Dan Savery Raz, at The Blogs

Dan Savery Raz

Sep 17, 2024, 12:39 AM

The art of travel writing in Israel (Part II)

Looking back over 15 years of writing and promoting Israel as a travel destination, continuing from part one. Welcome to the BBC In 2012 I was overjoyed to become a father for the first time, but due to the high cost...

Sep 9, 2024, 6:46 AM

The art of travel writing in Israel (Part I)

"There are more bars than synagogues, God is a DJ and everyone’s body is a temple." Photo by Jan Cassalette on Unsplash

A look back on over 15 years of writing and promoting Israel as a travel destination. While waiting for my family’s luggage at Thessaloniki airport last month, I picked up a magazine called Incredible Greece. Printed on glossy paper, it...

Jun 27, 2024, 12:47 PM

The time has come for diplomacy, not more death

An open letter to PM Netanyahu (and Times of Israel readers) Dear Bibi Netanyahu, Ron Dermer, Yoav Gallant, and other decision-makers, I hope you understand the gravity of this precarious moment – don’t take Israel to an all-out war with Hezbollah. That’s...

Jun 6, 2024, 2:11 PM

Jonny Greenwood should be supported not silenced

The BDS movement is unfairly targeting Jonny Greenwood from Radiohead about playing in Tel Aviv. It’s not everyday that one of the greatest guitarists of his generation plays in Tel Aviv in the middle of madness with Israeli and Arabic...

May 5, 2024, 1:17 AM

To remember and never to forget

Tirza on the far left with her six siblings and mother. Photo courtesy of Tirza.

Tirza Halivni’s tale and why this year's Yom HaShoah is more important than ever. This year Yom HaShoah falls on the evening of May 5. That’s a significant date for me – I made Aliyah to Israel on May 5...

Dec 2, 2023, 11:50 PM

Featured Post

Who’s winning the war of words?

Although we want to ‘Bring them all home now’, the deeper question is – how?

Awash with slogans trying to pull people’s heartstrings and enlist their loyalty, Israel might do better to avoid that loud politicized messaging

Oct 8, 2023, 6:09 PM

How did we get here?

This isn’t a normal blog post. It ain’t a poem either. It’s not even prose. It’s just what I can write, right now, and God only knows, what or why or how or how long? Yesterday the sirens woke us up at 6:30 am, though I...

Aug 30, 2023, 10:38 AM

Let the children live and learn this year

As the new school year begins, let’s not disrupt our kids’ lives with the news or our own negativity. Being a kid is difficult enough. Today, much is written about the ‘nine-year crisis’ – the change in the middle of...

Feb 11, 2023, 8:10 PM

Was I wrong to protest?

Two million people at the anti-war protest in London, February 15, 2003.

Twenty years ago this week, I and millions of others, marched against the Iraq War. But recently watching Michael Palin’s Into Iraq made me ask myself – was I wrong back then? It was twenty years ago, on Saturday February...

Jul 14, 2022, 1:46 PM

Pixies, iconic indie band in Israel

Pixies live at Expo Tel Aviv, photo by Dan Savery Raz

They came. They played ‘Where is My Mind?’ and other anthems. They left. The Pixies gave a grunge masterclass this week in Tel Aviv. In 1995 my older brother Anthony came to Israel to volunteer on a kibbutz for a...

About Me

Dan Savery Raz is a Lonely Planet author, and has written for BBC.com, Time Out & various websites. Born in England, he lives in Tel Aviv with his wife & children.