[1] In 1994 Noga Hareuveni was awarded the Israel Prize for his leading role in the creation of the Biblical garden and nature preserve named Neot Kedumim.

After earning a master's degree in botany and Judaic studies, Noga Hareuveni developed a field survival course for training the Hagana and Palmach, Israel's pre-state military organizations.

[2] In the 1960s Hareuveni realized his parents' dream of establishing a botanical reserve of biblical plants, which is today called Neot Kedumim.

"These great trees of course are not native to Israel," Dr. Hareuveni says, "but they're referred to many times in the Bible, usually as a symbol of haughtiness, or again when Solomon had cedar timbers shipped from Lebanon for the construction of the Temple.

But not only did the cedars grow," Nogah Hareuveni continues, "they somehow even survived the neglect of 19 years while Mount Scopus was a no man's land in divided Jerusalem.