Date: 2017-03-23
To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: scattered clouds

There are plenty of reasons why the Israel Trail ought to appear on any long-distance hiker's bucket list. There's the stark beauty of the Negev desert, there's the chance to walk amid historic sites such as the plain where David defeated Goliath, and there's the chance to become enveloped in the unique Jewish culture of Israel. One of the explanations I commonly used during this hike was that everyone knows the Israel of the media headlines and I wanted to see the complicated but nuanced version of Israel that existed beyond that, through encountering the country at walking pace and by meeting ordinary Israelis. The comment usually went down well, because Israelis often feel perplexed about being misunderstood by much of the rest of the world.But the bit about the "Israel of the headlines" was more than just a bit of wordplay. As a journalist who'd worked in the Middle East for the past eight years, I'd written more than my share of those headlines. But I'd never been there, and along with all the hiking reasons to visit, I wanted to understand why Israelis make the decisions they do. As I also told some of those I met, Israelis make different decisions compared to people elsewhere but that cannot be disentangled from the fact that their back-story is also different to every else's. What I was really wanted to do on this hike was to walk a metaphorical mile in Israelis' shoes by walking more than 600 literal miles from the Red Sea to the border with Lebanon and Syria.I'd written this journal during my time in Israel but only began publishing it after my departure because, as anyone will soon discover if they delve deeper into my full INT journal from the link to the left, I'm no great fan of current Israeli policy and voicing what I was thinking on any particular day might not have been consistent with being permitted to remain in the country.I suspect the majority of you who have no interest in such political and cultural considerations -- or who believe Israel can do no wrong -- will be better served by either just looking at the photos or being prepared to skim over large sections of the text.My INT journal also includes some ancillary walking in Palestine afterwards. I'd had a vague plan to get the other side of the story by hiking the full 800km length of the separation barrier that envelops the West Bank but after doing about 50km of that, I abandoned the plan as too messy. Where there was the concrete barrier, the Palestinians built right up to and sometimes onto it, which made walking near it difficult. Most of the barrier is made up of a razor-wire fence, but trying to walk near that often led to me being chased off by IDF soldiers or the police.So instead I visited the main cities of the West Bank, attended some Friday protests, and hiked along what's known as Apartheid Street in Hebron, where IDF soldiers direct Jews and western tourists to walk on one side of the road and Muslims are forced to walk on the other, amid garbage and other debris. Whoever is in charge of teaching history in Israel doesn't seem to be doing a very good job.I also did a section of the Masar al Ibrahim (the Path of Abraham), the relatively newly-created Palestinian counterpart to the Israel Trail.I emerged from two and a half months in Israel depressed by the diminishing prospects of a peaceful outcome but with the more nuanced perspective I'd sought. I'd also been shocked, humbled, surprised and challenged in a way like no other countries I've ever been to before. I'd been showered with hospitality from all sides ... well, maybe not the IDF.