Nir Topper

The Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee, the two most iconic bodies of water in the Israeli landscape, are actually the remnants of a much larger lake that once covered vast parts of our region: Lake Lisan. Lake Lisan existed along the Jordan Rift Valley from approximately 70,000 to 14,000 years ago. At its peak, around 26,000 years ago, the lake stretched continuously for about 230 kilometers (143 miles) — from the Sea of Galilee region in the north to the Hazeva area in the Arava valley in the...

The Tethys Ocean was a vast, ancient ocean that spanned across the Earth's ancient continents for hundreds of millions of years. Its name is derived from Greek mythology, where Tethys was one of the Titans—an ancient and powerful race of gods who ruled the world before the Olympian gods (such as Zeus). Tethys herself was the Titan goddess of the primal font of fresh water, the sister and wife of Oceanus, and the mother of the numerous river and spring gods. The choice of this name hints at...

Emek Refaim ("Valley of Rephaim") is today the name of one of the central and most well-known streets in Jerusalem, running through the heart of the German Colony, but its origin is ancient and deep. The name is mentioned already in the Bible as a geographical valley serving as a reference point in describing the borders of the inheritance of the Tribe of Judah: "...which is at the end of the Valley of Rephaim northward" (Joshua 15:8), and also as a battleground where King David defeated the...