Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The main city of the central Negev is Beer Sheba, an important industrial center and the
home of Ben-Gurion University, founded in 1965, Israel's fastest-growing institution of higher
education.
At the southern tip of the Negev is the fourth subregion: the granite Eilat Mountains and
the town of Eilat. Eilat is both a port and a tourist destination for Israelis and Europeans, es-
pecially given its warm temperatures throughout the winter months. It offers snorkeling and
skin diving, an aquarium, and a submarine ride utilizing the beaches or adjacent waters with
their rich coral reefs and sea life.
David Ben-Gurion was an advocate of settling the Negev. After his retirement as prime
minister, he lived on Sde Boker, a kibbutz there, where he worked as a laborer until his death;
he was buried on the grounds. Nevertheless, the Negev remains only very lightly populated,
holding only 8 percent of Israel's population. About 85 percent of the land belongs to the state;
the IDF uses much of it for training and bases. The Negev is also the site of experimental ag-
riculture and enterprises such as fi sh farming, although the Negev's potential is still far from
realized.
CLIMATE
Israel's climate can vary widely from geographical area to geographical area. Forested high-
lands, lush green valleys, barren mountains, stony deserts, long beaches, and a fertile coastal
plain, each with its own micro-climate, may be found within a short distance of one another.
In general, though, there are two main seasons: a mild winter and a long, hot summer. South-
ern Israel is subtropical, albeit much affected by aridity; northern Israel is in the eastern Medi-
terranean temperate zone.
The temperate zone has generally moderate temperatures and suffi cient rainfall— though
unreliable and varying greatly each year — for agriculture and concentrated human settlement.
The average annual rainfall is around 19 to 27 inches (about 50 to 70 centimeters). Summer
temperatures range between 71 and 86 degrees Fahrenheit (22 and 30 degrees Celsius). High
humidity, which may reach 70 percent on the coastal plain, raises perceptions of temperature
fi ve to ten degrees, somewhat less inland.
Israel's winter season is short and usually lasts from December to March, when tempera-
tures remain moderate, though colder in the hill country. Jerusalem occasionally sees light
snow. The lowest winter temperatures range from 35 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius)
in the mountainous north to 50 degrees Fahrenheit (10 degrees Celsius) in the coastal plain.
Around 65 percent of the country's annual rainfall comes in December, January, and February,
mainly in the north.
One unusual feature of Israel's climate is the
sharav
, a hot, dry summer wind. Israel's weather
usually comes from the west, but during a sharav, the wind blows in from the Arabian Desert
to the east. Barometric pressure rises, humidity plummets, and sand and dust damage crops
and make people dehydrated and irritable.
Israel's semiarid climate zone, a small area between the temperate north and the subtropical
desert in the south, includes the northern Negev and the town of Kiryat Gat, as well as the Gaza
