Air-conditioned kotel

This picture has been up for a while without me really explaining what it is -- it was taken furtively about 50 feet from the main section of the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, in an air-conditioned cave.

The wall, as you may know, is the wall of the temple mount, the massive platform which used to house the most sacred Jewish temple, which was destroyed by the Romans 2000 years ago. Over the years, Jews became forbidden from going up on the temple mount, partly by superstition, partly by the presence of two very important Muslim monuments that were built in its place. They were allowed instead to worship at one small (50m) segment of the base of the mount, and that's about it. The remaining 2km circumference of the mount, while technically available for worship, was soon covered up in the many feet of sediment that somehow unexplicably builds up in every town. Over the course of the two millennia, the street level in the old city of jerusalem rose up some 25 meters. The Western Wall area, which was in active use for worship and was not built upon, rose only some 10 meters. This left a 15 meter shelf between the area at the foot of western wall and the area that adjoined it.

Now that the jews are firmly in control of Jerusalem, they have taken the liberty of putting that shelf to use by burrowing into it and area which is also alongside the temple mount and as such equally holy, but also has the advantages of being enclosed. This means that it is shielded from the sun, and naturally, air conditioned.

This is good because a lot of the men there were wearing those awesome round furry hats and silk dressing gowns, despite it being about a million degrees outside. Oh yes -- only men are allowed inside.

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