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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Correspondents, editors and producers from our newsroom share the pieces that have kept them reading, using the #NPRreads hashtag. Each weekend, we highlight some of the best stories. -
The little girl did something lots of kids do. She took her clothes off. The teacher acted as if the child had ruined her life. The Gaza Strip mother found the courage to rebuke the teacher. -
Israeli schools on Thursday carried out a standardized lesson plan for the first time to teach kindergartners the meaning of the country's annual Holocaust Remembrance Day. -
Days after the first bus bombing in Jerusalem in years, Israel is investigating whether the young Palestinian man who carried the bomb on the bus acted on his own or as part of an organized effort. -
Correspondents, editors and producers from our newsroom share the pieces that have kept them reading, using the #NPRreads hashtag. Each weekend, we highlight some of the best stories.
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At the high-tech center where Israel's military keeps an eye on Hamas-controlled Gaza, soldiers monitor the border using remote-controlled cameras and machine guns. -
There's now limited reconstruction in the territory that was badly damaged in the 2014 war with Israel. But it's very uneven, depending on factors like whether money comes from Qatar or Kuwait. -
The rival positions are so entrenched that change can seem impossible. NPR Jerusalem correspondent Emily Harris talks to two Israelis and two Palestinians who explain why they changed their thinking. -
A Palestinian woman talks about going out on a limb years ago to work with left-wing Israelis on co-existence — an effort that ended in disappointment.
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Bassam Aramin grew up hating Israel and spent years in prison. Yet he's now a voice for peace, a position that did not change even when his daughter was killed by Israeli police.
