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An earthquake was felt Sunday morning in northern Israel, recording a magnitude of 3.2. The epicenter of the quake was Lake Kinneret, which was also the site of a series of previous tremors felt throughout the region last week.
The current earthquake was the tenth record between 3-4.5 in strength. Overall, some 30 tremors have recently been felt in Israel, some at very low intensity. On Saturday, an earthquake of 3.4 was felt in the north and another 3.2 quake was reported Thursday in Kinneret Lake.
>> A minor earthquake swarm shakes the Sea of Galilee in Israel – others are coming?
The earthquakes around Lake Kinneret and in the region in general are not uncommon. According to Yariv Hamiel, head of geological hazards at the Israel Geological Institute, the sea, actually a freshwater lake, is located on the Dead Sea Fault (which l? it is called the Great Rift Valley), which stretches for thousands of miles.
"We had a similar swarm in October 2013 which continued for exactly one month at the same place – north of Kinneret," he said. "The intensities were a little less so – the strongest was then above 3 but did not reach 4."
The earthquakes in Israel are of the type called slip. Israel sits on the plate of Sinai, which rubs against the Arabic plaque to the east. The Arabic plate moves northward from the Sinai plate, and sometimes very large earthquakes result.
In recent history, Israel suffered powerful earthquakes in 1927, in the northern part of the Dead Sea, and another in 1995, centered in the Gulf of Eilat. Doing calculations for about 2,000 years, says Hamiel, we see powerful tremors about every 80 to 100 years. So yes, Israel is late for a big one, which could happen to any part of the Dead Sea Fault. "We know where, but we do not know when," says Hamiel.
Archaeologists have found clear evidence of past tremors in all the ancient cities around the Sea of Galilee, including Tiberias itself and Hippos-Sussita on the other side of the lake, and Beit She & # 39; a little south of them, to name only three. All were destroyed by earthquakes in the year 363 C. E. Tiberias and Beit She & # 39; s year recovered. The hippopotamuses, finally razed by the moving earth in the year 749, have never been rebuilt.
Ruth Schuster contributed to the context of this report
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