Sde Boker is a small kibbutz in the Negev desert, known to every Israeli as the place where David Ben-Gurion, the founder and first prime minister of Israel, chose to live after leaving politics. Ben-Gurion believed that the future of Israel lay in settling the Negev, and he put his conviction into practice by moving to Sde Boker in 1953, living in a simple wooden hut on the edge of the desert.
Ben-Gurion’s Hut
The hut where Ben-Gurion and his wife Paula lived has been preserved as a museum, with the original furniture, books, and personal items. The library is the most striking feature: 5,000 books in multiple languages that reveal the intellectual world of a leader who read as voraciously as he governed. Ben-Gurion taught himself Greek to read Plato in the original. He studied Buddhist philosophy. He read scientific journals. His desk, his reading chair, and the thousands of books that lined the walls create a portrait of a leader who believed that governing a nation required understanding the world in its entirety.
The Grave
Ben-Gurion and Paula are buried on the rim of the Zin Valley, overlooking one of the most dramatic desert canyons in Israel. The grave site, simple and unadorned, faces the wilderness that Ben-Gurion wanted to make bloom. The contrast between the simplicity of the grave and the grandeur of the landscape is quintessentially Ben-Gurion: a man of enormous historical consequence who chose modesty for himself and majesty for his nation.
Midreshet Ben-Gurion
Adjacent to the kibbutz, the Midreshet Ben-Gurion campus of Ben-Gurion University houses research institutes focused on desert agriculture, water technology, and solar energy, fulfilling Ben-Gurion’s vision of the Negev as a frontier of innovation. The Vidor Center on the campus is a visitor center with a multimedia exhibition that tells Ben-Gurion’s story from Poland to the declaration of statehood to his decision to move to the desert. The campus sits on the rim of the Zin Valley, and the view from the campus across the canyon is spectacular.
Visit with Hoshen Tours
Sde Boker connects the story of Israel’s founding father to the Negev he loved. Hoshen Tours visits the hut, the grave, the Vidor Center, and combines it with a hike through Ein Avdat in the canyon below.