Steve Gutkin, formerly the Associated Press bureau chief for Israel and the Palestinian Territories. Prior to this posting, Gutkin served as an AP bureau chief in Caracas, Singapore and Jakarta. Working more than a decade in Venezuela and Colombia in the 80s and 90s, Gutkin covered the rise and fall of the Medellin and Cali drug cartels, uprisings of leftist rebels, and Hugo Chavez’s failed 1992 coup attempt and his subsequent rise to the presidency of Venezuela. He rode into Kabul with the Northern Alliance after spending months in Afghanistan covering the post 9/11 war, and he was in Baghdad after the defeat of Saddam Hussein’s forces. Gutkin has degrees from Columbia University and Pomona College.