The Middle East blind mole rat or Israel mole rat (Spalax ehrenbergi or Nannospalax ehrenbergi) is a species of rodents in the Spalacidae family found in Egypt, Iraq, Israel, the Palestinian territories, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Syria and Turkey. Its natural habitat is Mediterranean-type shrubbish vegetation, and it is threatened by habitat loss.
Recent cytogenetic studies have shown S. ehrenbergi may actually be a species group containing several cryptic species with chromosome numbers 2n=48, 2n=52, 2n=54, 2n=56 and 2n=58.
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“At middle night great cats with silver claws,
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Came up out of the hole, and red-eared hounds
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Suddenly, and ran at them and harried them.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“The beds i’ th’ East are soft.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“But he though blind of sight,
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His fierie vertue rouz’d
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—John Milton (1608–1674)
“For like a mole I journey in the dark,
A-travelling along the underground”
—John Davidson (1857–1909)
“When a rat crosses a street, everyone shouts and beats it.”
—Chinese proverb.