Jonathan Cook

Cook was born and raised in Buckinghamshire, England, UK. He received a B.A. (Hons) in Philosophy and Politics from Southampton University in 1987, a postgraduate diploma in journalism from Cardiff University in 1989, and an M.A. in Middle Eastern studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies in 2000.Cook, Jonathan. [http://www.jkcook.net/ Short biography], Jhcook.net, accessed 30 November 2009. Jonathan has Israeli citizenship through marriage to his Israeli Arab wife, Sally Azzam. The couple met in Nazareth where they lived with their two daughters for several years before moving to the UK.{{cite web | title=Sally Azzam | website=Leeds Palestinian Film Festival | date=2021-09-02 | url=https://leedspff.org.uk/sally-azzam/ | access-date=2025-03-17}}

Cook was a freelance sub-editor with several national newspapers from 1994 until 1996. He was a staff journalist at The Guardian and The Observer between 1996 and 2001.

Since September 2001, Cook has been a freelance writer based in Nazareth, Israel.{{Cite book |last=Masalha |first=Nur |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xYWNCX-eYRcC&dq=%22jonathan+cook%22+palestine&pg=PR7 |title=Catastrophe Remembered: Palestine, Israel and the Internal Refugees: Essays in Memory of Edward W. Said |date=September 1, 2009 |publisher=Zed Books |isbn=978-1-84277-623-0 |language=en}} Until 2007, he wrote columns for The Guardian.{{Cite web |title=Jonathan Cook {{!}} The Guardian |url=https://www.theguardian.com/profile/jonathancook |access-date=2024-12-31 |website=www.theguardian.com}}{{cite web|url=http://antonyloewenstein.com/2008/03/30/how-occupation-has-corrupted-israels-soul/|title=How occupation has corrupted Israel's soul|website=Antony Loewenstein|date=30 March 2008}}, also published in Sydney's Sun-Herald newspaper on the same day

In 2011, Cook received the Martha Gellhorn special award for journalism, "for his work on the Middle East".{{cite web|title=Previous Winners|url=http://www.marthagellhorn.com/previous.htm|publisher=Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140422112822/http://www.marthagellhorn.com/previous.htm|archive-date=22 April 2014}}{{cite news|last=Deans|first=Jason|url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/2011/jun/02/julian-assange-martha-gelhorn-prize|title=Julian Assange wins Martha Gellhorn journalism prize|work=The Guardian|date=2 June 2011|access-date=11 July 2017}} The award citation said Cook's work on Palestine and Israel made him "one of the reliable truth-tellers in the Middle East".{{cite news |last1=Gunter |first1=Joel |title=Julian Assange wins Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism {{!}} Media news |url=https://www.journalism.co.uk/news/julian-assange-wins-martha-gellhorn-prize-for-journalism/s2/a544492/ |access-date=18 February 2021 |work=www.journalism.co.uk |date=2 June 2011}}

In 2013, Cook questioned that the Ghouta chemical attack was perpetrated by the Syrian government, presenting a "counter-narrative" that the Syrian rebels may have committed the attack.{{Cite web |date=2013-09-25 |title=Critical distance and open minds on Syria |url=https://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2013-09-25/critical-distance-and-open-minds-on-syria/ |access-date=2024-12-31 |website=Jonathan Cook writing on media, politics and corporate power |language=en-US}} In 2018, after the Douma chemical attack, Cook said that the testimonies of 17 Russian-produced witnesses at the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons confirmed a report by Robert Fisk that said victims' breathing problem was due to dust and lack of oxygen rather than gas.{{Cite web |date=2018-04-28 |title=The west closes its ears to Douma testimony |url=https://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2018-04-28/the-west-closes-its-ears-to-douma-testimony/ |access-date=2024-12-31 |website=Jonathan Cook writing on media, politics and corporate power |language=en-US}}

Cook has written three books. In Blood and Religion (2006), published by Pluto Press, the central thesis is that, "Israel is beginning a long, slow process of ethnic cleansing both of Palestinian non-citizens from parts of the occupied territories that it has long coveted for its expanded Jewish state, and of Palestinian citizens from inside its internationally recognized borders." Cook links this strategy to the Israeli perception of two threats: the physical threat of terrorism and the demographic threat of a Palestinian majority potentialised by high Palestinian birth rates and the continued demand for a Palestinian right of return. The Israeli leadership is also said by Cook to view the idea of a "state for all its citizens" as a threat.{{cite news|url=http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/2007/03/DE_NEUTER/14523|newspaper=Le Monde Diplomatique|title=Blood and Religion: The Unmasking of the Jewish and Democratic State|first=Wim |last=de Neuter|date=March 2007|access-date=5 December 2009}} Rami George Khouri describes the short book as, "important but disturbing".{{cite web|url=http://www.agenceglobal.com/Article.asp?Id=1509|title=Ethnic Cleansing Cannot be Ignored|first=Rami G. |last=Khouri|date=15 March 2008|access-date=5 December 2009|author-link=Rami George Khouri|website=Agence Global|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110927161417/http://www.agenceglobal.com/Article.asp?Id=1509|archive-date=27 September 2011}}

In 2008, Cook published Israel and the Clash of Civilizations: Iraq, Iran and the plan to remake the Middle East, published by Pluto Press. Of the book, Antony Loewenstein wrote that, "Cook bravely skewers the mainstream narrative of a Jewish state constantly striving for peace with the Palestinians." According to Lowenstein, Cook argues that Israel "pursues policies that lead to civil war and partition," and that this idea of dissolving many of the nations of the Middle East, shared by the neocons and the Bush administration, was developed by Israel's security establishment in the 1980s.{{cite journal|url=http://web.overland.org.au/?page_id=602|journal=Overland Literary Journal|first=Antony |last=Loewenstein|date=Summer 2008|isbn=978-0-9805346-0-3|title=The Resource Wars|access-date=4 December 2009|archive-date=2 November 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091102041514/http://web.overland.org.au/?page_id=602|url-status=dead}} Cook discusses an essay authored by Oded Yinon and published by the World Zionist Organization in 1982 which advocated for Israel's transformation into a regional imperial power via the fragmentation of the Arab world, "into a mosaic of ethnic and confessional groupings that could be more easily manipulated" (p. 107). A review of the book in The Jordan Times called it "well-researched and very readable."{{cite web|title=Spreading 'organised chaos'|first=Sally |last=Bland|newspaper=The Jordan Times|date=31 March 2008|access-date=5 December 2009|url=http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=6807&searchFor=sally%20bland}}

Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair was published in 2008 by Zed Books.{{cite web|title=Disappearing Palestine, Israel's Experiments in Human Despair by Jonathan Cook|date=18 May 2009|first=Pam |last=Hardyment|url=http://www.paltelegraph.com/entertainment/books/856-disappearing-palestine-israels-experiments-in-human-despair-by-jonathan-cook|access-date=31 August 2009|url-status=usurped|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090526142159/http://www.paltelegraph.com/entertainment/books/856-disappearing-palestine-israels-experiments-in-human-despair-by-jonathan-cook|archive-date=26 May 2009}} Helena Cobban in the Boston Review says Cook argues that to encourage voluntary emigration, Israel has made life unbearable for Palestinians, primarily via "the ever more sophisticated systems of curfews, checkpoints, walls, permits and land grabs."{{cite journal|url=http://bostonreview.net/BR34.4/cobban.php|title=Peace Out: The decline of Israel's progressive movement|first=Helena |last=Cobban|author-link=Helena Cobban|journal=Boston Review|date=July–August 2009|access-date=4 December 2009|archive-date=1 October 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091001202148/http://bostonreview.net/BR34.4/cobban.php|url-status=dead}}

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• (2006) Blood and Religion: The Unmasking of the Jewish and Democratic State. Pluto Press. {{ISBN|0-7453-2555-6}}
• (2008) Israel and the Clash of Civilizations: Iraq, Iran and the plan to remake the Middle East. Pluto Press. {{ISBN|978-0-7453-2754-9}}
• (2008) Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair. Zed Books. {{ISBN|978-1-84813-031-9}}

• (2005) "Unrecognized Villages: Indigenous 'Ayn Hawd versus Artists' Colony 'Ein Hod," in Nur Masalha, Catastrophe Remembered: Palestine, Israel, and the Internal Refugees, Zed Books, {{ISBN|1-84277-623-1}}{{cite journal|journal=Journal of Refugee Studies|year=2006|volume=19|issue=2|pages= 267–268|title=(Review of) Catastrophe Remembered: Palestine, Israel, and the Internal Refugees|doi=10.1093/jrs/fel007|last1=Loddo|first1=S.}}
• (2006) "Israel's Glass Wall: The Or Commission," in Joel Beinin and Rebecca L. Stein. The struggle for sovereignty: Palestine and Israel, 1993–2005. Stanford University Press. {{ISBN|0-8047-5365-2}}
• (2008). Foreword in Hatim Kanaaneh, A Doctor in Galilee: The Life and Struggle of a Palestinian in Israel. Pluto Press. {{ISBN|0-7453-2786-9}}

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• {{Official website|www.jonathan-cook.net}}
• [https://www.theguardian.com/profile/jonathancook Cook's Guardian profile page]

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Category:Living people

Category:Alumni of Cardiff University

Category:Alumni of SOAS University of London

Category:Alumni of the University of Southampton

Category:British expatriates in Israel

Category:British male journalists

Category:People from Nazareth

Category:The Guardian journalists

Category:Year of birth missing (living people)