In regard to the "oldest place on earth", I'm not sure how you'd define that - especially if it were to included desert (sands?). However, just a few months ago I was reading an article in one of my science magazines that stated that the oldest ROCKS found so far were part of an outcropping somewhere that was definitely not in Israel. I seem to recall that the rocks were in a mid-continental area and they were some 400+ billion y.o.

All of which doesn't rule out that your source might be correct, though.

Mike W.
"For every complex problem, there is a simple solution. And it's wrong."