Jordan Valley, Khalet Makhul - Accompanying shepherds

We accompanied Yosef at Khalet Makhul on a bright and pleasant day which came after the rains and the cold. Nature is at its last good days.  Just a few heat-waves soon and all this beauty will turn a prickly yellow-brown.

Since the West Bank’s schools are on semester break, the children are at home, and some have joined us for the grazing.

The shepherding passed peacefully. We found Ashraf's lamb, born three days ago,  which had survived in the field. The newborn lamb was thirsty but alive. We walked in an area where there is no danger of encounters with settlers.

These days the grazing is extended until the afternoon. The flock remained in the field and Yosef's eldest son came to replace our crew.

Later in the day we held a violin concert in Khalet Makhul for the Barhan family.  Avner, who came with a violin and was happy to share his talent with the locals.  He amazed us all by playing Fairuz on a violin that sounded otherworldly in the dark tent setting.  We all sat enchanted with a smile of happiness on our faces and listened with wonder.

We tried the same thing on the Ashraf family, but the parents there were busy preparing for milking and the children were more interested in the violin’s case than in the sounds it produces.

This is how it is when going out to the pasture. You think donkeys and discover gold.

And we are at the onset of riots in the territories that no one knows where they will lead. Three deaths have already been announced in Jenin.

On the night of Wednesday, March 30, in the area of ​​the Hamra checkpoint, there was an attack by settlers on Palestinian cars.  The cell phones are full of cacophonous videos with honking cars and there is no telling how it ends, because we are not informed of such disturbances in our Putinesque media.