Tonight (Saturday) we head back to New York. Don't know when I'll actually get to update Friday's very interesting day, or do anything serious for today. Let me just summarize, and you see if you can make any necessary connections. Thursday's and Friday's pictures are not in order. Friday morning we visited a possible location where Jesus preached the Sermon on the Mount, and visited Capernaum where Peter lived. Then we visited a Kibbutz in Northern Israel and stood at a spot overlooking South Lebanon (occupied by Israel until 2000). Then we went to the Golan Heights, where we visited battlefields and a modern shopping center. This took us close to the Syrian border. We went back down to the Sea of Galilee, and took a boat back to our hotel. (I'm getting my times and dates mixed up. I'm going to come back and correct the sequence later.) Today, we walked the Via Dolorosa , ending at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre .
This morning we visited the Temple Mount. This, of course, houses both the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock. Muslims control access and have strict restrictions on dress, etc. They also have a lot of restrictions on any display of non-Muslim religious symbols or activities (such as Christian or Jewish prayer). They're not good about women's equality here. There's plenty of evidence of security measures by various interests. We passed over the Wailing Wall. Most (not all) people on the tour are Christian, while the tour company is run by Jewish folks with a lot of nationalist and theological energy. I'll have some things to say about today's adventure during the Rendezvous. The Israeli police police assigned to the Temple Mount are Muslim. Jesus predicted that Herod's Temple would be destroyed, and "not one stone left upon another." In 70 AD/CE, when the Romans destroyed the Temple, they dismantled the temple, rock by rock, throwing the build...
Last evening began Tisha B'Av , commemorating the destructions of both the first temple (by the Babylonians) and the second temple (by the Romans). Both destructions are believed to have occurred on the same date, but several hundred years apart. So in the evening I went down to the Wailing Wall, where there was a very large crowd. Because of the crowd, I stayed back and took a few pictures, but none of them captured the immense number of people there. A telephoto shot. The army was there providing security. I couldn't figure out what these girls were doing other than exercising their 2nd amendment rights. Unless they were plainclothes police ... or something. The Al Aqsa Mosque overlooked the entire scene. Tuesday morning we traveled to the Mount of Olives. A common sight along the way. During this time I think they're most concerned about Israeli hotheads -- some of whom we encountered. We see these folks around town quite a bit. Don't know what they're doi...
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