Trip to the South

Thursday, Yael took us down south to the Dead Sea. We climbed Masada to see the sunrise (which was lovely). Masada, as the story goes, is the place where a Jewish community rebelled against the Roman Empire in the beginning of the Common Era. On the top of Masada, Flavius Josephus (Jewish historian who worked under the Roman Empire) reports that the community of Masada, facing defeat, committed mass suicide rather than facing lives as Roman slaves. In spite of the sad ending, the community at Masada is upheld as Jews who were unafraid to stand up and fight for themselves (something that was glorified at the beginning of Zionism as a critique of passive Jews who took no action to further themselves or fight against Antisemitism).
After Masada, we hiked in Ein Gedi and swam in the same pool we visited with Eric's group. And then a dip in the Dead Sea. (It is REALLY cool.) Finally, we drove to Sderot, a community close to Gaza that receives a lot of rocket fire. That was a very sad visit, but important to see. I was incredibly impressed by the man in charge of rocket cleanup who was stationed there by the military. He was very sympathetic to the Palestinians as well as the Jews and spoke very eloquently.