Sinai Tourists Ride Buses Where Hebrews Once Wandered

Note: Due to the physical difficulties
involved in touring Sinai and because
of the.oriootive conditions experi-

mired on such a tour. this tour has
not yet received the official approval
of the Israel Ministry of Tourism.

By LARRY GETT
SINAI PENINSULA — The Sinai
desert played an important role in
the history of the people of Israel.
But, unp two years ago, content
porary Jews were not able to visit
the area from which they drew
their moral strength: the region
where Moses received the Ten
Commandments.
Following the events of June
1967, the situation changed and
Sinai became suddenly accessible
to the people of Israel. At that
point, Israelis and visitors from
abroad began to swarm over the
landscape, rediscovering the bar-
ren land where the will of a nation
was formed. Between June 1967
and today, over 700,000 persons
have visited Sinai.
Some take the method of explor-
ing the land from the comfort of
an airplane which circles the key
points, such as Mt. Sinai and
Sharm-el-Sheik. Others go by Land
Rover or Jeep, following the rock-
strewn dry river beds which the
Arabs call wadis.
By far the most popular meth-
od is a combination of land and
air, and lately by land and sea.
The trip I took was the three-way
combination. I urge it only on
those who are willing to endure
bone-jolting rides over harsh des-
ert, wind-driven sand that covers
you with a crust of grit, and
accommodations only a

few cuts above the type the Is- , 'The "Hey Daroma" is a brave. Here we shared the oasis as monastery in the world , it has an
library of illuminated marl-
raelis suffered thousands of years little velisel, but any similarity he- guests of the 3.000 Bedouin who use ancient
tween it and a luxury ship is pure- the water source. We ate box 'uscripts and a history rich in tra-
ago.
Today the trip begins in Tel Aviv, ly coincidental. lunches and enjoyed Bedouin-brew- dition.
The ship is met in "Sharem, • as ed Turkish coffee. According to tra-! Despite the hard clay spent in
where an air-conditioned touring
bus is boarded for the first phase. it is familiarly called by the Is- dition, one of the tribes of the area. •reaching the monastery, everyone
This ride from Tel Aviv to Eilat is raelis, by a bus specially geared the Tarhin, are descendants of was up at 3:30 a.m, to begin the
2-hour climb to the 6,700-foot
through the Negev desert, austere for desert travel. The bus travels Romanians brought here hundreds 2 1
by most judgments, but tame when along the highway to Ras Nasrani of years ago to serve the monks of summit of the mountain. I stood on
compared to the desert areas soon and on to Ras Mohammed where St. Catherine's Monastery. We Mt. Sinai. And I prayed.
the Gulf of Eilat, the Red Sea and reached that monastery by sunset. That . night we spent at Abu
to be met.
Rudeis.. Once a colony for Italian
At the southernmost part of the the Gulf of Suez merge.
The reason for St. Catherine's oil workers, it now held contem-
The next stop is A-Tor on the
Negev is the resort port city of
the
same
as
porary
desert wanderers such as
.
Gulf
of
Suez.
Barracks-like
build-
placement
in
Sinai
is
Eilat. Here a ferry of Scottish an-
the one which prompted
m
most of us
censtry, now named the "Hey Da- ings here once accommodated up to undertake the tour. This is the we. The clean cots, hot showers
and
warm
food there looked to us
roma" (which can be loosely trans- to 20,000 pilgrims returning from
Mt. Sinai, the place most accepted like the pinnacle of luxury. Though
lated as "Southward Ho!"), be- Mecca. Then through Wadi Firan, , as the site of the giving of the Ten in retrospect the facilites were
comes the second link in the four- a place of hills and mountains
Commandments. primitive, I don't think at that time
day journey. The voyage down the changing color with the changing
St. Catherine is a story in itself. anyone could have - convinced me
Gulf of Eilat to Sharm-el-Sheik angle of the desert sun. The real
takes seven hours, and although the break came at the oasis of Neve The oldest continuously inhabited there was a better life.
schedule may vary, generally the Firan approximately two hours
'Friday, September 19, 1969 - 31
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
first night is 'spent aboard ship. later.

E11111111111111M111111111111111181111I111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111101111111111M11111111111111111111111101111111111111111I11111111111111111M111111111H1111 11111111111111111111111111111111 I 0111111111111M111111H11111111111111111111111111111U1110111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

I

I

Israel 'Aliya'

HAIM SCIIACHTER
The establishment of an "Aliya
movement" was resolved by the
27th Zionist Congress. People join-
ing this movement pledge them-
selves to undertake aliya within
a period of three years. At the
time of writing, the 108 aliya cir-
cles in 10 countries, notably the
United tates, France and Britain,
have a emb.ership of over 10,000.
As w sum up aliya and absorp-
tion ov r a period of 20 years un-
til the end of 1968, it transpires
that of the 1,316,327 immigrants
arriving to the country, a quarter
of a million have been absorbed
in 25 new development towns;
200,000 housing units had been sup-
plied to new immigrants; 100,000
children and young people had
been educated and brought up in
institutions run by the Youth Aliya
Department of the Jewish Agency;
407 new agricultural villages had
been founded and 75 existing set-
tlements had been expanded and
developed; 139,000 people had been
absorbed in agriculture and 94,000
immigrants had been put through
their paces in Hebrew in ulpanim
established and run by the Jewish
Agency.
What are the prospects of aliya
in the near future? Deputy Prime
Minister and Minister of Absorp-
tion Yigal Allon reported to a
meeting of the cabinet that in the
first half of 1969, 16,214 immigrants
had arrived in the country as
compared to 11,433 in'the corres-
ponding period in 1968. There had
been a 177 per cent rise in the
number of immigrants from Eu-
rope; a 44.6 per cent rise in the
number of arrivals from North
America and a 38.3 per cent rise
in the number of arrivals from
Latin America. The percentage of
arrivals from Asia and Africa had
dropped, 35 per cent of the immi-
grants were under the age of 19;
another 35 per cent were between
20-39; only 5 per cent were over
the age of 60; over 5,000 of the
new arrivals were skilled workers
and 1,370 among them, members
of liberal and academic profes-
sions.
Louis A. Pincus, chairman of
the Jewish Agency and head of its
Aliya department, forecast an im-
migration of 50,000 per annum in
the coming years, of whom more
than 25,000 a year would be ar-
riving from the United States.

is

==-7

7-7-4

.0_

on its 20th Birthday

from the staff

of

The Jewish News

17100 W. 7 Mile Rd.

Detroit, Mich. 48235

2

Phone (313) VE 8-9364

ammmummummonuouriniuommimumimmoutinnimmommimumpummunitumenimmonimmummunommin immormmumommmommoiliiimutumnionnimiiiumninimmimmimunnummiimmt

IIIIIMIIIMM11111111111111111111111111111111111

