The New York Times has an interesting article about Israelis managing to harvest dates from the famous Judean date palm, planted with seeds that are over 2000 years old:
The plump, golden-brown dates hanging in a bunch just above the sandy soil were finally ready to pick.
They had been slowly ripening in the desert heat for months. But the young tree on which they grew had a much more ancient history — sprouting from a 2,000-year-old seed retrieved from an archaeological site in the Judean wilderness.
“They are beautiful!” exclaimed Dr. Sarah Sallon with the elation of a new mother, as each date, its skin slightly wrinkled, was plucked gently off its stem at a sunbaked kibbutz in southern Israel.
They were tasty, too, with a fresh flavor that gave no hint of their two-millenium incubation period. The honey-blonde, semi-dry flesh had a fibrous, chewy texture and a subtle sweetness.
These were the much-extolled but long-lost Judean dates, and the harvest this month was hailed as a modern miracle of science.
Where was the seed found again?
Hannah’s seed, which came from an ancient burial cave in Wadi el-Makkukh near Jericho, now in the West Bank, was carbon dated to between the first and fourth centuries B.C.E., becoming one of the oldest known seeds to have ever been germinated.
The phrase "now in the West Bank" is awkward - did the cave somehow move from Judea to the "West Bank"? But for the Times to more accurately say "now called the West Bank" would be problematic for a paper that chose to embrace that term only in the 1970s.
No one had ever heard of the "West Bank" before the 1950s, yet that Jordanian name is now considered the most accurate for media like the New York Times while "Judea" is considered a right-wing Israeli term created to supplant it. Articles like this are awkward precisely because they highlight that the land has always been associated with Jews, not "Palestinian" Arabs.
Luckily, the scientists who managed this remarkable feat aren't bound by the political correctness of using a brand new term for a Jewish historic area:
Ancient Judea was ideally placed between North Africa and Asia, along major trade routes, and the Romans, who traded all over the Mediterranean, could have brought western varieties with them to pollinate the older varieties from the east.
“Putting it simply, what do we find?” Dr. Sallon said. “The story of ancient Israel and the Jewish people, of diasporas, trade routes and commerce throughout the Middle East.”
(h/t Charlie)
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
This blog may be a labor of love for me, but it takes a lot of effort, time and money. For over 19 years and 40,000 articles I have been providing accurate, original news that would have remained unnoticed. I've written hundreds of scoops and sometimes my reporting ends up making a real difference. I appreciate any donations you can give to keep this blog going.
Alon Mizrahi, latest anti-Zionist kid on the block
-
Meet Alon Mizrahi, the latest kid on the Mizrahi anti-Zionist block,
joining the ranks of such luminaries as Avi Shlaim, Hadar Cohen, Ella
Shohat, Rachel...
Happy Pessah!
-
Wishing all our readers celebrating the festival of freedom a happy holiday
and hoping for the liberation of all the hostages.
The post Happy Pessah...
Happy Pessah!
-
Wishing all our readers celebrating the festival of freedom a happy holiday
and hoping for the liberation of all the hostages.
The post Happy Pessah...
The New Jihadists Are Our Kids
-
“I will use my knives and machete to slit their throats and kill them."
Coeur d’Alene, an Idaho city with a population of over 50,000, had too many
chur...
A Conversation on X with a Professor
-
Basically starts here, with him responding to me reaction so:
Re: "That is the least disruptive way of occupying space on a campus”
Actually, it's one of...
Confrontation with Iran: Who Won?
-
The West likes its Jews passive, dependent, and weak. When American
officials say “Israel has a right to defend [herself]” they mean that they
will allow h...
The Palestinian “Two-State” Plan: Duping the West
-
One of the great unsolved mysteries of the 21st century is why, given what
a catastrophe it proved to be, anyone, much less a whole phalanx of
politicians,...
06-Feb-24: Obituary: Naftali Gordon
-
The obituary that follows was published yesterday by *Times of Israel* under
the headline "*Master Sgt. (res.) Naftali Gordon, 32: A man of ‘honesty and
...
Closing Jews Down Under Website
-
With a heavyish heart I am closing down the website after ten years.
It is and it isn’t an easy decision after 10 years of constant work. The
past...
‘Test & Trace’ is a mirage
-
Lockdown II thoughts: Day 1 Opposition politicians have been banging on
about the need for a ‘working’ Test & Trace system even more loudly than
the govern...