ABOUT
ME
Whether I’m advising the leader of the Israeli Labor Party, writing speeches for the President of the State of Israel, acting as confidante, comrade and co-conspirator with bestselling authors such as Jonathan Freedland, Hadley Freeman and Tom Segev, bringing bespoke research skills to the work of David Landau and Jeremy Bowen or five-star factual quality control to TV shows like BBC 1’s award-winning The Little Drummer Girl, words and facts are my stock in trade.
Words, and the ideas that they animate, were key in my work with Israel’s Deputy Minister for Diplomacy, at the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York and as an adjunct professor at City College of New York where I taught the history of the modern Middle East.
Ideas, and the words they inspire were my principal tools at BICOM, the Britain-Israel Communications and Research Centre, at Mishcon de Reya in the pursuit of legal challenges to contemporary anti-Semitism and at the Portland Trust, a policy-oriented group committed the resolution of conflict in the Middle East.
Many of the words and ideas that mean most to me went into my "highly readable and thoroughly researched" book, Israel’s Public Diplomacy, which followed my PhD in International Relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science where I was a Chevening Scholar and elected as Fellow of the Royal Society of Historians.
I don’t just like words. I love words. May I have a few with you?
SERVICES
Book doctor
From refining your earliest ideas to authoring a book proposal through researching, writing or editing your manuscript, I am here to get your ideas into print. With twenty years of experience and as many successful projects, I work with you to make sure your book says what you want and engages the audiences you would like to reach.
Speechwriter and content advisor
Words that work are ones that inspire and energize, excite, move and transform. Writing them is a craft, gained over many years of experience with presidents and prime ministers, with corporate leaders and thought leaders. Whether you need a speech that authentically captures your voice and your vision, talking points that articulate your ideas clearly or an op-ed where your byline is matched by compelling content, my words get your message across.
Israel consultant
Working with the public, private and voluntary sectors for over twenty years, I provide strategic advice to clients working in or with Israel. My extensive network ensures that your decisions are backed up by the best analysis and that your contacts include the most valuable voices.
Expert researcher
Comment is free; facts are sacred. Working across print and broadcast media, documentaries and drama, from novels and textbooks to one-off features and multi-episode series on TV, radio and film, I research, investigate and verify the broadest concepts and the tiniest details to make your words accurate and credible.
He plunged deep into the history with me, at my side as we burrowed into the archives, trudged through the forests of Slovakia and walked among the ghosts in Auschwitz. I am deeply grateful.
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Jonathan Freedland, author of "The Escape Artist"
CLIENTS
Office of the President of the State of Israel
Foreign Media Advisor to President Reuven (Ruvi) Rivlin of Israel: speechwriting, media strategy and press liaison
Tom Segev
Archival research on the National Jewish Book Award-winning One Palestine, Complete: Jews and Arabs Under the British Mandate (2000)
BBC One
Script editing for BBC 1's six-part adaptation of John le Carré's The LIttle Drummer Girl (2018)
Hadley Freeman
Book doctor for the Sunday Times bestselling The House of Glass: The story and secrets of a twentieth-century Jewish family (2020)
BBC Radio 4
An occasional series of radio documentaries on key moments in Israeli history, including Shoah in Jerusalem (2015), One Day in Entebbe (2016), Present at the Creation (2018) and The Most Successful Assassination in History (2020)
Office of Deputy Minister Michael Oren MK
Advisor and Spokesperson for Deputy Minister for Diplomacy, Dr. Michael Oren MK
Jonathan Freedland
Research for award-winning author and broadcaster Jonathan Freedland, including Jacob's Gift: A Journey into the Heart of Belonging (2005) and Sunday Times bestseller The Escape Artist (2022)
Sam Bourne
Research for Sunday Times No.1 bestselling novelist Sam Bourne on books including: The Righteous Men (2006); The Last Testament (2007); The Final Reckoning (2008); The Chosen One (2010); Pantheon (2012); The 3rd Woman (2015); To Kill the President (2017); To Kill the Truth (2019) and To Kill a Man (2020)
CONTACT
Looking forward to hearing from you
jonathan@factotum-consulting.com
+972 544 707 709