SUNDAY, 8 p.m.

Nature: Eagles of Mull

PBS Cameraman Gordon Buchanan returns to his birthplace, the beautiful island of Mull, off the west of Scotland. There he photographs white-tailed sea eagles, golden eagles, oyster-catchers, curlew and skylarks, as well as basking sharks, bottlenose dolphins, minke whales, gray seals and sea otters — plus deer, mink and wild goats.

MONDAY, 9 p.m., midnight

Belly of the Beast: Giant Trucks

DISCOVERY CHANNEL In this new series, Rossi Morreale follows giant vehicles as they are made and then put to use. Tonight he finds that even three-story, 600-ton mining trucks can look tiny when they are at work in a gargantuan open-pit mine. Advisory: TV-PG.

TUESDAY, 8 p.m., 9 p.m.

How the Earth Was Made

HISTORY This first episode studies asteroids’ impact (pun intended) on our planet’s geography, and the second episode examines the formation of the Hawaiian islands.

WEDNESDAY, 2 p.m.

Waking the Baby Mammoth

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC CHANNEL At an eroding bank of the Yuribei River in Arctic northwestern Siberia’s Yamal Peninsula in 2007, Nenets reindeer herder Yuri Khudi and his sons found “Lyuba,” a baby wooly mammoth who died about 38,000 B.C. The best-preserved wooly mammoth ever, she weighs 110 pounds and is a treasure for scientists.

WEDNESDAYS, MAY 6-20, 9 p.m.

WWII Behind Closed Doors: Stalin, the Nazis and the West

PBS In three two-hour segments in successive weeks, this documentary uses rare wartime files to unmask the connivance of Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill with the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin in immoral geopolitical deals that betrayed whole nations to Red occupation and set the stage for the Cold War. The shows expose the Stalin-Hitler pacts, the shocking lengths to which FDR and Churchill went to appease Stalin, and the Soviet agents who were policymakers for FDR.

THURSDAY, 8 a.m., 10 p.m.

The Fifth Gospel: The Land and Sea of Galilee

CATHOLICTV This video, based on the book by Benedictine Father Bargil Pixner, an archaeologist, helps illuminate the Gospels by picturing Holy Land sites. Re-airs 4:30 p.m. Saturday.

FRIDAY, SATURDAY, live

Pope Benedict XVI in the Holy Land

EWTN At 7:30 a.m. Friday, Pope Benedict will arrive in Amman, Jordan, and visit the Regina Pacis Center. At 10:30 a.m., he will visit Jordan’s king and queen. At 2:15 a.m. Saturday, he will visit the Memorial of Moses on Mount Nebo. He will also visit the Hashemite Museum and the Mosque of al-Hussein bin Talal in Amman. At 10:30 a.m., the Holy Father will go to the Melkite Cathedral of St. George in Amman for vespers.

Dan Engler writes from
Santa Barbara, California.