English

Hadassah Mission
Geopolitical Israel
A Tour With More Questions than Answers
Led by Barbara " BG" Goldstein
& Carol Rosenthal
March 6 - 17, 2017

Tour Rates & Dates:

There are no Departure Dates available for this Package.
*Please note that all rates displayed are based on standard room double occupancy.
All rates above are in US Dollars, and are based on full payment by credit card unless otherwise noted.
If check payment discount is available for this tour, it can be selected after clicking "BOOK" above.
(Deposit can still be paid by credit card). Upgraded room categories may be available to book later in the booking process.
If Land & Air price is displayed, the air portion includes tax and fuel surcharges, which are subject to change until ticketed.

Tour Overview:

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This Amazing Mission Includes:

7 nights Mount Zion Hotel, Jerusalem, Israel
1 night Kibbutz Kfar Blum, Galilee, Israel
1 night plus late check out Crowne Plaza, Tel Aviv, Israel
All touring and sightseeing per an agreed upon itinerary in a deluxe
air-conditioned vehicle with an English speaking guide in Amsterdam & Israel
Breakfast daily
Welcome dinner at a restaurant in Jerusalem
Dinner with Gil Hoffman in Jerusalem
Lunch with Hadassah hospital staff
Dinner at Abu Gosh
Shabbat of a Lifetime dinner & hospitality
Shabbat lunch
Salad trail picnic lunch in Eshkol
Lunch at Psagot Winery
Dinner at Kibbutz
Lunch at Meir Shfeya Youth Village
Farewell dinner in Tel Aviv
Group transfers and airport assistance upon arrival and departure
Entrance fees, speakers as per itinerary
Porterage

These prices do not include:

Roundtrip airfare, departure taxes and fuel surcharges 
(listed separately)
Travel Insurance
(Highly recommended)
Tips to guide, driver, hostess and all staff on tour not including room staff at hotels
($20.00 per person, per day-pre-collected) 
Items of a personal nature

Tour Itinerary:

Day 1, Monday, March 6, 2017: Departure

• Depart JFK on our overnight flight to Israel

Day 2, Tuesday, March 7, 2017: Arrival in Israel “The Quiet Before the Storm”

• Early afternoon arrival at Ben Gurion Airport, with assistance by an Ayelet representative - Welcome Home!
• Transfer to Jerusalem.
• Stop at Neot Kedumim Biblical Landscape Reserve, where we plant a tree, connecting us physically as well as spiritually with the land of Israel. From the outlook we will view the size of Israel and see part of the outline for next week: to the east there is Jerusalem, and to the west is the Mediterranean.
• Sh'hekiyanu from Har Adar and a unique view point of Jerusalem and the surroundings.
• Check-in to our hotel.
• Welcome dinner and orientation with speaker Rachel Korazim: “My Israel from the Shoah to Israel today, in Faith and Text.”

O/N Jerusalem

Day 3, Wednesday, March 8, 2017: Jerusalem through the Obama - Netanyahu Prism

• Breakfast at our hotel.
• Explore the interplay between demographic, security and historical issues with the backdrop of the Jerusalem hills. A guided geopolitical tour through Jerusalem.
• Introduction: Drive to the top of the Mount of Olives for an introduction to the landscape of Jerusalem, followed by a view of the Arab - Jewish weave, while overlooking the Holy Basin, focusing on some of the solutions suggested:
     o Beilin - Abu Mazen
     o Camp David 2000
     o Taba Agreements
     o Shared Sovereignty
     o Boroughs - Functional Sovereignty
     o The Olmert Proposals
     o The Geneva Proposals
• Stop at Hadassah founder Henrietta Szold's grave on the Mt. of Olives.
• Defining the Line on the Outskirts of Jerusalem: Drive to Mount Scopus for a look toward Maaleh Adumim to the East and the Shuafat Refugee Camp to the North.
• Compromising Individual Rights to Ensure National Rights…Shiekh Jarrah - A Unique Quagmire: Visit the Shimon HaZadik compound in the Shiekh Jarrah neighborhood. Here we delve into the ongoing conflict over post 1948 land ownership and rights in this neighborhood on the Arab-Jewish Seam Line in Jerusalem, and its ramifications on the Peace Process.
• Lunch on own in Ramat Eshkol.
• From a Small Far Flung Collection of Buildings to a Neighborhood in Central Jerusalem: Guided drive through the neighborhood of Ramat Eshkol, the first Jewish neighborhood built over the Green Line in Jerusalem.
• The Large Jerusalem Ring Neighborhoods: Visit Ramat Shlomo - Reches Shuafat, the Ultraorthodox neighborhood located next to the Arab neighborhood of Shuafat, followed by an overlook into Ramot, one of Jerusalem's largest neighborhoods. (Ramat Shlomo was the focal point of US-Israeli tensions when building plans were announced during Vice President Biden's visit in 2010).
• Roads and Neighborhoods: A concluding drive along part of Jerusalem's new road network, which connects and divides Jewish and Arab neighborhoods.
• Dinner with Gil Hoffman, Chief political correspondent of the Jerusalem Post to discuss Israeli politics today.

O/N Jerusalem

Day 4, Thursday, March 9, 2017: Hospital and Politics

• Breakfast at hotel.
• Visit the Knesset and meet with representatives of number of political parties for a panel discussion on the Coalition today.
• Continue with a visit to Ein Karem Hadassah Hospital, where we tour the newly opened Sarah Wetsman Tower, featuring the most modern hospital facilities in the region. Tour the underground operating theaters, the emergency treatment area and the Synagogue.
• Lunch at the hospital with staff, where we see that the politics stop at the entrance to the hospital: all people are working and are treated with no regard to differences of sex, religion, or nationality.
• Afternoon visit to a MP (Military Police) unit securing Jerusalem from all: terror, crime, interreligious outbreaks etc.
• Visit the Fuchsberg Center for Conservative Judaism campus, and meet with representatives of the Masorti/Conservative movement in Israel. We'll discuss “Israel and the Diaspora” in general and the US specifically.
• Dinner tonight at Abu Gosh followed by a bus tour of the ultra-religious neighborhood of Mea Shearim.

O/N Jerusalem

Day 5, Friday, March 10, 2017: Shoah to Shabbat

• Breakfast at our hotel.
• Visit the Yad Vashem complex, the Jewish National Memorial to the six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust. Visit the Children's Memorial and walk the Path of the Righteous among the Nations.
• Meet with a survivor followed with a group debate: Seventy years later - did we make the survivors proud in Israel and the Diaspora?
• End the visit with a group memorial service at the Valley of the Lost Communities.
• Walking tour around the market neighborhoods: From the different Hasidic dynasties to the modern rebuilding of the neighborhood. End in the Machane Yehuda Market for lunch on own, and some time to shop before Shabbat.
• Free afternoon.
• We join together at the Western Wall for some reflection as Shabbat arrives; within minutes you will hear the siren of Shabbat sounding, the bells of the churches and the Muezzin calling the Muslims for prayer. This is Jerusalem!
• Meet our hosts for Oneg Shabbat and home hospitality dinner - “Shabbat of a Lifetime”

O/N Jerusalem

Day 6, Saturday, March 11, 2017: Shabbat Shalom!

• Breakfast at our hotel.
• Free morning for Shabbat services at one of the nearby synagogues; list and maps will be available.
OR
• Join our guide to visit a number of typical synagogues in the area.
• Lunch at our hotel, with an open discussion on all that we have seen until this point, as well as preparations for next week.
• Havdalah at Montefiores Windmill overlooking Jerusalem.
• Drive to Modi'in and join with Reform Congregation, Yozma in celebrating Purim tonight. Take part in the Megila reading.

O/N Jerusalem

Day 7, Sunday, March 12, 2017: Eshkol and Beer Sheva on the Gaza Border

• Breakfast at our hotel.
• This morning we drive south to the Eshkol region, a region bordering Gaza; visit the Regional Center at the Command Center for a security briefing.
• Visit the Elementary school, an amazing fortified campus and educational center including the opportunity to celebrate Purim with the kids.
• Drive along the border and see where and how close the Hamas tunnels were found; hear a briefing about Hamas and the current situation.
• Enjoy a picic lunch at the “Salad Trail” in the Eshkol region on the border with Gaza. See how Israeli innovation is literally making the desert bloom - with crops grown out of some of the most inhospitable sands imaginable.
• Visit Nachal Oz - one of the kibbutzim that was hosted in Neurim during Tzuk Eitan in the Summer of 2015.
• Visit the JNF/Hadassah project of a park in the desert in Beer Sheva.
• We enjoy a bus tour of the Cyber Center and visit one of the up & coming companies within the center.
• Meet the Mayor of Beer Sheva, who is transforming the city to be a global cyber center.
• Return to Jerusalem and visit the Western Wall to hear the Megila reading in many Minyanim and Nigunim.
• Dinner on own.

O/N Jerusalem

Day 8, Monday, March 13, 2017: The Shomron to Ramallah

• Breakfast at our hotel.
• Israelis and Palestinians: When Reality and Fiction Meet, with Palestinian Affairs journalist Avi Issacharov, who also wrote and produced the highly acclaimed Israeli TV production of Fauda, a geo political thriller about Israelis and Palestinians.
• Depart for Rawabi, the new Palestinian city north of Ramallah, for a glimpse at this unique project: a synthesis between private enterprise and public resources to create a new urban reality in Palestinian society. Meet with developer Bashar el Masri.
• Lunch at the Psagot Winery.
• My Home in Judea and Samaria - I am Here to Stay. Visit Psagot, a flagship Gush Emunim Settlement, for an understanding of the origins of Jewish settlements in the West Bank/Judea & Samaria, while overlooking the Palestinian cities of Ramallah and El Birah.
• Visit the current capital of the Palestinian Authority, Ramallah. Meet with PA leaders and/or financial leaders.
• Close out the day at the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem, and meet with those who run Israel's foreign policy.

O/N Jerusalem

Day 9, Tuesday, March 14, 2017: The Eastern Border

• Breakfast at our hotel.
• Drive to the Jordan Valley.
• Stop at Qasr el Yahud, for an introduction to the Israeli-Jordanian border, at the site where many Christians say Jesus was baptized, and some Jews say that Joshua crossed the Jordan River.
• Stop at Kibbutz HaOn, on the shores of the Sea of Galilee for The Geopolitics of Water, with Dr. Doron Markell, head of the Kinneret monitoring and management department at the Israel Water Authority. This is an introduction to the major role water plays in the relationship between Israel and each of the neighboring countries as well as the Palestinians, followed by lunch.
• Ascend Tel a Saki on the Golan Heights for a view into Syria and the junction of the Syrian, Jordanian and Israeli borders. We receive an up to date briefing about ISIS and Jabat el Nusrah.
• Take an amazing Jeep tour on the border with Syria in the North of the Golan.
• Meet with a Druze representative at their village on the border. Learn about the connection with their families across the fence. We discuss the idea of national loyalties for their community.
• Relax with a visit to a nearby winery, including wine tasting.
• Dinner at our kibbutz, where we meet with the General Manger, a former Young Judaean.

O/N in Kfar Blum Kibbutz 

Day 10, Wednesday, March 15, 2017: The Mediterranean Coast

• Breakfast at our kibbutz.
• Drive along the Lebanese border, with views into Lebanon, stopping at Kibbutz Malkia, a strategic overlook. Here we will meet with the IDF unit on the border and kibbutz security personnel to learn about the steps they take to protect a small frontier community.
• Visit Hadassah's Meir Shfeya Youth Village, where we interact with the kids and staff and enjoy lunch with them.
• Visit Zichron Yaakov - stroll the streets, browse through the shops & cafes of this charming European style village. We'll also visit the Nili Spy Museum in town.
• We are joined this afternoon by Colonel (Res.) Miri Eisin, a former International Media Advisor to the Prime Minister of Israel and a former Israeli government spokesperson. Together we drive along Route 6, the main highway north to south along the security fence, past some of the largest cities of Israeli Arabs.
• Check into our hotel.
• Free evening for dinner on own.

O/N Tel Aviv

Day 11, Thursday, March 16, 2017: Innovation Central

• Breakfast at our hotel.
• Visit to the Intelligence Museum in Herzliya and get a briefing on what are Israel's threats in the foreseeable future, and how we plan to cope with them.
• Continue to the city center to visit the Space for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. This library provides a shared-working space and hub facilities for teams dedicated to developing internet startups and technology companies. In addition, the library offers networking events, meet-ups, and professional infrastructure for young entrepreneurial visionaries. We will tour the sight and meet with some of these entrepreneurs - what a bright future is seen for us.
• Free time to relax and shop on Rothschild Boulevard.
• We join together for a relaxing cocktail and the chance to review all we have seen & experienced together.
• Farewell dinner at a local restaurant.
• Depart to Ben Gurion airport for our overnight flight home

Day 12, Friday, March 17, 2017: Land in the US

• We arrive back home

THE MEMORIES LAST FOREVER!!!

*Itinerary subject to change