By Bob Van Leer

  (ASHDOD, ISRAEL, Sunday, April 16, 2000) - Betty and I spent the day touring Masada and the Dead Sea in the Jordan Valley in southern Israel today.

  Ashdod is the main port for Israel (63% of the country's shipping) and hums with activity.
We arrived here this morning after a short trip from Port Said, Egypt. Israel is a small country, about the size of New Jersey, and our guide said the population is now 6.5 million of which 4.2 million are Jews and 1.5 million Arabs.

  Israel is the largest recipient of foreign aid from the U. S., about $3 billion per year. Egypt is second at $2 billion.

  The country is big in agriculture, growing citrus, potatoes, wheat, corn, cotton and bananas. The coastal plain is a fertile area. There is also a lot of manufacturing, service and software development, according to our guide, an Israeli with a Cockney accent (from London).

  We bypassed Jerusalem to get to the north-south highway to southern Israel. But even the bypass was gridlock traffic, this being Palm Sunday. Eastern Israel is like Eastern Oregon, brown hills. There were a number of Bedouin encampments. They are in a transition here from pure nomads, to now living in shack cities and at least one has upgraded to a modern city.

  Along the way on a downgrade we passed a sign that said "sea level". The Dead Sea is 1200 feet below sea level, we are told the lowest spot on earth. Our guide said the sea level has dropped 100 feet since 1913. The sea is like the Eastern Oregon lakes with no outlet to the sea. With upstream irrigation and population increase, not enough water is running into the Dead Sea to maintain its level and it is shrinking.

  Masada is a flat-topped mountain west of the Dead Sea cut off from the mountain range to the west of it. The level top is about 20 acres. A highly developed settlement was made on the top including a palace for Jewish King Herod. Later it had a Roman garrison.

  The Jews revolted from Roman rule in 66 A.D. with Masada being one of the first Roman posts to fail. The Romans reasserted control at the Galilee in 67 and Jerusalem fell to the Romans in 70. A band of Jewish patriots withdrew to Masada for another, and even more hopeless stand. The Roman legionaries followed them and put Masada under siege for three years.

  Unable to storm the mountain top or starve it out, the Romans finally built a ramp up the west side that allowed them to breach Masada's wall. When the Jews saw the end was near they had a mass suicide pact in which 940-950 died. There were a handful of survivors. The fall of Masada in 73 A.D. marked the end of Jewish independence until 1948 when modern day Israel was formed.

  Access to the top of Masada is a little easier than in the days of the siege. There is a tramway to the top.

  A few miles south of Masada we stopped at a resort on the Dead Sea and I had to try a swim there. It's a weird sensation. The salt content is about a third, instead of about three percent for sea water. It looks like ordinary water, but you can't sink in it. Some bathers in the sea were demonstrating this by laying back in the water and reading magazines. When you are on your back, it is very difficult to get into any other position. Getting your legs under you is like trying to hold corks underwater, they want to come back to the top. The water feels slick, greasy. Fortunately, the hotel where we stopped had fresh water showers just off the beach.

  Yesterday we spent the day at Port Said, Egypt, at the northern entrance to the Suez Canal. The city dates to 1869 when the canal was built. At the entrance there is a huge pedestal, but no statue. Our guide said it was a statue of Ferdinand de Lesseps, builder of the canal, and was taken down at the time of the British-French invasion of Egypt in 1956. But he said the 21 ft. high bronze statue is in storage and there is a movement to put it back on the pedestal as part of Egyptian history, whether he was French or not. He said the canal brings $1 million per day into Egypt.

  Tomorrow we will be in Haifa in northern Israel and Betty and I will tour the Golan Heights, an area taken from Syria by Israel in the several wars Israel and its Arab neighbors have fought.