When you think of petroleum in the Middle East, Israel is hardly the place that comes to mind.
Well, Israel recently announced controversial plans to drill for natural gas in a contested region of the Mediterranean Sea.
And now an Israeli firm contends that the country is sitting on an oil bonanza, in the form of a vast deposit of energy-rich rock known as oil shale.
The company says the resource could transform Israel’s energy economy, but its plans have set off an environmental battle replete with biblical imagery.