ISRAEL WELCOMES YOU

By Frank Rosci

Galilee
Major developments in Galilee include the new 258-room Nazareth Marriott, a much needed addition to an area all too often short of hotel rooms. The hotel offers an outdoor swimming pool, health club, meeting space, and four restaurants and lounges. Another new hotel, the 400-room Nazareth Renaissance, is set to open just south of downtown this summer. Nazareth, a city with close to 100,000 inhabitants, is a spiritual center. Nazareth is not commercial...for the visitor in search of Jesus' hometown, the city has a unique feel to it.

By the Sea of Galilee or Lake Kinneret
An important new attraction, especially for Christian pilgrimage groups is a 2,000-year-old boat, the so-called Galilee or Jesus Boat, found near Kibbutz Ginosar in 1986 and now on display there. The boat, regarded by experts as the only authentic object from the time of Jesus on display in its natural habitat, will soon be housed in a new museum. Traditional Christian sites by the Sea of Galilee include Capernaum, Tabgha and the Church of the Beatitudes.

By the Dead Sea
At 1,300 feet below sea level the lowest point on earth, new hotels, most with spa facilities, are the rule. Among the new properties is the 578-room Hyatt Regency Dead Sea Resort Spa. At nearby Masada, a new system of larger cable cars is in operation, swiftly carrying visitors up and down the 1,000–ft.–high landmark and ancient mountain fortress that stands above the Judean Desert and Dead Sea.

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