Workers from Israel's Nature and Parks Authority bury a 17-metre-long Fin whale, after it washed ashore, on Nitzanim beach near the city of Ashkelon.
The rare appearance of the dead Fin whale was initially thought to have been connected to the tar pollution brought across the country's coastline last week by powerful winds and high waves.
But Israel's Nature and Parks Authority said on February 19, that experts had determined that the decayed state of the whale, discovered on February 18, indicates that it had died some two weeks ago.