Gamla (גמלא), the ancient Jewish city on the Golan Heights, is described in the Talmud as a walled city dating from the time of Joshua (Bronze Age). Presumably the Talmud describes Gamla thus because a fortified settlement, later destroyed, existed here in the Early Bronze Age. That ruin was resettled during the Hellenistic period of the mid-second century BCE, when it seems to have been re-founded as a Seleucid fort which later became a civilian settlement. Jews inhabited it from the last quarter of the second century BCE, and it was annexed to the Hasmonean state under king Alexander Jannaeus around 81 BCE.
The city was built on the slope of an extremely steep ridge jutting west from the Golan plateau, and surrounded on three sides by cliffs, accessible only from the eastern plateau by a single trail, the same one that provides access today. Shaped like a camel's hump, the ridge thus gave the city its name (Gamla meaning 'camel' in Aramaic).
The site is within the Gamla nature reserve which is accessed from the east from the plateau of the Golan Heights. Travelling through this plateau one may see a number of dolmens, some 700 of which may be found around Gamla, and some thousands exist scattered across the Heights, some covered by cairns of gathered rocks. These 4,000-year old structures comprise a massive stone slab laid across two upright slabs like a table (in fact dolmen is ancient Breton for stone table). It is thought that dolmens were burial structures for the Bronze Age nomads who wandered the heights.
Though there is no dolmen in this picture, it shows the beautiful plateau of the Golan Heights with still-snow-capped Mount Hermon in the distance, looking like so many clouds!
Arriving at the edge of the plateau overlooking Gamla, there are first two other attractions. One is the remains of the Byzantine Christian village of Deir Qeruh (“deir,” meaning monastery in Arabic, signifies a Christian settlement). The village was established around the fourth to fifth centuries CE and a church was built in sixth century CE. The village was abandoned during Arab conquest (seventh century). The locality was again inhabited during 13-14th centuries. A Syrian village occupied the site in the twentieth century and was abandoned after six-day war. Unlike most of the churches discovered in Israel, which have round apses, this ancient church in Gamla has a square apse in keeping with others in the basalt regions of Syria and Jordan.
The remains of the Byzantine church.
The remains of the Byzantine church.
The Greek inscription over the door to the church reads “The God of Gregorius saves and takes pity, Amen.”
The other attraction is the presence of rare and huge birds, including Egyptian vultures (Neophron percnopterus), Griffon vultures (Gyps fulvus) and other raptors. Gamla nature reserve is home to Israel’s largest nesting colony of raptors, as well as being the most varied and dense such colony, due to the abundance of food and nesting sites. Nevertheless the more than forty pairs of Griffon vultures nesting here today are but a remnant of the population at the beginning of the twentieth century. Griffon vultures may have a wingspan of upto 2.7 metres. There is an extensive multi-agency survey and conservation program that has been going on since 1994, and a number of birds from elsewhere are being re-introduced via a “halfway house” cage.
Griffon vultures both inside and outside the conservation cage.
The Gamla valley north of the Gamla ridge.
The Gamla falls.
On this occasion we did not take the hard trek down from the plateau to the ridge to walk inside Gamla, but viewed it from the lookout on the ridge, where we observed (and were careful not to touch) thousands of Pistacia Processionary (Thaumetopoea solitaria) caterpillars. These bugs, whose hairs are extremely irritant when touched, and protect the caterpillars (which gather together in the Pistacia therebinthus trees and forage for food together) as they process in spring to pupate into moths in the soil, are from the same family as the pine and oak processionaries, known in Hebrew as תהלוכן. They were both processing and feeding in protective "clumps" on pistacia trees.
Pistacia Processionary (Thaumetopoea solitaria) caterpillars processing down the trunk of a Pistacia therebinthus tree.
Pistacia Processionary (Thaumetopoea solitaria) caterpillars "clumping" in a Pistacia therebinthus tree.
In his book, The Jewish War, Yosef ben Matityahu (Josephus) writes extensively about Gamla. Initially loyal to Rome, the citizens of Gamla joined the Jewish Revolt against Rome in 66 CE, just after Josephus, as Commander of Galilee in the revolt, fortified Gamla as his main stronghold on the Golan. Josephus gives a very detailed topographical description of the city and the steep ravines which precluded the need to build a wall around it. Only along the northern saddle, at the town's eastern extremity, was a 350 meters-long wall built from a round tower on the ridge to just above the Daliyot stream. It was constructed by blocking gaps between existing houses, including the synagogue, and destroying houses that lay in its way.
King Agrippa II besieged the city but was forced to retreat after seven months. After that Vespasian, who had rushed to Judea with three Roman legions, besieged the city for a month, breaching the walls and penetrating the city. However the Jews managed to kill most of the Roman soldiers, turning the episode into a humiliating defeat for Vespasian. A few days ;ater, in a second attempt at breaching the walls, the Romans overwhelmed the city at a cost – according to Josephus – of 9,000 Jewish lives. After the Romans destroyed the city in 67 CE it was abandoned and forgotten for 1,900 years until 1968 when Yitzhaki Gal, participating in a survey of the Golan Heights carried out by the Jewish Agency and the then-Nature Reserves Authority, rediscovered it, making the attribution through the nature of the site’s geography and archaeological finds. Archaeologist Shmaryahu Guttman’s excavations confirmed the city’s identification as Gamla and revealed the city’s wall, synagogue and residential quarter as well as evidence of the attacks in the form of hundreds of Roman ballistas and thousands of catapult arrowheads and iron nails.
Before ending our trip, we took a look at the Golan Heights Memorial, from which you actually have a more stunning view of Gamla than from the observation point. This unique monument commemorates the residents of the Golan Heights who were the victims of terror or fell in the line of duty during military service. Their names of inscribed on the rock face, and a quotation from Josephus symbolizes the link between the people of Gamla at that time and today’s residents of the Golan.
On the way back we stopped at the Ayit (Eagle) falls. Though it flows all the year round, because there had not been rain for a few days there was a very meagre flow over this 20 metre waterfall, but the beauty of the exposed basalt columns on the sides of the canyon formed by the falls over millennia was magnificent, and we then had an excuse to buy some apples and dates from an old Druze couple by the roadside.
There are both horizontal and vertical basalt columns exposed at Ayit falls.
Amber at Ayit falls.
Then finally, we stopped at the Golan wineries for a bottle or two, and enjoyed its cool and lush garden, before heading home.
