The Zookeeper’s Wife: A War Story

By Diane Ackerman

Diane Ackerman has skillfully woven Antonina Zabinska’s writings about her time at the Warsaw Zoo before and during World War II into a book that both terrifies and delights.

Antonina, her zookeeper husband Jan, and their son Ryszard lived in a villa on the zoo grounds.

“Each morning, when zoo dawn arrived, a starling gushed a medley of stolen songs, distant wrens cranked up a few arpeggios, and the cuckoos called monotonously like clocks stuck on the hour.

Beaufort

By Ron Leshem

Beaufort – named “beautiful fortress" by 12th century French Crusaders– was a symbol of Israeli defensive strength when it was captured from the PLO in 1982.

With a commanding view of the upper Galilee and South Lebanon, it was touted as the safe zone that protected Northern Israel.

By the late 1990s, it was a symbol of the failure of the Israeli campaign into Lebanon. Rising death tolls made it the focus of escalating anti-war campaigns and a national debate on troop withdrawal.