Trees

What is the connection between Zionism and planting trees in Israel?

Trees have repeatedly been destroyed by war, fires, and other causes, but we have always planted again as an expression of Jewish resilience and rebuilding.

|ByMOSHE TARAGIN
‘MAN IS like the tree of the field.’
Ayalon Canada Park after the fire.

Ancient olive trees damaged in wildfires given new life, rehabilitated into bonsai trees

The rehabilitated trees will eventually be displayed to the public at the Jerusalem Botanical Gardens in Givat Ram and at KKL-JNF's Eshtaol Nursery.

|ByJERUSALEM POST STAFF
Plan of forest to be planted in Mendoza, Argentina by Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael-Jewish National Fund in memory of those murdered at the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023.

KKL-JNF to plant forest in Argentina in memory of those murdered at Nova music festival

Tree planting has already begun near the city, and the site, which will also include a memorial for the victims, is expected to be inaugurated in October 2026.

|ByRAMI SHANI
Excavations of Raknehaugen, Norway, in 1939.

Scandinavia's largest prehistoric mound is not a tomb, but a memorial to a natural disaster - study

Archaeological excavations that have taken place at Raknehaugen, have all failed to discover evidence that would typically indicate a burial mound, such as a grave or human remains.

|ByMIRIAM SELA-EITAM

Tu Bishvat, the New Year for trees: What is it and how is it celebrated?

Tu Bishvat, known as the New Year for the tree, will be marked this year from Sunday evening until Monday evening.

JANUARY 16, 2022ByJERUSALEM POST STAFF
Israeli kids plant trees for the Jewish holiday of Tu Bishvat in Haifa on February 9, 2017. Tu Bishvat is also called literally "New Year of the Trees." In contemporary Israel the day is celebrated as an ecological awareness day and trees are planted in celebration.

Tu Bishvat invites appreciation of trees and greenery in Israel - opinion

Jews who lived in the Old World often encountered constant gloom, never seeing green trees or even the sunlight.

JANUARY 15, 2022ByRAYMOND APPLE
A KEREN KAYEMETH LeIsrael-Jewish National Fund tree-planting takes place in the Binyamin region on Tu Bishvat.

In honor of Tu Bishvat, new tree bill submitted to Knesset

MK Alon Tal: "Time to plant a new law – the best birthday present we can give the country’s forests and those that will yet be planted."

JANUARY 14, 2022ByGIL HOFFMAN
Palm trees grow at an R&D station in Israel's Arava region

How tree plantings almost toppled a coalition

POLITICAL AFFAIRS: The Likud managed to sow the seeds of rebellion in Bennett’s government.

JANUARY 14, 2022ByGIL HOFFMAN
POLICE OFFICERS detain a Bedouin man who was protesting tree planting by KKL-JNF outside the village of al-Atrash in the Negev, Wednesday.

How planting a tree in Israel became controversial

Increasingly, the JNF’s signature program has drawn vocal critics.

JANUARY 14, 2022ByCNAAN LIPHSHIZ/JTA
PEOPLE PLANT trees at the Oz Vegaon nature preserve in Gush Etzion on the eve of Tu Bishvat last year.

Pandemic thoughts on Tu Bishvat - opinion

Nature, the Holiday of Trees' romantic hero, is the villain with which civilization is now at war.

JANUARY 13, 2022ByAMOTZ ASA-EL
Cranes fly amid blooming almond trees in an orchard near the northern town of Kiryat Shmona. On Tu Bishvat we will, like the Psalmist, praise ‘the birds of the sky’ that ‘sing among the foliage.’

Negev crisis: Seeing the forest for the trees - editorial

On the one hand, Israel has every right to exert its sovereignty within its territory. On the other, Bedouins see the tree-planting on land they use for farming as part of a campaign to expel them.

JANUARY 13, 2022ByJPOST EDITORIAL
Bedouin women gesture as they stand by an Israeli policeman during a protest against forestation at the Negev desert village of Sawe al-Atrash, southern Israel

Tu Bishvat: Planting trees in Israel

This story is dedicated, on his first Yahrzeit, to the great collector Ezra Goredesky z”l, a friend for 40 years.

JANUARY 13, 2022ByDAVID GEFFEN
SEASONAL DRAWING, Ze’ev Raban, ‘Moadim.’

Tu Bishvat: There's Jewish tradition in trees

According to Jewish mystic tradition, Tu Bishvat is the day when God renews sustenance and the life cycle of trees (when the sap starts to rise).

JANUARY 13, 2022ByDVORA WAYSMAN
MANY PIOUS Jews hold a Tu Bishvat Seder, an ancient tradition upheld in Safed. Pictured: Seder in Meron, last January.

An update on Methuselah, Israel's palm tree from a 2,000-year-old seed

Methuselah remains in his permanent home in the Arava Institute research park on Kibbutz Ketura.

JANUARY 13, 2022BySYBIL KAPLAN
A picture of Methuselah taken on November 28, 2021.