Few foreigners would expect the winding Palestinian road that goes past the Israeli army base and into the village of Taybeh to lead to a beer brewery.

Even fewer would expect to find a woman standing in front of the beer tanks, measuring out the hops and directing the export of crates of ales and lagers around the world.

Madees Khoury, the general manager at the Taybeh Brewing Company, is used to people’s surprise. She is, after all, believed to be the only female beer brewer in the Middle East.

“I like shocking people,” said Madees. “When I tell people that I make the beer, whether they are Arabs or foreigners, they say to me: you’re joking, right?”

Beer making is a family tradition for the Khourys, a Christian Palestinian family whose surname literally means “priest” in Arabic.

They hail from Taybeh, an ancient Palestinian village in the occupied West Bank, not far from where Jesus is said to have fasted for 40 days.