The celebrated American Jewish novelist, writer and essayist Cynthia Ozick delighted readers once again in 2021 with the publication of her latest novel, Antiquities, a parable in the style of Kafka that delves into antisemitism in American life. “Some readers might forget that Ozick, who just turned 93, has a darting, impudent wit,” wrote the New York Times in a glowing review. “Antiquities is a reminder.” The Bronx-born Ozick is a recipient of a Lannan Literary Award for fiction and a National Book Critics Circle winner for essays. She is the author of Trust, The Messiah of Stockholm, The Shawl, and The Puttermesser Papers, and many other titles. (Photo: The Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives)

Dara Horn is the author of five novels and one of Granta’s Best Young American Novelists. Horn’s latest book is a work of non-fiction, however. In People Love Dead Jews – a finalist for the 2021 Kirkus Prize – Horn reflects on subjects as far-flung as the international veneration of Anne Frank and the mythology that Jewish family names were changed at Ellis Island. Throughout, she challenges us to confront the reasons why there might be so much fascination with Jewish deaths, and so little respect for Jewish lives unfolding in the present. Horn has taught Jewish literature at Harvard, Sarah Lawrence College, and Yeshiva University. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and four children. (Photo: Homepage, photo by Michael Priest)

Emily Jenkins is an American writer of children's and adult fiction who writes under the pen-name E. Lockhart. She is known best for the Ruby Oliver quartet, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks, and We Were Liars. Most recently, Jenkins created the first Jewish character unveiled by DC Comics in 44 years – Whistle, also known as Willow Zimmerman, a New York City activist turned masked superhero who draws inspiration from Jewish teachings. “I had done research on the Jewish history of the Lower East Side for another book, so when DC invited me to create a new Gotham City hero, it felt natural to use some of that research and my own love of the neighborhood to create a new part of Gotham that’s a lot like the LES of the 1980s,” Jenkins explained in a recent interview. (Photo: Author homepage, photo by Heather Weston)

Eve Barlow is an LA-based, Scottish freelance music journalist, and former Deputy Editor of the New Musical Express. She currently contributes to New York Magazine, The Guardian, the Los Angeles Times, Pitchfork, and GQ, among other publications. She was also a Contributing Editor at Q Magazine from 2015 until the magazine’s closure in 2020. In recent years, Eve has become a more active voice on Jewish identity and fighting antisemitism via Twitter and Instagram. As a proud progressive, she tackles the issue from the left—and in doing so, offers a rare critique of the kind of antisemitic vitriol emerging from both sides of the political aisle. (Photo: courtesy)

Describing himself as a Mizrahi Jew, the “son of Amazigh and Iraqi Refugees” who is engaged in “loving myself 10x more than they hate us,” Israeli writer Hen Mazzig is a senior fellow at the Tel Aviv Institute. In August 2020, Mazzig started a viral movement, #JewishPrivilege, with Jews telling personal stories of discrimination and abuse. As a young Israeli, he served in the IDF for almost five years as an openly gay commander. During his service as a lieutenant in the COGAT unit, he worked as an intermediary between the Israeli Defense Forces (the IDF), the Palestinian Authority, the UN, and the many non-governmental organizations that work in the West Bank. (Photo: Twitter)

Jewish author Judy Batalion was born and raised in Montreal, where she grew up speaking English, French, Yiddish and Hebrew. She has written for the New York Times, the Washington Post, Vogue, the Forward, Salon and other publications. Batalion’s latest work, The Light of Days: The Untold Story of Women Resistance Fighters in Hitler's Ghettos, is based on a neglected book she discovered at London’s British Library – a Yiddish-language thriller entitled Freuen in di Ghettos (Women in the Ghettos), about “ghetto girls” who hid revolvers in teddy bears, bribed Nazis with whiskey and pastry, and blew up German supply trains. Her previous book was White Walls: A Memoir About Motherhood, Daughterhood, and the Mess in Between, published in 2016. She lives in New York with her family. (Photo: courtesy)

Social media influencer Liora Rez is the executive director of stopantisemitism.org, which exposes bigotry towards Jews across society. In a recent report, Rez’s group awarded failing grades to leading corporations, including Google and Unilever, for their weak response to antisemitism. “Antisemitism is not just a Jewish problem; it’s an American problem. It is up to us to do something about it,” she says. Rez credits her group’s skyrocketing success to adopting a bipartisan approach to fighting antisemitism. Born in Kaunas, Lithuania to Jewish parents, Rez and her family immigrated to America when she was four, settling in Cleveland. In 2013, her social media career took off under the guise “Jewish Chick.” (Photo: Forward)

Liza Wiemer is the author of the best-selling novel The Assignment, about two non-Jewish teenagers who object to a school assignment that requires them to play the role of Nazis deciding on the extermination of the Jews. Based on a similar controversy that erupted at a school in Oswego, New York, in 2017, The Assignment was described by one reviewer as a “frighteningly realistic portrayal of modern antisemitism in a small-town community that blurs the lines between past and present, fiction and reality.” An award-winning educator with over twenty years of teaching experience and the author of several other books, Weimer lives in Milwaukee, Wisc., with her family. (Photo: courtesy)

A leading Arab social media influencer and advocate for coexistence with Israel, Loay Alshareef has enjoyed a busy year in the wake of the historic Abraham Accords that brought peace between the Jewish state and the Gulf kingdoms of the UAE and Bahrain. Alshareef’s posts on Instagram and other platforms have shown him at key sites around the Middle East, including on a pilgrimage to Mecca, as well as speaking to leading regional politicians, among them Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid. A Saudi national who is said to be close to the Saudi royal family, Alshareef first emerged in 2018 with a Hebrew language message to Israelis claiming they had nothing to fear from a Saudi nuclear weapon. Alshareef also runs the Loya Academy, which offers a number of language courses, including Hebrew. (Photo: Personal Instagram)

An entrepreneur and philanthropist, Mark Gerson is the co-founder of Gerson Lehrman Group, African Mission Healthcare, and United Hatzalah of Israel. A graduate of Williams College and Yale Law School, he is the author of books on intellectual history and education and writes a weekly Torah column for the Christian Broadcasting Network. He also hosts the popular podcast The Rabbi’s Husband, and recently launched Torah Academy, an online resource for channeling the Torah’s practical insight and wisdom to live a happier, more successful life. His latest book on the Passover Haggadah, The Telling, was praised by one critic as “the perfect introduction for those desiring to explore this aspect of Jewish life.” (Photo: Personal Twitter)

New York Times journalist Nellie Bowles was raised Greek Orthodox and Episcopalian, but is in the process of converting to Judaism. She writes a weekly blog, “Chosen by Choice,” to enable her readers to deepen their understanding of Judaism. “Maybe you were raised Christian like me but now are now starting toward living a Jewish life,” says Bowles, who is planning to marry her partner, a Jewish woman. “Maybe you’re Jewish and hoping to convert your husband or wife and looking for tips. Maybe you think religion or changing your religion or non-Orthodox Judaism or lesbianism is all crazy and want to know just how exactly a crazy person thinks. I’m here for all these readers and more.” (Photo: Personal homepage)

Dr. Sheila Nazarian is a Board Certified Plastic Surgeon with a private practice in Beverly Hills. She founded the Nazarian Institute where she helps medical professionals develop their business skills by Thinking BIG – Branding, Innovation, Growth. Nazarian stars in the Emmy-nominated Netflix original series Skin Decision: Before and After. Nazarian is an important influencer on social media, talking about Jewish identity and combating antisemitism. Nazarian recently took issue with her local community college, San Diego Community College, for passing a hardline anti-Israel resolution. “This normalization of hatred has no place on American college campuses,” she stated. “SDCC can and must take a stand with Jewish students by condemning this unfounded anti-Israel resolution.” (Photo: business homepage)

Wisam al-Hardan is the leader of the Sunni movement known as the “Sons of Iraq,” which aligned with the US military in Western Iraq against al Qaeda in 2008. Al-Hardan was among more than 300 leaders of Iraqi civil society who gathered in the Kurdish city of Erbil, in northern Iraq, in September to advocate for peace with Israel. “In striving to rebuild Iraq, we must reconnect with the whole of our diaspora, including the Iraqi Jews,” al-Hardan wrote in the Wall Street Journal following the conference. “We reject the hypocrisy in some quarters of Iraq that speaks kindly of Iraqi Jews while denigrating their Israeli citizenship and the Jewish state, which granted them asylum.” Along with several other participants, Al-Hardan was the subject of an Iraqi government arrest warrant following the conference. (Photo: Center for Peace Communications)