Education

The Museum of Islamic Art in Jerusalem offers a focused introduction to Islamic art, culture, science, and craftsmanship across many regions and centuries. Its collection includes ceramics, metalwork, textiles, jewellery, manuscripts, weapons, and scientific instruments. The museum also holds the rare collection of clocks assembled by Sir David Salomons, including works associated with the French royal clockmaker Abraham-Louis Breguet. The story told through the collection is one of exchange rather than separation, with artistic styles, scientific ideas, materials, and skilled craftspeople moving across the Islamic world and between East and West.

The Hebrew University’s Mount Scopus campus looks across the Old City, the Judean Desert, and the hills beyond Jerusalem. Its setting makes it a strong place to explore a side of the city that is often missed by first-time visitors. A walk can include the history of the university, its architecture, academic life, and the story of Mount Scopus itself. The area played an important role in the development of modern Jerusalem, from the early Zionist period through the years when the campus stood as an isolated Israeli enclave between 1948 and 1967. The campus reflects the ambition to build a centre of learning in Jerusalem, but also the reality that education, politics, war, separation, and reunion became part of its story.

The Eretz Israel Museum, also known as MUZA, looks at the material culture of the Land of Israel through archaeology, crafts, design, coins, ceramics, and everyday objects. It is a museum for curious visitors who want to see how people made, traded, built, and lived in this part of the world. A guided visit can focus on ancient technology, local crafts, the history of Tel Qasile on the museum grounds, or changing ideas of Israeli culture and design. The story here is told through the things people made and used, showing how daily life, craft, technology, and beauty can reveal as much about a society as its kings and battles.

Travel south with Eli Romanovsky to explore the Negev through the people who chose to build their lives there. The desert was central to David Ben-Gurion’s vision for Israel. He believed its future would be shaped by the ability to live, farm, and create communities in the Negev. This tour follows that idea through early kibbutzim, desert farms, and the wide open landscape around Sde Boker. Visit Kibbutz Revivim, one of the communities founded in the 1940s under difficult desert conditions. Continue south to Sde Boker, where Ben-Gurion chose to make his home after leaving public office. Visit his desert home and his grave overlooking the Zin Valley. The route can include a local farm or winery, a walk near Avdat Creek, and a stop connected with the Nabataean Incense Route. The day can end in Mitzpe Ramon, making it a natural beginning to a longer Negev stay. This private journey combines Israel’s modern story, desert life, and the landscapes that continue to shape both.