Israel Active

For the first time all eight places on the Apple Music chart of most listened to songs in Israel are held by one Israeli singer - Omer Adam. He released a song each day from his new album, called simply “8”, with each gaining enormous popularity.

A blanket of snow covered the Jerusalem streets in mid-Feb. The streets were full of sounds of excited children, many seeing and playing in the snow for the first time. Ironically at the beginning of that week it was warm enough to walk barefoot through the streets of Jerusalem.

Every February, a burst of red anemones totally transforms the dusty landscape of the Negev Desert. Click on the video to see the brilliant red carpet of anemones spread out as far as the eye can see.

Israeli-born chef and restauranteur Michael Solomonov is famous for the Israeli cuisine at his award-winning Philadelphia restaurant Zahav. He has now launched “Bringing Israel Home,” a new 16-part web series on Vimeo where he chats about Israeli cuisine, plus what he misses about his home country. (Episode 1 - skip to beginning at 5mins:30)

Many of Israel’s world-famous museums have just re-launched. The Israel Museum had activities for Purim with free entrance for children. See links below for other exhibitions.

Israel’s Keshet Studios has renewed its deal with media and entertainment company Universal Television for the third time.  The Israeli production studio will be developing two new dramas for NBC, “The A Word” and “Ties That Bind”. NBC also recently picked up Keshet drama “LaBrea”.

On Sunday 28th Feb there is another opportunity to watch Center Stage Israel’s live production of Endings & Beginnings, previously performed in December. Enjoy songs from the stage and charts that celebrate the fact that with every ending there is a new beginning.  Smiles are returning to our faces.   (sneak preview)

Israeli-founded Fuse.ar used its Alternate Reality filter in the Super Bowl ad for Dexcom – a diabetes management company. In the ad, actor Nick Jonas (who has Type 1 diabetes) becomes an old man, thanks to the special effects from Fuse.ar. His 30 million Instagram followers need not worry though!

Archeologists from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the University of Haifa have discovered what may be the earliest-known use of symbols on earth.  They were found on a bone fragment in the Ramle region in central Israel and are believed to be approximately 120,000 years old.

Olives are one of the seven species, mentioned in the Bible as produce of the Land of Israel. Israeli researchers have discovered evidence of table olives from 6,600 years ago at a submerged site off the Haifa coast. They pre-date the earliest known edible olives by some 4,000 years.