Episode 179 - Borderlines: Within the Border - Efrat
What would it take to reopen a 2,000-year-old water system that's sat behind a line since Oslo?
That's the question behind the final episode of our Border series.
Fifteen minutes south of Jerusalem, in the town of Efrat, a group gathers that doesn't come together often: a Member of Knesset, IDF officers, a rabbi, the mayor, a filmmaker - pulled together in under 48 hours to walk into Solomon's Pools.
Together, we trace the pools back to the Book of Ruth, stand where an Iranian missile struck just over a mile away, and hear how a mapping decision during Oslo quietly put a biblical landmark out of reach.
The conversation moves from Bethlehem's disappearing Christian community to a restoration vision that could open this site back up - and to a Member of Knesset's case for why it matters now.
Beyond the border in Syria. Along the border in Gaza. Within the border, here in Efrat. This is the one that goes inside.
Episode 178 - Borderlines: On the Border - Gaza
Most people know October 7th from news reports. But on the ground - at the Nova Music Festival, in kibbutzim, in bomb shelters 15 seconds from danger - the reality is far more personal and complicated.
We walked these sites with Mati, a kibbutz agricultural worker who has lived here since 1978 and witnessed October 7th from inside his home. Mati shares what it was like to be in the toilet when the alarm sounded, to receive a call that terrorists were shooting at Palestinian workers in his fields, to slowly understand - through Facebook posts and calls to friends - that something unprecedented was happening.
But beneath the immediate violence lies a deeper wound: an intelligence notebook found at Kibbutz Mefarsim revealing that Hamas had meticulously mapped every detail - where the doctor lived, the security chief's phone number, which gates had which locks, where the generators were.
That intelligence came from a trusted Palestinian worker who had lived on the kibbutz for 30 years. A man Mati knew well. A man Mati can no longer speak to.
The episode explores the layers of this betrayal and asks the question that haunts many: how do you rebuild trust after this?
Episode 177 - Borderlines: Beyond the Border - Syria (featuring Ilan Schulman)
Headlines tell you there's a war on Israel's borders. But they don't explain why it matters, who's fighting, or how 50 years of history shapes today.
Ilan Schulman - kibbutznik, IDF paratrooper, intelligence officer, and PhD scholar of Syrian cities - walks us through the real complexity.
Syria isn't one nation but ~200 tribes loyal to different interests.
Understanding jihadists requires reading the Quran, not just analyzing weapons.
The Ottomans' 500-year control of this region echoes in today's geopolitics.
Iran builds power through schools and hospitals, not just missiles.
And the 1973 Yom Kippur War - which nearly destroyed Israel - reshaped military philosophy that still drives strategy today.