>> the palestinian-israeli conflict that we are experiencing today. you ever seen it experienced in jerusalem for thousands of years. >> for the jews, jerusalem is where solomon built the holy temple. for christians, this is a place where jesus was crucified. >> for muslims, jerusalem is where the prophet muhammad made the night journey. >> people are said to have conquered the world that have swept through this city. >> no other individual changed the landscape in the way that herod the great did. >> solomon was determined to take on the christians. >> at a time of ottoman islam rule, the british badly wanted to control the holy land. >> against british government policy in palestine. >> we are the only people in the world -- >> for israelis, the creation of the state of israel is seen as a miracle. and of course, for the palestinians, it is a great disaster. >> the history of jerusalem. very complicated story, and if you don't know it in its complexity, it's very hard to understand what's going on there today. >> the past is never dead and if there is a city in the world to which that applies, it's jerusalem. it's been 900 years since solomon's death. and the world has undergone a dramatic transformation. >> previous centuries have seen the growth of these empires that just try to swallow as much land around them as possible. >> there are two great powers in the world. there is the roman republic, which is now controlling much of the mediterranean. and there is the partheon empire. a huge empire that controls everything from the borders of syria and iraq all the way to the borders of india. >> they were the descendants of the ancient persians to the east of the area of syria-palestine and when you look at a map, what you can see is that the sort of natural meeting place of conflict between these two powers is the land where jerusalem sits. >> jerusalem is now ruled by the hazmanians, a revered jewish dynasty. >> the dynasty was the jewish dynasty that was established by a group of jewish conservative rebels that overthrew greek rule in jerusalem and in israel. >> that revolt, in 167 b.c., is commemorated by the modern jewish holiday of hanukkah. over the course of time, they expanded the size of their kingdom. by conquering other peoples around them who were not jewish. >> they ruled a big kingdom for about 150 years. >> but now, the hasmoneans are faced with a new enemy. one backed by the full might of the roman empire. a native of palestine who longs to claim the holy city for himself, herod. >> i think herod would have been one of those people that would have been terrifying to be, both, friends or enemies with. if you were his enemy, he was ruthless, implacable, he held a grudge, he was scheming. and even if you were his friend, you never knew where ya stood. >> he is part monster, part hero. his name means hero in greek, so he was always going for that role. >> he deserves the reputation for cruelty that he gets because he wants what he wants, and he is willing to do and kill whomever he needs to to get what he wants. >> herod the great's grandfather, on his father's side, was forcibly converted to judaism. and herod's mother was an arab woman. she was not jewish. >> because he is this fascinating hybrid, herod isn't regarded as the full jew by all the jews. and for the hasmonean royal dynasty, of course, he is an upstart. >> they call him a half breed and i think this eats at him. i think herod the great realizes that the only way he's ever going to be able to be accepted as really jewish is if he takes jerusalem. and sets himself up on the throne of david. >> he understands that -- that the key to the crown of judaea, to the throne of jerusalem, is rome. >> the romans want to control the entire mediterranean. >> and they need an ally. they need a client king in jerusalem. >> herod. his classmates were the students who later on grew to be the caesars. so, he really was very well aversed in political intrigue and his alliances helped advance his position and his career. >> and the romans are extremely arrogant and they think they can appoint anyone they like king of anywhere. um, not unlike certain other great powers today. so, they decide that herod is going to be their person. and they say to him, we'll provide an army. you take jerusalem, and you will be king of judaea. and off he goes. >> but because herod is aware that he has what many jews would call a mixed-blood ancestry, proving his jewishness is a motivation for many of the actions that he takes. >> and one of those things is he could marry into the hasmonean family. he could make a claim to the throne by marrying, let's say, a jewish princess. >> herod uses the threat of his army to force a hasmonean princess into a jewish marriage contract. >> and he chooses marian who is young, beautiful, cultured, generally loved by everybody. >> herod's relationship with marian, they would have made really good reality television. on the one hand, herod deeply loved her, and expressed his love in grandiose gestures. on the other hand, she constantly berated him about his status and he always felt a sense of inferiority around her. >> the very jerusalem story because it contains both love and hate, as jerusalem as auls always does. you have this young, ruthless, self-made king. you have this princess of the grandest, royalest family. it's like a kardashian marrying a windsor. >> so, he marries in to the hasmonean dynasty and she knows that herod is only marrying her for political purposes but she also fears that he is going to begin getting rid of her relatives. killing all hasmonean heirs to the jewish throne. and he's got so many roman troops with him that this shouldn't be that difficult. >> with 40,000 roman soldiers under his command, herod sets his sights on jerusalem. intent on forcing the jewish people to accept him as their king. ray loves vacations. but his diabetes never seemed to take one. everything felt like a 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(gasps) ♪ did it work? only pay for what you need ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ spider-man no way home in theaters december 17th herod the great is determined to prove he is a true jewish king. after making a deal with the romans, he descends on jerusalem. >> it was a bloody massacre. heaps of corpses lying around the city. the slaughter of a lot of innocent civilians. you know, men, women, children. >> herod's harshest actions are saved for the royal family. >> there is a political tradition that when you take a city, you would take the king and you would allow them to live. you would exile them. herod the great, however, isn't your typical noble king. he's ruthless and he's paranoid, and so when he takes the city, he begins executing all of his potential rivals, including the former hasmonean leader. >> the hasmonean ruler is marian's uncle but herod only cares about claiming his prize. >> he takes jerusalem and he declares himself king of judaea. and then, he sets about making himself the most successful king not just of judaea but of the whole mediterranean. >> herod is not alone in his ambitions. a powerful rival looms in one of the most ancient kingdoms on the planet. >> egypt, at this time, is no longer a superpower. it's far from its former glory. previous rulers, incompetent rulers, civil wars had shrunk the kingdom down to a rump of itself. >> now, it's almost a rome client state. it's lost its power. >> but there's one person who doesn't like it that way. cleopatra wants to see egypt rise, once again. z >> when you look at roman descriptions of cleopatra, they're all in a negative light because basically all these guys were, anyway, misogynists. the word unscrupulous is used a lot, which i think is very, very unfair because the scruples that she was having to work around weren't hers. and you see how incredibly frustrating this must have been for an intelligent, energetic woman. >> cleopatra is a woman who sees herself as being a bigger player than what a male-dominated world would want to make her be. women don't have a lot of power in this patriarchal culture, but there are ways in which they can gain power. >> cleopatra has partnered with one of the most powerful and influential men in the world -- mark antony. and together, they want to rule the world. >> mark antony was one of the powerful generals controlling rome. mark antony meets and -- and falls in love with cleopatra, and establishes his base of operations in alexandria in egypt. >> he is a bit of what we today call a player. he was master of horse, cavalry commander for julius caesar. >> mark antony and herod the great, they're old war buddies. and herod the great actually saved mark antony's skin on one occasion. so, they owe each other quite a bit. >> mark antony and herod had had a very intimate relationship that, of course, cleopatra knew of and was very, very jealous. >> and cleopatra wants what herod the great has -- jerusalem. >> cleopatra wants jerusalem under egyptian control because it gives her another kind of a gateway to the east. she is able to trade with them. >> all of these trade routes coming in from the far east go down into what is now modern syria, modern lebanon, and israel. and they all kind of meet together. so, if you want to take goods, either east or west, jerusalem is an incredibly important place to be. >> but above all, jerusalem, of course, was part of judaea and judaea had once been part of egypt back in the 3rd century bc. and so, cleopatra viewed the territory that herod had been given as her birthright. >> it was her job, her mission, as the divinely ordained monarch of egypt to reunite and to reannex the lost territories, which includes jerusalem. >> the problem is is that she can't go to herod's buddy, her lover, mark antony, and ask him to give her herod's holdings. so, who does she turn to? who else hates herod the great? the hasmoneans. >> so, cleopatra enters into a conspiracy to overthrow herod with his own wife. the woman who witnessed his soldiers topple her family's legacy. >> herod the great loves marian but she is actively plotting against him. and behind it all? is cleopatra. this is your home. this is your family room slash gym. the guest bedroom slash music studio. the daybed slash dog bed. the living room slash yoga shanti slash regional office slash classroom. and this is the basement slash panic room. maybe what your family needs is a vacation home slash vacation home. find yours on the vrbo app. ♪ ♪ i'm a reporter for the new york times. if you just hold it like this. yeah. ♪ i love finding out things that other people don't want me to know. mm-hmm. [beep] i just wanted to say... ♪ find yourself in these situations and see who you are. and that's just part of the bargain. ♪ sweet pillows of softness! this is soft! holy charmin! excuse me! roll it back everybody! charmin ultra soft is so cushiony soft, you'll want more! but it's so absorbent, you can use less. enjoy the go with charmin. we've been waiting all year to come together. it worked! happy holidays from lexus. get 1.9% apr financing on the 2022 es 350. ♪ how not to be a hero: because that's the last thing they need you to be. you don't have to save the day. you just have to navigate the world so that a foster child isn't doing it solo. you just have to stand up for a kid who isn't fluent in bureaucracy, or maybe not in their own emotions. so show up, however you can, for the foster kids who need it most— at helpfosterchildren.com cleopatra longs to bring jerusalem back under egyptian control. so, she enters into a conspiracy to overthrow herod with his own wife mariamne. it begins with tricking herod to unwittingly promote his replacement. >> so there were two big offices in judaea in this period. one was the office of king and one was the office of high priest. the hasmoneans had served, both, as kings and as high priests. but herod, because he was only half jewish, could not serve as a priest in the jerusalem temple. >> but mariamne has a brother named jonathan. jonathan's a hasmonean and he is, therefore, eligible to be a high priest. >> mariamne convinces herod to appoint jonathan high priest. successfully completing cleopatra's scheme to bring jonathan one step away from the throne. >> from what we know, mariamne's brother, jonathan, was a good-looking, charismatic guy. certainly, the kind of guy that the jews much rather would have had as a king than herod the great. >> there is a story of a festival -- the feast of tabernacles, which was one of the major pilgrimage festivals to the jerusalem temple. and he goes to officiate over the sacrifices at the altar. all of the people start to cry out about what a wonderful, young man he is. >> crowds, look at how attractive this boy is, look at how regal he looks, look at how amazing he looks. oh, the hasmoneans are back. >> so, as jonathan leading this event, you better believe that herod the great hears the commotion, hears how popular jonathan is, and herod is seething with jealousy. >> so, herod invites his brother-in-law to come swimming with him at his palace in jericho. he is drowned in the pool. it's an accident. nothing untoward. but everybody knew what really had happened. herod had eliminated a rival. imagine if you are mariamne. you hate your husband. you can't divorce him because you're a woman, and now he's killed your brother. you must be furious with this man. >> mariamne has not only lost a brother but the conspiracy to overthrow herod is also ruined. >> when the plot against herod the great involving jonathan fails, cleopatra is furious. >> the egyptian queen works at convincing mark antony to turn on his close friend. >> cleopatra uses her huge influence with mark antony to undermine herod whenever possible. she tells tales about herod's treatment of his wife, his treatment of the jews in jerusalem. his ruthlessness. but mark antony aspires to run the whole roman empire. his interest is not to have his client kings, even such a powerful monarch as cleopatra, his partner, mother of his children, fighting amongst themselves. >> so, mark antony says, listen, you have to play nice. and so, cleopatra -- the cunning ruler that she is -- she says, okay, i'll play nice. i will go up and visit herod the great and i will show you how we can spend time together. so, cleopatra travels to jerusalem, and publicly declares that this is a peace journey. that, she is going to make peace with herod. but what she secretly wants is for herod to die. >> herod has a wide network of spies, and he quickly discovers the truth of cleopatra's intentions. >> so of course, herod the great now knows that cleopatra is out to get him. >> cleopatra and herod are very deadly frenemies. because of their common patron, mark antony, they have to be political friends. but they are definitely enemies. >> and now, you've put the two fighting fish in the same jar. and now, somebody's gonna die. 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well, mark antony was a man and he was a roman. cleopatra was an eastern queen and a woman. so she becomes the focal point of the negative propaganda that octavian starts to put out. >> he says things like cleopatra's a foreigner. she's polluted the mind of mark antony. and he does this so effectively, that the people start turning against mark antony and cleopatra. so, what was once a power-sharing agreement becomes a battle between the two. they are going to vie for the sole rule of rome. mark antony basically calls up all of his supporters and he says come fight with me against octavian. and herod the great says, yeah, no, sorry, i'm busy. and that's because he hates cleopatra and he sees that octavian is the one who is going to win. >> mark antony and cleopatra are routed at the battle of acteum. they manage to flee back to egypt but octavian is right behind them. >> it becomes clear that cleopatra's going to end up being paraded around in a roman triumph, which was the last thing that she wanted. >> she says over and over again, i will not be triumphed over. and it means that she just can't envisage herself as a prisoner, as anything other than a queen. >> hoping to trick octavian, cleopatra hides in her mausoleum. and has her maid servant spread the rumor that she has killed herself. >> so the problem with cleopatra locking herself up in the tomb is that she didn't tell marc anthony and part of what you need to do is tell your lover where you are gaeoing to be because he, of course, is defeated. and thinking that he's lost everything. >> so, mark antony ends up committing suicide by stabbing himself in the stomach. >> when cleopatra finds out that mark antony kills himself, she ends up dying by her own hand, as well. and it's really a very sad story, which sort of mirrors the romeo and juliet story. but maybe, in a sense, it's the way in which the tale was always going to end for them because they had tried valiantly but failed to gain this power that really wasn't theirs to gain, in the first place. >> soon after the death of his rival, herod travels to meet octavian in person and beg for his life. >> remember, herod was a friend of mark antony so when octavian defeats mark antony, herod the great has got to go face octavian and deal with him. and octavian says i understand you backed the wrong horse. and herod the great, ever the s shrewd politician, says something quite profound. >> he doesn't pretend he was anything other than a supporter of mark antony. he says as good of a friend as i was to antony, i will be an even better friend to you, octavian. >> and herod is so convincing, that not only does octavian reconfirm herod as king of judaea but he actually increases the size of his kingdom. >> when herod the great gets back to jerusalem, one would think that, wow, he's avoided this major disaster with octavian. maybe everything would be better when he gets home. but that's certainly not the case. because when he gets back to jerusalem, everything is all the worse. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ experience the power of sanctuary at the lincoln wish list event. this holiday season, give your family the gift that keeps on... going? 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ask your health care provider today about once-weekly ozempic®. oh, oh, oh, ozempic®! you may pay as little as $25 for a 3-month prescription. herod has convinced octavian to allow him to remain in control of jerusalem. but when he returns to the holy city, he finds the royal family in turmoil. >> mariamne and members of her family are sequestered under armed guard while herod is away. and when herod comes back, some other members of the family start spreading rumors that mariamne had had an affair with her guard. >> herod has the guard killed. and then, turns his attention to his wife. >> herod and mariamne are wrestling together. they're -- they are linked together in this terrifying relationship of love and hate. but in the end, he just can't trust her and all the time, she is plotting within his own household even though she is the mother of his children, she is plotting to destroy him. >> he felt that he had been betrayed and for a rational person, you'd say well, of course, you don't kill someone. but herod the great isn't a rational person. he's an obsessive compulsive madman. >> ultimately, his fear, suspicion, paranoia, hatred even, of her was more powerful than his love. >> mariamne was not even 25 years old at the time. she had already born him five children. >> herod thought that this would solve his problems. little did he know, that this would drive him to absolute madness. >> after mariamne's death, herod was so distraught, he would wander around in his palace and talk to her as if she was still alive. like, he saw her ghost in front of him or something like that. >> he goes mad with grief. he howls all night through his palace corridors. he particularly had problems with the children they had with mariamne because they were actually better bred than he was. >> and this is the reason he kills even his own sons. herod's afraid that his sons are going to take his kingdom from him. >> the tragedy of herod is t that -- it's this tragic character who never quite can feel secure enough, and thus is forced to kill those closest to him. >> herod just sinks more and more. and the matter he gets, the -- the more depressed he gets. so, herod the great latches onto building projects because he can build buildings that will outlive him. he is trying to build his way out of depression. >> he builds a series of fortified desert palaces along the eastern frontier, including overlooking the dead sea. he built whole cities like on the coast where, in addition to building a city, he built the largest artificial harbor that had ever been constructed up to that point. and at samaria, the ancient capital at the northern kingdom of israel, he built another city. >> one of the main figures that have dominated palestinian geography and we owe to him the major monuments of palestine. >> prior to king herod, jerusalem was small, cramped, underdeveloped. >> and basically, he knocks it all down and he starts again. he builds extraordinary palaces, canals, fountains, fortresses. >> but herod focuses most on one massive undertaking. >> herod the great wants to try to appease the people in jerusalem. and he knew that, regardless of how many different structures he built, it was the temple in jerusalem that was the most important building to his people. so, herod wants to put his stamp on the center of judaism and surpass even solomon, himself. >> and the temple is a bit of a wreck. it is a bit of a ruin. and so, he decides he is going to knock down the old temple and rebuild a new one. >> he is trying to reclaim that really ancient sense of being appointed by god, and protecting god's chosen city. >> he builds a massive retaining wall around the temple, fills it in so that there is a platform so 100,000 people can come in and celebrate around the temple. and then, he doubles the size of the temple. >> with colossal stone. some of them are so enormous, they are 200 tons in size. >> when you look at the western wall, you're seeing a tiny fragment of the retaining wall. the temple walls went up 60 feet, 80 feet higher. that is what herod builds. >> he created the jerusalem we know today, which we call the temple mount in english, which is muslims call -- and they are built on herod's sacred precinct. >> herod has spent his life building up his kingdom. but the final days of his rule will threaten to tear it all down. ext alert] ♪ son of a bi— beth? 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