hit the school Wednesday, killing 15 Palestinians and wounding 90. The agency is housing scores of people displaced by the fighting in schools across Gaza.
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A United Nations school, which was being used to shelter displaced Gazans awaiting evacuation, came under fire from a missile or shelling. The attack reportedly killed 15 people. Palestinian officials blame Israeli shelling; Israel says it may have been Hamas rockets that fell short of their target.
