Ala Hlehel is a Palestinian writer from Jish in Galilee, now based in Acre. Having trained as a scriptwriter, Hlehel has written plays and scripts for both film and TV; his work has been presented at the Royal Court Theatre in London and the Schaubühne in Berlin among others.

Author of novels and short stories, Hlehel is the recipient of 2024 Katara Prize for Arabic Novel and the 2013 Ghassan Kanafani Resistance Arts Prize for a short story. Hlehel founded the Hkaya lab project for Arab children literature in 2016 and has written and translated numerous children’s books.