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TORAT HAMIZRACHI

Rabbi Doron Perez

CHERRY TOMATO

CHAMPIONS

The Love of a Land for a People

he story of the regeneration of About 70 years later, in 1939, the record that has been written in the
the Land of Israel – its soil and Lowdermilk would arrive in Palestine land know that this state of decadence
Tshrubs, plants and trees, flora on a mission to search for similar soil is not normal… Rural Palestine is
and fruits, is one of the greatest stories and climates to the California Dust becoming less and less like Trans-
of human accomplishment. An ecolog- Bowl he was aiming to develop. He Jordan, Syria and Iraq and more like
ical marvel, unrivaled in the annals of was shaken by what he saw – both by Denmark, Holland and parts of the
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recorded history. the desolation of the land and soil but United States.”
Two great American Lowdermilk was
gentiles attest to this so deeply impacted
fact; the renowned that he and his wife
author, Mark Twain, eventually settled in
and soil conservation Israel in the 1950s. His
expert, Walter Clay world-class knowledge
Lowdermilk. in the science of
soil gave him a
In 1867, 11 years unique appreciation
before the first for the extent of
modern agricultural this miraculous
settlement in transformation and
Palestine was a desire to use his
attempted – Petach expertise to contribute
to it. He would be a
Tikva – Twain visited proactive part of the
the land for the first team that built Israel’s
time and was deeply national water carrier
shaken by the great and has a department
desolation. named after him at the
Walter Clay Lowdermilk Mark Twain Technion in Haifa. A
“There was hardly
a tree or shrub anywhere. Even equally by the remarkable regeneration true lover of Zion.
the olive and the cactus, those fast begun by the Jewish pioneers of He felt so moved by the Israel
friends of a worthless soil, had almost Palestine who he notes had little or no phenomenon that he opined: “If we
deserted the country. No landscape background in agriculture. were interested in the regeneration
exists that is more tiresome to the He attests: “When Jewish colonists of Man, let all the righteous forces
eye than that which bounds the first began their work in 1882... the on earth support these settlements
approaches to Jerusalem. The only soil was eroded to bedrock over fully in Palestine as a wholesome example
difference between the roads and the one-half of the hills – streams across for the backward Near East, and
surrounding country, perhaps, is that the coastal plain would choke with indeed for all who seek to work out a
there are more rocks on the roads than erosional debris from the hills to form permanent adjustment of people to
in the surrounding country. Palestine pestilential marshes infested with their lands.”
is desolate and unlovely. dreaded malaria... Those who can read Continued on page 4
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