Sunday was our first day in Israel. Once we got on the bus, we made our way into Jerusalem. Of course we are stuck in a wonderful traffic jam. It seems as a tanker truck broke down and they needed to safely offload the fuel. It almost seemed like I wasn’t on vacation. So this put our tour a few hrs behind. However since we were doing an overland tour, we had the whole evening to continue our tours. We first drove through Jerusalem, and made our way through to Bethlehem.
Remember Bethlehem is Palestinian controlled, so we all had to be searched and we had a few check points to go through. For us Americans, this was a rude awakening and frankly an eye opening experience to the true amount of danger we were really in. As we make it through check point I see something that opening my eyes personally. I saw a dove with an olive branch in its mouth, and it was wearing a flak jacket. The dove also had a target over its heart. The imagery speaks for itself.
We went to a great authentic Palestinian restaurant, that served a great lunch, and after that were we taken to the church of the nativity. Remember this is the same church that just a few months ago (it might be longer), but it was the same church that housed Palestinian rebels, that the Israelis were going after and eventually killed a few of them. I walked through the same gates, I saw on the new where they were pulling the dead bodies from the church. Yes, this is real. Visiting the church really gave me a since of realism that I hadn’t had in my own faith. Seeing the church that St. Helena built in honor of Christ’s birth and being to go to touch the star that marks the spot and see the grotto was just amazing. We are just beginning.
As we are leaving Bethlehem, we have to go back through the same gates. I made sure to get the picture of the dove. I will post it when I get back in the states. Next we made our way to the old city of Jerusalem. We left the bus and entered through the Jaffa Gate. So we talked through the last few stations on the journey to the cross, and finally made it to the church of the Holy Septlicure. This is the sport where Jesus was crucified. St Helena also built a church in honor of this spot, so we could spent time looking at this area, and we were able to see a rock that Jesus’ body was purified on, and then we walked over to the tomb.
After that we walked underneath the structures and saw part of the catacombs. Ollie decided to play in the dirt. Most of the Holy Sites are controlled by multiple denominations, i.e. the Roman Catholic Church or the Greek Orthodox Church, so needless to say it’s hard to get any of them to agree on anything, so when you are visiting these sites you have to learn to be flexible and make do with what you can see. Once we left this church of the Holy Septlicure, we made our way to the Western Wall, or Wailing Wall. At this time it was part 7:00pm at night so it was dark, and it was amazing to see the city in this fashion.
People will be there 24 hrs a day and I think there is a web cam as well. However once again, it really hits home how real the religious struggle is when I am walking all of the Christian Holy Lands, and I hear the Islamic Prayers broadcast over obnoxiously loud speakers. It’s kinda like them saying… take this Christians.
Next, we checked into the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. This is a place I have always wanted to stay. Whenever something happens you always see the reporters broadcast from there, so that was on my list of if I am ever there… so it was nice to stay. It was a great place to stay, and I am glad I had the opportunity. So now we leave for dinner and we make it to an Israeli restaurant. I have no idea what I ate, but it was good. 
Then we hopped on the bus and took a drive around the city of Jerusalem, and saw how things were lit up at night. It was a very beautiful city.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashdod
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerusalem
