The Jordan Valley

The Jordan Valley runs from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea, the deepest valley on earth. At its southern end lies Jericho, the City of Palms, where people have lived for over ten thousand years; its stone tower is five thousand years older than the pyramids. Here Joshua’s walls fell, Elisha healed the spring, Zacchaeus climbed his sycamore, and blind Bartimaeus received his sight. Just to the east, at Qasr el-Yahud, the Israelites crossed the Jordan into the Promised Land, Elijah was taken up in a chariot of fire, and John baptized Jesus.

Further north, where the valley meets the Jezreel, Beit She’an rises over the best-preserved Roman city in Israel, its columns felled in rows by the earthquake of 749. At the foot of Gilboa lie the warm springs of Gan HaShlosha and the zodiac mosaic of Beit Alpha, and 500 meters above the river stands Belvoir, the Crusader castle that held out against Saladin for eighteen months. Along the Jordan near the Sea of Galilee, the pioneers of the Kinneret farm planted the seed of the kibbutz movement.