He is the author of two acclaimed works of fiction – a novel, Tell the Running Water[1][2] and a collection of short stories, The Secret Maker of the World[3][4][5] – as well as an award-winning memoir, Leave to Remain, about growing up in civil-war Lebanon and migrating to Europe and Australia.

His work has appeared in the New York Times[10] the Guardian[11] the Age,[12] the Sydney Morning Herald,[13] as well as literary magazines Meanjin, Heat and Overland.

[14] His writing is part of a body of work by a number of Anglo-Arab and Franco-Arab writers, first emerging in the 2000s, especially authors from a Lebanese background writing in English or French, post Lebanese civil war, such as Rabih Alameddine, Nada Awar Jarrar, Wajdi Mouawad and Rawi Hage, in whose work themes of violence, loss, memory and identity are prominent.

[7][15][16] El-Zein has made numerous media appearances[17][18][19] and, as a scholar, has authored and co-authored a large number of scientific papers on environmental sustainability, hydrology, sea level rise and development.

In 2005, he won an Australia Council for the Arts grant for new work, which led to the writing of his memoir Leave to Remain in 2009.