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Ella Valley

Along Route 38 we stopped in the Ella Valley, a location reputed to be where the shepherd David battled the Philistine Goliath (1 Samuel 17). There is no marker in the dry stream bed, but it's the only creek in the valley. A road from Bethlehem would have extended here from Bethlehem through the mountains of Judah. The southern ridge extends to the west - perhaps the Tel Sokoh mentioned in the scriptures. Are the current Palestinians the descendants (spiritual or literal) of the biblical Philistines? Probably doesn't much resemble the way the land looked in the 10th century BC, but who knows?

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