Background
Yossi Klein Halevi was born on June 9, 1953 in Borough Park, Brooklyn in New York City, New York, United States in a Jewish family. Son of Zoltan and Bertha (Hiller) Klein. His father was a Hungarian-born Holocaust survivor.
Yossi Klein Halevi was born on June 9, 1953 in Borough Park, Brooklyn in New York City, New York, United States in a Jewish family. Son of Zoltan and Bertha (Hiller) Klein. His father was a Hungarian-born Holocaust survivor.
After attending high school at Yeshiva University High School for Boys (Brooklyn Branch), he completed a B.A. in Jewish Studies in Brooklyn College in 1978, and completed his M.A. in Journalism at Northwestern University.
Halevi worked as a senior writer for the magazine "The Jerusalem Report" from its founding (1990) until 2002. He wrote a column for "The Jerusalem Post", and wrote regularly on Israeli issues for the op-ed page of the "Los Angeles Times", and occasionally for the "New York Times" and "Washington Post". His first book "Memoirs of a Jewish Extremist" was published in 1995.
He is currently Israel correspondent and contributing editor of "The New Republic". He is a lecturer on American and Canadian campuses, focusing on politics and culture in Israel. In the fall of 2013, he began teaching at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York.
Halevi's religious beliefs are described as: "Practicing Jew, with strong sympathy for other religious paths". Halevi joined the prayers and meditations in mosques and monasteries, in an attempt to experience the devotional lives of his non-Jewish neighbors and to create a religious language of reconciliation among the three monotheistic faiths (Judaism, Christianity and Islam).
Halevi has been active in Middle East reconciliation efforts, and serves as chairman of Open House, an Arab-Jewish educational project in the working class town of Ramle. He was a founder and board member of the now-defunct Israeli-Palestinian Media Forum, which brought together Israeli and Palestinian journalists.
Yossi was a founder and board member of the now-defunct Israeli-Palestinian Media Forum, which brought together Israeli and Palestinian journalists. Halevi is a Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, a Jerusalem-based research institute and educational center.
Yossi married Sarah Rintoul Halevi on June 26, 1983. The couple has 2 children: Moriah and Gavriel.