Kiss Me on the Main Road
This historical novel tells the love story of a Jewish doctor and nurse who flew from Israel to work in a refugee camp in Yemen in the late 1940s. The camp, named Geula, was established to accommodate the Yemeni Jews who wanted to immigrate to pre-state Israel. and was shut down after they were brought over during an operation called “On Wings of Eagles.” The novel, however, focuses on the time when the camp was being built.
Alongside the medical problems and diseases, the medical team also had to deal with social and political hardships: overcoming friction between the heads of the Yemenite community and the leadership of pre-state Israel, as well as handling the British Mandate authorities, who were delaying the issuing of visas. At first, the doctor and nurse are also at odds, but their mutual antagonism slowly gives way to an extraordinary affection. Their love story is portrayed against the background of daily life in the camp and the individual stories of its various residents.