Zoo on the Road to Nablus: A Story of Survival from the West Bank: 0 - Tapa dura

The last Palestinian zoo stands on a dusty, dead-end street in the once prosperous farming town of Qalqilya, on the very edge of the West Bank. The zoo's bars are rusting; peacocks wander quiet avenues shaded by broad plane trees; a teenage baboon broods in solitary confinement; and, walls bear the pockmarks of gunfire. And yet the zoo is an extraordinary place, with a bizarre, troubling and inspiring story to tell. At the centre of this story is Dr Sami Khader, the only zoo vet in the Palestinian territories. Family man, amateur inventor and dedicated taxidermist, he is fiercely independent, apolitical, and resourceful in times of crisis. Dr Sami dreams of transforming the zoo into one of an international calibre.In "The Zoo on the Road to Nablus", Amelia Thomas brings the reader into a world rarely glimpsed from the outside, weaving the stories of the zoo's animals, its staff, and its visitors into a rich, colourful chronicle of the indomitable nature of the human - and animal - spirit.

Amelia Thomas is a British journalist, working in the Palestinian Territories and Israel. She is a correspondent for the Christian Science Monitor, Middle East Times and Egypt Today and lives in Tel Aviv.