Hiking in Israel: Overlooking Jericho

I had never heard of the Dok Fortress until a few weeks ago. Dok (the name used in the Book of Maccabees, while Josephus called it Dagon) was the first Hasmonean fortress. According to tradition, Dok is where Simeon, the last of the Maccabean brothers, together with his wife and two sons, was murdered in 135 BCE by his son-in-law.

Centuries later, a Byzantine church was built inside the fortress, and much later, a medieval church. Nothing remains of that church except for an outline of its stone walls, and nothing at all remains of the fortress itself.

I joined a group including Ami, a good friend, for the hike. We travelled in a convoy of some 20 cars through a Border Police training base (everything we did was with IDF permission) and then several kilometers further into the desert. Finally, we parked and set off on foot for about 2 kilometers before climbing to a lookout point where we could see Dok. Then we made our way up to the fortress itself for an amazing view over the Palestinian city of Jericho – a very green oasis just north of the Dead Sea.

Coming down the mountain I was in for some unexpected surprises. First was seeing the Monastery of the Temptation built precariously on the opposite cliff walls. The temptation mentioned refers to Jesus spending forty days and forty nights fasting and meditating and fighting off the call of Satan. Qurantal, another name for the mountain, can be translated as 40, referring to those days and nights.

As we continued our descent, we reached a network of caves called ‘ma’arat ha’meraglim’ – Cave of the Spies. This is where traditionally Rahab from Jericho hid the two men sent to scout out the land before the arrival of the Israelites in the Book of Joshua. We walked through the caves including one where bats flew noisily over our heads.

We reached the bottom of the mountain and then followed the rocky path up a wadi until we reached the road where we had parked our cars.

Quite an amazing hike through unfamiliar territory, with many sites connected to Israel’s Biblical past.