Hisham's Palace and the mosaics were very recently renovated and the mosaics are now covered and protected by a special shield and that's why there has been quite a lot of attention for the place, even from the world media, because the mosaics are one of the largest mosaic carpets in such a good shape, in the world. The mosaics cover an area of about 900 square meters. In this episode you can learn about the Umayyads, why they built palaces in the desert and I will take you on a virtual tour to visit the remains of Hisham's Palace with the famous mosaic carpets.My daughter Louisa and I also made a five minutes video of our visit that you can see on the YouTube channel. Everything you hear in this episode you can see in those five minutes!If you are interested to dig a little bit deeper into the mosaics then I recommend reading these two articles that I also used for my research:https://www.academia.edu/12102557/The_Mosaics_of_Khirbet_el_Mafjar_Hishams_Palacehttps://eprints.soas.ac.uk/388/1/Lion-Gazelle_mosaic.pdfYou can find all the links to the social media, YouTube channel, website and to register for the email list here: https://linktr.ee/StoriesfrompalestineIf you are interested in the October program in Palestine (3 - 14 October 2022) then you can find more information on https://storiesfrompalestine.info/travel-to-palestine/ If you enjoy listening to Stories from Palestine then you should also check out the podcast Jerusalem Unplugged. You can find it on most podcast players and on social media.