DAYTRIP: Sde Boker & Ben-Gurion's Negev Vision, Fri July 25th 8:30am

TLV Internationals

Presents:

Daytrip to Sde Boker

Ben Gurion's Zionist Vision for Israel's Future - The Negev

What was the dream and what is the reality?

Date: Friday July 25th, 8:30am-5:30pm

Cost: 20NIS includes roundtrip bus & tour

(Bring your own picnic lunch)

This event is for young professionals in their 20s and 30s only.

About the Event: Ben Gurion's Zionist Vision

8:30am - Buses leave Tel Aviv from Kikar Rabin

10:30am - Arrive in Sde Boker

11:00am - Guided tours of Ben Gurion's house & grave, followed by a talk on his Zionist vision with Eytan Schwartz of Avoda Internationals.

1:00pm - Picnic lunch (self-packed)

2:00pm - Tour of the kibbutz followed by a talk with some of its young members about the Kibbutz movement's past, present, & future.

3:330pm - Return to Tel Aviv

5:30pm - Back in Tel Aviv

About the Place: Sde Boker

Kibbutz Sde Boker is the realization of the ambitious dream envisioned by the Israel Labor Party & David Ben Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister and defense minister, who loved the Negev and its expanses and wanted to settle the desert and make it bloom. The kibbutz, built in the northern Negev Mountains, was established in 1952 by a group of discharged soldiers and attracted the public’s attention when Ben Gurion moved to Sde Boker to live there with his wife Paula.

Ben Gurion’s vision has indeed been realized and today the Negev is a blossoming region, dotted with many communities and thriving farms. Sde Boker has retained Ben Gurion’s heritage. The hut in which he lived from the day he moved there until his death in 1973 is preserved exactly as it was when he lived there. The area around the hut has been developed and expanded for the benefit of visitors, including a display of Ben Gurion’s famous statements and photographs of the early days of the kibbutz. The hut also houses the Ben Gurion archive, which is actually his private library, containing over 5,000 books about all the things he loved. The adjacent hut, where his bodyguards lived, has been turned into a museum devoted to Ben Gurion’s special relationship with the Negev.

South of the kibbutz there is a campus named after Ben Gurion, which houses a desert research institute, a Ben Gurion heritage institute, a field school and a guest house, a high school where youth from all over the country study nature from nature itself, a reptile farm and a desert sculpture museum. The nearby Ben Gurion memorial site, where David and Paula Ben Gurion are buried, offers a beautiful view of the Nakhal Tsin rift.