Covenant at Tel Beth Sheva

A modern well and a modern tamarisk tree at Tel Beer Sheva, along with the reconstruction of an altar discovered there; reminders of the well Abraham dug, the tamarisk tree he planted, and the worship he offered when making a covenant or treaty to deal well with the people of the land in which he was then a foreigner.  ‘From Dan [in the north] to Beersheba [in the south]’ became a way to express the promised land, and is how it is described when Moses sees it from Mount Nebo shortly before he dies.  Today there are proposals to remove the remaining Bedouin villages, concentrating their residents in a small number of designated towns, thought to be opening up the way for the establishment of further Jewish settlements across the area.  Water remains the headline issue: it is not provided to the ‘unrecognised’ Bedouin villages, and there is a differential in its provision elsewhere.