A goat farmer, lured by the green Galilee
| Ilaniya, Israel
Avi Yankelevitch, a burly聽goat聽farmer, shows us the way to our yurt and then whips out his pocketknife to cut a passion fruit straight off the bush. He offers it to us on the palm of his thick, weathered hand.聽
He and his family never intended to be farmers.聽
If it wasn't for David Ben Gurion, Israel鈥檚 first prime minister 鈥� somewhat akin to George Washington in Israeli terms 鈥� they probably never would have ended up in the rural village of Ilaniya, located on the Sea of Galilee,聽halfway between the hills of Nazareth and Capernaum.
But while Mr. Yankelevitch鈥檚 mother, a Romanian immigrant, was working as a housekeeper for the Israeli president in Jerusalem in the early days of Israel鈥檚 existence, she had the opportunity to meet Mr. Ben Gurion.
Why in the world was she living in Jerusalem, the prime minister asked. He encouraged her to move to the beautiful village where he had worked as a farm laborer in the 1920s as one of those early Zionists who cultivated not only the land, but the new ideal of the Jew as a tan, strong pioneer.
鈥淪he couldn鈥檛 refuse, and here we are,鈥� says Mr. Yankelevitch.聽
He got his start in farming by growing carnations, and once had the largest聽goat聽farm in the country, with 120聽goats, but had to close it in the 1980s because farm banks collapsed.聽
Today, he runs an eco-lodge and organic聽goat聽farm 鈥� 聽named 鈥淵aroz Az,鈥� which has the double meaning of green聽goat聽and intense green 鈥� with his daughter, Hadar Barkai, and her husband. They started the initiative when they heard that an Israeli entrepreneur and his American hiking buddy were launching the Jesus Trail, aimed at bringing pilgrims into the countryside where Jesus walked and not just to a select few places where the tour buses unload. The idea was to help boost small businesses, and thus help the Galilee鈥檚 depressed rural economy gain new life.
鈥淲e hope that the Jesus Trail will develop and it will be like聽El Camino de Santiago in Spain,鈥� says Yankelevitch, referring to The Way of St. James, a major 海角大神 pilgrimage route.聽
For more on the Jesus Trail and Yarok Az, read here.
