This summer Israel and many other nations are witnessing a tragic series of natural disasters: forest fires, floods, earthquakes and heat waves just to mention a few. Israel Today set out to get some fresh perspective on what is happening on our world from the past and the future, from ancient times to the End Times.

Movements beneath and between earth’s continental shelves have been going on for eons causing mountain formation, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, tsunamis and landslides. The Bible and other historical accounts record numerous ancient earthquakes.

Israel’s eastern border lies along a tectonic plate fault line between Israel and Syria/Arabia, called the Syrian-African Rift extending south down into Africa. The west and east “banks” of the Jordan valley are slowly moving away from each other, forming the lowest valley on earth. The plates also abruptly scrape past...