Henges

Giant’s Ring, near Belfast. Neolithic henge with the remains of a chambered tomb in the middle. Breathtaking from the air, in the slanting rays of sun. #aerialphotography #prehistory #archaeology
Photo: ©UK Telegraph pic.twitter.com/BW1y5gGkyQ

— Chiara Botturi (@botturi_chiara) May 11, 2018

Rujm al-Hiri (Galgal Refaim) in the Golan Heights

Credit: By ​Assaf Tzaddik, CC BY-SA 3.0.

Credit: Haaretz.

From Haaretz article, Morbid Theory in Mystery of Israel's Answer to Stonehenge:

Rujm al-Hiri's unremarkable appearance from the ground belies its striking form when seen from the air: It consists of four circles — the outermost more than 500 feet across — made up of an estimated 42,000 tons of basalt stone, the remains of massive walls that experts believe once rose as much as high as 30 feet. It is an enormous feat of construction carried out 6000 years ago by a society about which little is known.

It seems likely that Rujm al-Hiri served residents of excavated villages nearby that were part of the same agrarian civilization that existed in the Holy Land in the Chalcolithic period, between 4500 and 3500 B.C. This predates the arrival of the Israelites as described in the Bible by as much as three millennia....

Most scholars have identified Rujm al-Hiri as some kind of ritual center, with some believing it connected to astronomical calculations. Archaeologist Yonathan Mizrahi, one of the first to excavate there, found that to someone standing in the very center of the circles on the morning of the summer solstice in 3000 B.C., "the first gleam of sunrise would appear at the center of the northeast entryway in the outer wall."...

[Mike] Freikman's excavations have yielded almost no material remains of the kind that are common at most archaeological sites, he said. That is significant, however, as it confirms that the site was never lived in and was thus not a defensive position or a residential quarter but most likely a ritual center of some kind — possibly, he said, one indeed linked to a cult of the dead.

Druze on the Golan are now asking for Israeli citizenship

Some real news, highlighted by Elder of Ziyon - "The protest against Assad: The Druze on the Golan are asking for Israeli citizenship." The story is from Israel's Channel 2 news of June 21, 2012 (for the Hebrew, go to: חדשות 2 - המחאה נגד אסד: הדרוזים בגולן מבקשים אזרחות ישראלית). My translation follows:

The thirty-year old ban that the Druze majority on the Golan imposed on the residents of the villages that agreed to receive Israeli citizenship - has ended. In opposition to Assad's regime, and in order to show that it no longer rules over the villages on the Golan, the leaders of the community lifted the ban imposed on those who accepted Israeli citizenship.

... Thirty years after the Knesset decided to grant Israeli citizenships to the residents of the Golan, the ban has ended which the leaders of the community decreed against the residents who agreed to accept Israeli citizenship.

In contrast with the Druze who live in other parts of Israel, the Druze on the Golan see themselves first of all as citizens who are loyal to Syria. Therefore, the Druze sheikhs decided to place a ban on anyone who accepted Israeli citizenship - their families were shunned, they could not marry their children, and they were not honored at funerals of their loved ones.

Senior officials in Israel tried for years to put pressure on the Druze sheikhs to change their policy without any success. It took events occurring over the border, in Syria, to bring a change. In defiance of Assad's regime, Druze on the Golan are now asking to take advantage of the right that was given to them by the law and to add Israeli citizenship. This step has been taken, among other reasons, to show Assad that he does not rule any longer over the Druze villages on the Golan.

This is really a major step. There remain close ties between the Golan and the Syrian Druze, and the Golan Druze have not wanted to seek Israeli citizenship in order to ensure that those ties continue. They have also done so out of the consciousness that if they accepted Israeli citizenship, and the Golan went back to Syrian rule, they would be regarded as traitors and treated accordingly.

My first thought is - if this is how the Druze on the Golan feel - why should the Golan ever go back to Syria?

Trip to the Galilee and the Golan

I got back verrry late last night from my trip to the Galilee and the Golan with my friend A., her daughter, and her daughter's friend. It was a lot of fun. We stayed at the Beit Sefer Sadeh Har Hermon (Mt. Hermon Field School), next to Kibbutz Snir, from which we had a view of the upper Galilee, the Golan, and Lebanon - which is very close that far north. On Friday we planned a trip to a waterfall on the Golan (the Sa'ar waterfall), not far from the Nimrod Castle (a Crusader castle from the middle ages) - the photos in the guide book promised a lovely waterfall, but all we found were lots of climbing up and down, and a dry river bed. We definitely came in the wrong season if we wanted to see the waterfall!

Dry wadi of the Sa'ar waterfall.

We still wanted to find water, preferably to swim in. We continued up Rte. 99, which is the road that goes up from the Galilee into the Golan (a beautiful, winding, somewhat dangerous road). On our way we encountered a small kiosk by the side of the road, selling "Druze pita" - a big round pita, with lebene and zaatar in it - delicious. The kiosk was situated right in front of a field of cherry trees - now is when the cherries are ripe. The owner of the kiosk invited us to pick some cherries - and so A's daughter and her friend followed him into the orchard and they came back with delicious, just picked cherries.

A cherry orchard in the Golan.

We then continued on our way, drove through Masade (one of the Druze towns on the Golan), and finally came to a beautiful, small, almost circular lake called Birket Ram. We scrambled down the hill and into the cool blue water. In past visits to the Golan with friends, we've tried to get to into the lake but had never figured out how to do it. Apparently the lake is a "crater lake" (according to Wikipedia), whose only sources are rain water and underground springs. It is not stream fed, nor do streams flow out of (which would be impossible anyway, since it is lower than the surrounding hills). It is surrounded by bountiful orchards and fields cultivated by Druze farmers.

Birket Ram

 The next view is of some of the orchards surrounding the lake.

Notice the little saplings that have just been planted, close to the water.

After enjoying the nice cool water for a while, we climbed back up the hill and got back in the car. We drove through Majdal Shams, a Druze town quite near Syria (on Nakba Day and Naksa Day it was where people tried to get in from Syria). Our goal was to drive up as far as we could on Mt. Hermon, but we were stopped quite close to the town at a military base. There's a ski resort on the Israeli side of Mt. Hermon, so it is possible to get there, but the sign said that the road was not open after 3:30 p.m. The Golan is full of Israeli military bases and listening stations, and there are roads that civilians aren't permitted to drive on, all in addition to the still-active minefields (which are clearly marked).

We turned around, through Majdal Shams again, and then back down to the Field School. On our way we passed by the same kiosk again and bought some more delicious food - in all, we bought lebene in olive oil, cherry jam (with whole cherries, pits and all), apricot jam (with whole dried apricots), eggplant jam (tiny little eggplants cooked in sugar), and a comb of honey. All delicious.

We passed by Nimrod's Castle again - this is a view from the road. I've visited there in the past, but this time we didn't go into it.

Nimrod's castle and a long ridge leading up to it.

Flowers on the side of the road, Nimrod's Castle in the background.

We made our way back to the Field School after that, and sat down to eat more pita with delicious cheese (lebene) and jams on it. After that my friend A. and I painted a bit in watercolors (she is definitely more skilled than I am!) and I took photos of the scene. Very quite and pastoral. As the sun was setting, we heard the eerie howls of some animal - hyenas? jackals? I don't know what is common in Israel.

The view from our porch - fish ponds with the mountains behind them. I think the fish ponds belonged to the nearby Kibbutz Snir.

And then to bed!

Nakba Day protests - what do they mean?

I don't really know what to say yet about the Nakba Day protests today. I find what happened today to be really frightening - the idea that thousands of protesters could cross the Syrian and Lebanese borders with Israel, without using arms, and surprise the Israeli army. Did the IDF have any idea that this was going to happen? Earlier this week I was reading articles online that they were preparing for riots in Israel and the West Bank - and they seemed well-prepared for them. But I don't remember anything being mentioned about their preparations for possible protesters coming over the borders. If they had, they might have had less lethal methods for dealing with the protesters, like water cannons or using rubber bullets instead of live rounds.

This is the report from Haaretz about what happened in Magdal Shams, on the Golan:

This was the first serious incident on the Israel-Syria border, Israel's calmest frontier, in 36 years. Despite extensive preparations, IDF intelligence anticipated the main point of friction would be the Quneitra border crossing, which was beefed up with reinforcements, while only two jeeps with 10 soldiers were securing the fence when it was breached.

The army estimated that the demonstration taking place on the Golan's "Shouting Hill," a popular place for protests in recent years, would proceed without unusual incident, and was taken completely by surprise when some 1,000 people, including women and children, began sliding down a steep slope towards the fence.

The unit had clear orders not to shoot without authorization by the brigade commander.After using their few riot control munitions, the army said the soldiers held their fire until the demonstrators began surrounding the jeeps. The order to fire live rounds was given by the brigade commander, Colonel Eshkol Shukrun, who arrived at the scene.

He said yesterday he feared situation would get completely out of control, and ordered the troops to fire toward the lower body of the protesters. One person was killed on the Israeli side of the fence and three on the Syrian side, 40 were injured, and all but the 137 already on the Israeli side fled.

"I realized that this was spinning out of control and that we needed to do something before 10,000 infiltrators made their way to Majdal Shams," said Shukrun, who was injured in the face by stone throwers. "It became clear that we needed to shift it into higher gear."

Shukrun gave the order to his soldiers to shoot at the lower extremities of those who crossed into Majdal Shams.

"That was when the whole [flow of infiltrators] stopped," he said. "Whoever was on the fence ran away in fear and those who crossed into Majdal stayed there."

After the infiltrators protested in the main town square, the IDF sought to coordinate their return to Syria with UN forces stationed on the Golan Heights. By 5:00 P.M., all of the infiltrators were loaded onto buses and taken back to Syria via the Quneitra crossing.

I'm also suspicious about the protesters coming from Syria and Lebanon. As Jeffrey Goldberg and others have mentioned, this couldn't happen without the Syrian government or Hezbollah permitting it. Goldberg writes:

Consider: These borders, in particular the Syria-Israel border, have seldom, if ever, seen demonstrations like this. The Syria-Israel border is a notably quiet place; Hafez al-Assad, the late dictator, and his son, Bashar, the current dictator, have kept the border quiet for decades. But now there is widespread revolt in Syria, which threatens not only the Syrian regime, but its ally, the Islamic Republic of Iran, and its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah. So far, Bashar's security forces have slaughtered almost a thousand Syrian citizens. So what would you do if you were a cynical Syrian dictator, or a cynical ally of the cynical Syrian dictator? Change the subject. To what, you might ask? Well, Israel, of course.

Andrew Exum, whom Goldberg quotes, also has an interesting analysis - "Just Another Sunday in the Levant." See also Michael Totten, whom I always find gives insightful analysis on what is happening in the Middle East, especially Israel/Palestine, Lebanon, and Syria - "Nakba Day's Deadly Political Theater."

Copenhagen - blowing in the wind

I just spent a week in Tartu, Estonia, going to the international Society of Biblical Literature conference, and I have now arrived in Copenhagen for a couple of days of relaxation before returning to the U.S. I'm on the 12th floor of my hotel, so when I looked out over the city from the window, I had a great few of roofs, trees, church spires, and the like - and on the horizon, a whole row of wind turbines actively spinning! I really like the way wind turbines look - in my opinion, they add interest to a landscape, rather than intruding on it (as those opposed to Cape Wind have argued). So, forthwith, some photos of Copenhagen's wind turbines:

From Wind turbines in Copenhagen

From Wind turbines in Copenhagen

And by comparison, a photo I took a few years ago of wind turbines on a ridge on the Golan Heights:

From Wind turbines in Copenhagen

And, in case you've forgotten, a photo of the wind turbines on the way to Liepaja:

From Liepaja, July 22, 2010