Has it ever snowed in Israel in the summer?

Two people have reported snow in the month of Sivan (late May-early June), though in both cases, it was hearsay.

The first is Rabbi Moshe Basula (Moses ben Mordecai Bassola), who visited the ancient synagogues in Bar’am in the early 1500s and wrote as follows (translation mine):

On the lintel of the smaller entrance it is inscribed in Hebrew “May G-d give peace to this place and to all the places of Israel.” And I was told that on another stone which had fallen down was written “Don’t be surprised about snow in the month of Nissan, we’ve seen it in Sivan.”

The Hebrew inscription is unusual, as most inscriptions in Byzantine synagogues are in Aramaic. The synagogue was researched in the late 19th century, but by 1907 there was nothing left of its stones. The local Arab villagers had destroyed it completely and ransacked it for building materials. The “snow” inscription was never found. The lintel inscription is on display in the Louvre.

The synagogue entrance, circa 1882

The inscription

The second to report snow in the summer was Joseph (Yehoseph) Schwarz, the father of Jewish research of the land of Israel. In his book “Tevu’ot ha-Areẓ” (The Bounty of the Land, published in English as well), he says as follows (translation mine):

In 1844 it snowed a bit on the night and morning of April 11 (22 of Nissan) [... Schwarz then goes on to bring various examples of snowy years...]. In 1754 there was a lot of snow and it was very cold, and so 25 people died in the Galilee in Nazareth of the cold, and I heard from an old man that the snow continued that year until the month of Sivan [late May], and there was barely a minyan that year on Shavuot in the synagogue here in Jerusalem, because that night it snowed so much that barely anybody could go out for morning prayers.

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Six Arabs were arrested this weekend in connection with the widely publicized attack of two Ultra Orthodox youths by a group of Arab thugs on January 10^th.

The two Jews were walking out of Old City through the Shechem (Damascus) Gate when they were ambushed by a group of Arabs who physically assaulted them, as well as taking their streimels (hats), smashing them with snow, generally ridiculing them, all the while shouting “Allahu Akbar”, as they filmed the humiliating attack.

The arrest of the six follows the earlier arrest of another three participants in the attack. The remand of the first three has been extended by four days.

The police were initially hesitant about investigating the attack, and the victims themselves did not lodge an official complaint, explaining they felt the complaint would not be useful. Public pressure, generated especially through the social media, motivated the police to investigate the incident, and they have now announced that all assailants have been apprehended.

One of the victims told of what he experienced: “Dozens of Arabs surrounded us and began to throw snow at us. They played with our hats, knocked them down, punched us and kicked us in the face and on the back. We were two against tens, and could do nothing. I was sure I was not going to survive. I was drenched from the snow, and surrounded by Arabs, and no one helped.”

As readers may have heard, Israel (along with other countries in the Middle East) has been experiencing unusually stormy weather this last week with high winds and heavy rains. The more unpleasant aspects of these comparatively rare events have included disruptions to the transport system and homes affected by flooding, with the IDF’s search and rescue teams being called in to evacuate people trapped by flood waters both in Israel and in the PA-controlled areas .

The weather system culminated with much anticipated snow in Jerusalem, the Golan Heights and many of the higher areas throughout Israel – including the Negev desert – causing great excitement in a country where this is a fairly rare occurrence.  Equally exciting has been the dramatic rise in the water level of the Sea of Galilee, which climbed by almost 70 cms between the storm’s beginning last Friday and its subsidence on Thursday.

The short film below, made by Oz Segev of Ma’ale Gamla on Monday morning, shows some of the swollen streams of the south and central Golan Heights which all drain into the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee). In order of appearance the film shows the Daliyot stream, the Yehudia stream, the Meshushim stream, the Jordan Park junction at the top of the lake, the upper Meshushim stream, the Aiyt waterfall, the Bnei Israel reservoir and a view from Ma’ale Gamla.

Tsfat (Safed) with a dusting of snow

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The Kinneret rose another 14 centimeters in the past 24 hours, and 70 centimeters over the past 6 days. It’s expected to go up another 10 centimeters over the next few days.

Currently the Kinneret is 211.20 meters below sea level, and at it’s highest level since 2007.

Meanwhile, Thursday’s snowstorm is being touted as the worst (or best) snowstorm Jerusalem has seen in 20 years, with approximately 6 inches of snow sticking on the ground, while in Hebron, the snow reached more than a foot high.

Yoni Alper, on his Terror Watch facebook page, posted the above photo from the Temple Mount, taken on Thursday morning.

While Jewish children in Jerusalem are building snowmen and having friendly snowball fights, The Arabs, on the holiest site to Judaism, and a site the Arabs claim is holy to them too, are building symbols of hate, M-75 missiles out of snow, to show what they want to do to Israel.

The M-75 is the Gazan long-range missile that targeted Jerusalem and Tel Aviv during the “Pillar of Defense” operation.

During the war initiated by Gaza, the Palestinians launched M-75 rockets  at Israel from heavily populated areas. Gazan rockets were often launched at Israel from sites next to schools, and mosques.

As far as snow art goes, placing it next to the Al Asqa mosque is true to life.

In several locations, including the Golan, Jerusalem, Gush Etzion, Beit El, Ofra, Tel Tzion and other locations in Judea and Samaria, schools are closing at noon in anticipation of wintry weather.

Drivers are advised to exercise caution on the roads and to check weather and local reports for potential road closings before setting out on their way.

Seven men – including 4 rabbis – happened upon by an Israeli paratrooper in a closed military zone on the Hermon mountains on Monday, were on a mission of their own – to safeguard the sanctity of the Jews of the city of Metulla.

The Jewish Press’s Yishai Fleisher was on patrol during reserve duty with his paratrooper battalion on the snow-topped Hermon mountains when he happened upon an unexpected group of men. “As I was patrolling, I saw a group of people who were clearly Hareidi Jews using pitchforks on the snow, and approached them to ask what they were doing.”

As it turns out, the men – all of whom had military clearance to be in the area – were representatives of Israel’s National Center for Family Purity, and had made the trek to the Hermon to gather snow for a mikvah (ritual bath).

“The men informed me that they had clearance to be in the closed military zone for the purpose of collecting the snow for the people of Metulla,” Fleisher said.

Scraping the snow

It all began when the water of the mikvah of Metulla became dirty and had to be emptied.  The local religious authorities hoped that the water would be refilled by a late spring rain, but that rain never came.  Not knowing how to solve the problem, and wanting to provide the 1,500 residents of Metulla the ability to sanctify themselves in the ritual waters, as laid out in Jewish law and practice, the Rabbi of Metulla called Rabbi Shaya Pfoyfer of the Family Purity Center.

With a team of 3 additional rabbis and 3 workers, Rabbi Pfoyfer made arrangements to come to the Hermon, to collect snow for the mikvah.  Jewish law requires that mikvah water be “living” – rain or snow.  However, the means by which this water can be collected are laden with legal requirements and technicalities, necessitating supervision by religious authorities.

Rabbis collecting snow for the Metulla mikvah

Because the snow cannot be carried in vats or other closed containers, which would render it “non-living”, or drawn, huge construction materials sacks were marred by a series of rips in the bottom, to allow the snow to be collected in an incomplete vessel, and retain its “living” status.  The snow was not shoveled into the bags – which would have yet again compromised its “living” nature, but rather knocked off of snow drifts into the bags with pitchforks.

After 2 hours, 1500 liters of snow were collected in about 15 huge, ripped sacks, which rested on wooden palates.  The palates were forklifted onto a waiting refrigerated truck and transported to Metulla for the mikvah.

A sack of snow collected for the Metullah mikvah

“I took a few pictures of them, and I asked if I could join in and help fill a few bags, so that I could take part in this beautiful mitzvah,” Fleisher said.  “The Hermon is a beautiful place, but taking part in this mitzvah made it all the more meaningful.  Thank God for this year’s snowfall, which continues to be important for Israel and the Jewish people.”

Yishai Fleisher

The Hermon mountains are mentioned a few places in the Tanach, but the first mention is in Devarim (Deuteronomy), Chapter 3, Verse 8-9: “At that time we took the land from the hand of the two kings of the Amorite that were on the other side of the Jordan, from Arnon Brook to Mount Hermon – Sidonians would refer to Hermon as Sirion, and the Amorites would call it Senir”. Rashi, the great Torah commentator, notes in these passages that the names given to the Hermon by other nations were relevant because four nations contended for control of the Hermon, each giving the peaks a different name.  The Torah notes this, according to Rashi, to show how desired the Land was.

Following Thursday’s massive rainfall, Jerusalem woke up on Friday to snow. As the day progresses, we’ll add more pictures.