I had a great childhood. I think writers are always better off when they have more twisted childhoods, but I didn't.

On the flip side, I enjoy covering the Arab world, I've spent my entire career here in the Middle East, but I would never call myself a war correspondent.

As a journalist, your job is to bear witness.

In any kind of conflict, you have a certain dehumanization that comes along with it. And it's important as a reporter, a writer, a journalist, to try to restore humanity.

Journalism is always the art of the incomplete. You get bits and pieces.

I had a great childhood. I think writers are always better off when they have more twisted childhoods, but I didn't.

The best journalism is sometimes about footnotes—when we write small to say something big.