On Monday, we awoke in Jerusalem for the final time of this trip. It was another early morning Israeli buffet breakfast in the hotel restaurant before we went downstairs to the conference room to hear a wonderful presentation by Miri Eisin, a former Colonel in the Israel Defense Force (IDF). She is also a Zionist. […]
Sites of Conflict and Sites of Peace in the Holy City; And a Tour of Israel’s Security Fence
On Sunday morning, August 12, a group of us woke up early to go visit the Dome of the Rock. This is the area above the Temple Mount that is one of the most sacred spaces to Islam. We were above what was The Temple Mount. This is the site of Solomon’s great temple, which […]
A Day With Palestinians in Bethlehem and the Dead Sea
On Saturday morning, August 10, we had an early wake-up in Jerusalem since we had a lot on the agenda (of course it wasn’t as early as my 5:15am wake-up the day before!) On this day, we were to hear firsthand from a Palestinian journalist as well as two young Palestinian men who live in […]
A Holy Day in Jerusalem
On Friday morning, I woke up early to meet about six other members of our group. How early? 5:15am early. We met in the lobby of our hotel at 5:45am and proceeded on a 20-minute walk into the Old City to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The morning light was already up as we […]
Welcome to Jerusalem
After the wonderful day in Galilee, which I wrote about in my previous post, we woke up for our second and final morning at the Sea of Galilee. When I looked out my window, the sun was shining down through the clouds into the water, like one of those Biblical scenes where God is talking […]
A Day in Galilee and the Golan Heights
On Wednesday, we woke up at the Leonardo Plaza Hotel in Tiberias. As I mentioned in my previous blog post, this hotel is situated right at the Sea of Galilee. When I woke up in the morning, I opened my window from my room on the 10th floor and walked out onto the balcony to […]
Welcome to Israel & Dinner in Caesarea
As I mentioned in my previous blog post, I am traveling here to Israel as part of a trip with the Israel Collective. There are about 25 or so of us on this trip, plus a few of our guides, Josh and Raj. We boarded the plane for Israel at the JFK airport on Monday […]
Preparing for The Journey to The Holy Land
“Everything is going to change.” These were the words of Josh Ahrens, director of the Israel Collective, the organization that invited me and 25 other people for an all-expense paid trip to the Holy Land. He said these words to us as we gathered in a meeting room at the Crowne Plaza Hotel by the […]
Celebrating America’s Founding in the Black Hills of South Dakota
It was July 4th and we awoke in Keystone, South Dakota. After the crazy thunderstorm the night before, the blue skies opened up and temperatures had cooled off slightly. We drove just a few minutes down the road from the Holy Smoke Resort to “downtown” Keystone and found a traditional American diner breakfast at Peggy’s […]
Independence Celebration at America’s Mount Rushmore
On Tuesday, we woke up at the Badlands Inn and started our morning with the free continental breakfast. By 8:00am, we were checked out and made our way over to the Minuteman Missile Site, which is just north of Badlands National Park – and on our way out of the area as we would make […]