As NASA's partner in the Artemis 1 mission, which was launched into lunar orbit on November 15 last year, the Israel Space Agency received a special invitation: to send a number of symbolic items aboard the unmanned spacecraft, to join the MARE experiment, which was designed to test the Israeli AstroRad anti-radiation protection vest. At the end of 2020, the Space Agency asked the public to suggest the items to be sent aboard the Orion spacecraft. The citizens of Israel offered many and varied objects, among them are the blessing for the new moon, a flash drive with Hebrew space songs and even a bazooka gum flyer with the famous "fortune" inscription: "By the age of 21 you will reach the moon." There was, of course, no room to send all the proposals, and in the end five items were selected and launched. Now the items are coming back to us.
Jim Perry, NASA's Artemis program manager, and his deputy, Catherine Coerner, last week returned the items sent by the Israel Space Agency with the Artemis 1 mission to the moon, in a festive ceremony as part of the Ilan Ramon International Space Convention.
Moon trees and more
One of the special items sent by the Israel Space Agency with Artemis-1 was the seeds of Judean Date Palm trees. This is a palm tree of the Tamar variety that grew in the Judean Desert area two thousand years ago and was rediscovered during archaeological excavations carried out in the 1970’s at Herod's Palace in Masada. On Tu B'Shvat 2005, a palm tree of this specific species sprouted for the first time and grew in Kibbutz Ketura. After their return to Earth and to Israel, the seeds of the trees will be sent back to the Arava Institute, from which they were obtained. There they will germinate for planting in places of symbolic value in Israel.
This is not the first time that tree seeds have been sent to the moon to be replanted on Earth. In 1971, during the Apollo 14 mission, the astronaut Stuart Roosa brought back about 500 trees that were planted across the United States for the 200th Anniversary of Independence. The seeds of the Judean Date Palm trees, which have now returned with the Artemis 1 mission, express a symbolic connection between the ancient and the new, between the past of ancient Israel and the future of humanity in space.
