In this wide-ranging conversation with Wavemaker’s Michael Schulder, journalist Graeme Wood, of The Atlantic, shares surprisingly revealing stories from his recent meetings with MBS — the crown prince of Saudi Arabia. He tells us what he has learned post October 7th in his reporting from the Gaza border, the West Bank, and throughout Israel, as well as from earlier reporting journeys in Iran. And we probe his uniquely insightful takes on the political and cultural issues dominating the American conversation.
About Graeme Wood:
Graeme Wood is a journalist with a breathtaking range and depth of reporting and analysis on the most consequential issues of our time. His work at is an exhilarating antidote to the often-entrenched narratives of daily news cycles.
Before he was hired as a correspondent by The Atlantic in 2006, Wood satisfied his thirst for travel by becoming a courier and bootlegger in northern Iraq and hiking around Afghanistan and the tribal areas of Pakistan during a particularly violent period.
Fluent in Arabic, Wood’s book: The Way of the Stranger: Encounters with the Islamic State, is based on his deep immersion in Islam and his meetings with the “seducers” of ISIS.
Among other honors, Wood has received fellowships from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Center for the Prevention of Genocide and he led Nazi-hunting expeditions to Paraguay for the History Channel.
In addition to writing for The Atlantic, he teaches at Yale University and is a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations.