Mahmoud Muna is a writer, publisher and bookseller from Jerusalem, Palestine. He runs Jerusalem's celebrated Educational Bookshop and the Bookshop at the American Colony Hotel, both centres of the city's literary scene. Muna has degrees in Media and Communication from the University of Sussex and King's College London. He is active in many cultural initiatives across Palestine and writes regularly on culture and politics, with bylines in the London Review of Books and Jerusalem Quarterly, among others. He recently published the first-ever Arabic edition of the literary magazine Granta.

Matthew Teller is a UK-based author and broadcaster writing on place and culture, with a special focus on Palestine and the wider Middle East. His 2022 book Nine Quarters of Jerusalem: A New Biography of the Old City was a Daily Telegraph Book of the Year. Teller produces and presents documentaries for BBC Radio 4 and World Service, and reports for BBC Radio's 'From Our Own Correspondent'. His journalism is published by the BBC, Guardian, Independent, Times and Financial Times, among others. Teller is the author of Quite Alone: Journalism from the Middle East 2008-2019 and several travel guides, including the Rough Guide to Jordan.