I climbed Masada for the 10th time today.

It was the first time after my arthroscopic knee surgery almost two months ago. My legs were like jelly as I neared the top of the snake path of 1300-foot mountain in 100 degree weather, but my knee was fine.

On the way to Masada, with the Dead Sea - the lowest point on earth, beside us, I spoke with the Governor about an important policy issue. People are often cynical about the political process, especially this week with the news of an FBI probe of one of my colleagues.

Nonetheless, discussing policy with the Governor in this setting was unique and moving.

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Tonight, we went to dinner on Ben Yehuda Street, a mecca for tourists and young people.

The crowd was swelled tonight by visitors on the Birthright Israel, the same tour that my niece and nephew took two weeks ago. I wondered what "travel tips" a tour guide was giving to a group gathered at the entrance to Ben Yehuda.

Later on, one of the students told us her group was climbing Masada tomorrow. Better than imposing a curfew, I thought.

Better to walk so many steps tomorrow
Than to have too many beers tonight.

"Do you think I would have told you back then that my mother survived the Holocaust?"

Thirty years later, that's what an elementary school friend told the Holocaust scholar who was our guest speaker this morning.

In Israel in 1958, the survivors tried to hide the numbers the Nazis tatooed on their arms.

They were not the new Jews who had founded Israel. Many of the founders had rejected Jewish life in Europe.

Our speaker's grandfather forbade his son to leave for Palestine. He came here anyway.

Two events changed the country's view of the Holocaust: the trial of Adolf Eichmann and the Six Day War.

"The Egyptians said they would annihilate us. That language reminded us of the Nazis," our speaker related. "I went into the war an Israeli, but I came out a Jew."

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Yad Vashem is the Museum of the Holocaust.

It is two unrelenting hours of film, documents, eyewitness accounts, and artifacts of the dead.

The Nazis had a plan - to kill 11 million, according to one of their documents.

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After lunch, we toured the Jewish Quarter and prayed at the Western Wall.

Building here as well. A synagogue that was destroyed by the Jordanians, when they controlled the Quarter from 1948-1967, is being rebuilt.

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The Governor asked for advice before he bargained with the merchants in the Arab market in Jerusalem.

"Like legislators," I counseled him, "they all have a price."

"When a Democratic President lifts the restrictions on embryonic stem cell research, will it affect research in Israel?" I asked someone at the Biomed conference this morning.

"Absolutely," he replied but not before reminding me that Sen. McCain could be elected.

"He's not pro-choice but he does support embryonic research," I responded.

Later in the day, I made a mental note to find out the likely impact of federal funding for this research on our program in Maryland. We're now third among the states in funding, as Governor O\Malley said last night to a large crowd at the U.S. Ambassador's residence. But we can't rest on our laurels.

I also met Yosi TurKaspa, a sixth generation Israeli on his mother's side. When his father emigrated from Besarabia, his last name was Zilberg, German for silver mountain. TurKaspa is Aramaic for silver mountain. Yosi takes great pride in the fact that several of his leading researchers are Israeli Arabs.

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On our way to Jerusalem, we stopped somewhere where I had never been before.

It was the tomb of Samuel the prophet. There is now a fortress on the site, which provided Richard the Lionhearted his only view of Jerusalem. Events back in England and the military strength of the Muslim defenders prevented him from going further.

So both of us have now been here once.

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Jerusalem, on the other hand, I've now been to twelve times.

What struck me this afternoon were the changes to the city - several new roads to ease congestion, a tram system that is supposed to open next year, and new buildings, both completed and under construction - even on the street opposite the King David Hotel.

Even with these changes, I knew how to walk home from dinner last night, while the others read a map to figure out which was the quickest way.

This is what I tell people making their first trip to Israel.

If all you do is take a bus from the Tel Aviv airport; ascend the mountain unto Jerusalem (the topography hasn't changed since Biblical days); look out upon the City and see it, hear it, and smell it; and then say the Shehechiyanu, the prayer for joyous occasions, your trip is worthwhile.

Late this morning, some of us were on a bus to Jerusalem. I suggested that we say the Shehechiyanu.

We did, just before we entered the Old City through the Jaffa Gate.

As we drank our cups of wine, a group of blind tourists approached. I wondered what it would be like for these people to see Jerusalem for the first time.

We headed for the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, Jesus' burial site. Like the many civilizations layered in a tel, the nooks and crannies of the church unveil many beliefs and practices.

There are also contrasts between ancient civilizations and modernity. A priest with his digital camera, like any other tourist. The remnant of what was once an outer wall of the Church, next to the receptacle where suspicious objects are now disposed.

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Our next stop was the exhibit of "Orphaned Art" at the Israel Museum. The Nazis confiscated hundreds of thousands of valuable art works and books. No owner has yet to be found for the works on display.

More than 150,000 books were given to American libraries and institutions. Hannah Arendt. who supervised this effort, wrote that "present and future readers would be reminded of those who once cherished" these books.

There was also a film of Hitler's early morning visit to the recently conquered Paris. On his tour of cultural sites. Hitler tells Albert Speer, the architect of the Third Reich, that he won't bomb Paris. The Berlin that the two of them will build will make it look dim in comparison.

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Some of the sites being rebuilt in Jerusalem are of a recent vintage. The Imperial Hotel once stood at a busy intersection not far from the Jaffa Gate. The Waldorf Astoria chain will open the Palace Hotel in December 2010, preserving only the outer wall of the Imperial.

No word on who's opening in the big room.

"When did you become a Zionist?" I asked.

"When I returned home to Romania after the concentration camps and saw anti-Semitism - still," replied Chava Wolf.

Her art work, filled with bright colors and Miro-like figures, is on display at Independence Museum, where David Ben-Gurion read the proclamation declaring Israel a state 60 years ago this month. Her works deal with the Holocaust.

It was a very emotional experience to be in the room where Ben Gurion read Israel's Declaration of Independence 60 years ago this month and hear the tape of his speech and the playing of Hatikvah, the Israeli national anthem, that followed.

In July 1776, Thomas Jefferson wrote of "a decent respect for the opinions of mankind." Israel's Declaration is also adressed to a broader audience than just the citizens of the newly created state. It refers to the United Nations, "all the states around us," the "sons of Arab people dwelling in Israel," and the "Jewish people throughout the Diaspora."

When I next read the American Declaration - to the residents of Roland Park at the start of their July 4th parade, I will bring the Israeli declaration with me as well.

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Governor O'Malley arrived late this afternoon for his trade misson centered on high tech and life sciences. At a seated dinner tonight, we went around the table and introduced ourselves. I said:

I have been in the General Assembly for 26 years. My sponsorship of the legislation that created Maryland's embryonic stem cell research program will touch more lives than anything else I ever do.

I spent today in the first millenium.

I began at a church on the site where Jesus performed his first miracle - changing water into wine at a wedding reception. When I attended mass at New All Saints Church in my district two winters ago, the homily was about this miracle.

"Jews still wash their hands before a ritual," I told the congregation. That night, I decided to go to the site where this took place on my next trip to Israel.

If this were my Annapolis diary, I would have been precise and lawyer-like and written "where Jesus is believed to have performed his first miracle."

But in matters of faith, I've come to believe that it's what the individual believes happened at a certain sacred place, not whether it actually did.

Today, when a group of tourists entered the church , kissed religious objects, and crossed themselves, the meaning of that moment for them helped get me out of my post-10hour flight with very little sleep funk.

Tsiporri and Beit Shean are two archeological sites. Both are located at the intersection of trade routes. Today, we drove to them with the aid of a Global Positioning System.

Both cities commanded the high ground. "It's quite a view," someone said at Tsiporri. "That's why it's here," I responded.

There are 20 layers of civilizations at Beit Shean - one conquest after another, interrupted by a devastating earthquake.

A group of touring Israeli high school students was accompanied by two armed but out-of-uniform soldiers/contemporaries. Overhead, we heard the boom of jet fighters.

I'll be in Israel with Governor O'Malley, but I'm walking in the footsteps of my twin niece and nephew, Rachel and Elliot.

One week after their Bat and Bar Mitzvahs ten years ago, the three of us went to Israel, along with other members of the family. Last week, they returned from their second visit - this time with two dozen other kids their age on a Birthright Israel trip.

At the Newark airport this afternoon, a Birthright group was sitting on the floor listening to their tour leader. That prompted me to call the twins.

"We did so much it seemed like we were there for a month even thought it was just ten days," enthused Elliot.

I was now ready for my takeoff.

2008
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