NEIL MACFARQUHAR talks to Jeff Schechtman about real life in the Middle East

Beyond the headlines, the hot spots and the bombings are millions of people who go about their daily lives each day in the Middle East. People who eat, drink, play, love and engage in the stuff of everyday life. To those of us in the West, they often seem invisible. Some are eccentric, some normal. But very few represent what we see in the daily stories of life in the Middle East. It has been left to Neil MacFarquhar, to document their lives. He does so brilliantly in his new book THE MEDIA RELATIONS DEPARTMENT OF HIZBOLLAH WISHES YOU A HAPPY BIRTHDAY.