HAPPY NEW YEAR. 

( Six minute read)

The diversity of beliefs and practices has led to different definitions of “Who is a Jew.”

Judaism is a religion as well as a nation and culture. Approximately 14.7 million people worldwide identify as Jewish. Today, Judaism is comprised of four major movements: Orthodox, Conservative, Reform and Reconstructionist.

The above question is not just philosophical, it has political and legal ramifications.

Defining who is and is not Jewish is a contentious issue.

In Israel, questions of Jewishness have implications for immigration, conversion, marriage, divorce, and the allocation of government money.

Is it determined by heritage? By an individual’s choice of whether or not to identify as Jewish? Whether one “looks” or “feels” Jewish?

Or is the defining issue whether anti-Semites, such as the Nazis, would consider one to be Jewish?

All of these factors have been used at different times and places to determine who is and who is not Jewish.

Both the Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of Judah were formed by 12 tribes of Hebrew people. While there is historical evidence of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin (which formed the Kingdom of Judah and are considered the ancestors of modern Jews.

In Israel, where there is no civil marriage, marrying a Jew and being buried in a Jewish cemetery can be done only if the person in question is considered legally Jewish. In a synagogue, in order to be counted in a minyan, a prayer quorum, one must be Jewish, and so too if one wants to be called up to the Torah for an aliyah.

The Israeli Chief Rabbinate controls the marriage process for Jews in Israel, and their definition of Jewishness accords with traditional halacha. Thus, it is common to find people who are granted citizenship as Jews under the Law of Return, but are unable to legally marry as Jews (or marry Jews) in Israel.

Historically, Judaism has held that a Jew is anyone born to a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism in a halakhic manner (that is, according to Jewish law) Anyone with a single Jewish grandparent or a Jewish spouse is eligible to move to Israel and become a citizen under the Law of Return.

So who decides who is a Jew?

The original name for the people we now call Jews was Hebrews.

The word is apparently derived from the name Eber, one of Abraham’s ancestors. Another tradition teaches that the word comes from the word “eyver,” which means “the other side,” referring to the fact that Abraham came from the other side of the Euphrates or referring to the fact Abraham was separated from the other nations morally and spiritually.

The word “Jew” (in Hebrew, “Yehudi”) is derived from the name Judah, which was the name of one of Jacob’s twelve sons. Originally, the term Yehudi referred specifically to members of the tribe of Judah, as distinguished from the other tribes of Israel.

Another name used for the people is Children of Israel or Israelites, which refers to the fact that the people are descendants of Jacob, who was also called Israel.

In common speech, the word “Jew” is used to refer to all of the physical and spiritual descendants of Jacob/Israel, as well as to the patriarchs Abraham and Isaac and their wives, and the word “Judaism” is used to refer to their beliefs. Technically, this usage is inaccurate, just as it is technically inaccurate to use the word “Indian” to refer to the original inhabitants of the Americas. However, this technically inaccurate usage is common both within the Jewish community and outside of it.

Judaism thus begins with ethical monotheism:

The belief that God is one and is concerned with the actions of mankind. According to the Hebrew Bible, God promised Abraham to make of his offspring a great nation. Most ancient societies were polytheistic—they believed in and worshiped multiple gods.

When Jews have been at risk from the surrounding culture or from political persecution, they have turned inward and focused on the particularist elements of Jewish law and practice — the unique, defining rituals and institutions — in an effort to survive as a people.

Of course a country is entitled to defend itself when attacked.  Killing is good for preventing a future offense, but not for avenging one already done. It is a deed more of fear than of bravery.

You shall not take revenge… Leviticus 19:18

The duty to respect the commands of the government is clearly stated and emphasized in Jewish law.

After the Hamas barbaris attack in Israel today’s society vengeance is at the forefront with an an eye for an eye making the whole world blind.

If Israel wants peace and to be respected by its muslim Arabic neighbours in this time of sorrow it must give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all.

Deeply traditional Jews and the founders of the Jewish state alike understood that the foundation of Jewish values and identity is the Bible. Yet both the Torah of Israel and rabbinic tradition had very different ideas about authentic Jewishness and how Jews should live.

The Torah demands that we keep far away from lies and falsehood (Exodus 23:7), root out corruption from among us (Deuteronomy 19:19), not defile the land by spilling innocent blood (Deuteronomy 19:10), and not allow murderers to go free (Numbers 35:31).

The Torah also teaches that all human beings are created in the Divine Image (Genesis 1:26-27). This means that every human person has intrinsic dignity and must be accorded transcendent value.

Yet, all these fundamental traditional Jewish values are in peril in Israel today – undermined by so many leaders, the government,  rabbis, and by militant hypernationalists.

These values rarely pass the lips of today’s religious Zionists.

Zionism will evolve into just another materialistic amoral, sometimes immoral, coarse struggle for a place in the sun, no different from other nationalisms/ or terrorist group with large hats, kippot, tzitzit, or payot as markers of Jewishness, or by jingoistic calls for wiping out those who are not like us.

These are not Jewish values, only superficial facades and expressions of the vulgar abuse of power that is antithetical to the spirituality of the Bible and our religious tradition.

Below prehaps a better understanding of what or who is a Jew.

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Contact: bobdillon33@gmail.com

( Three minute read) 

There is no prognosis execept uncertanity and barbarism.

Six thousand bombs on the defenceless, is turning Israel into a phria of vengance.

However humanity is not just waging war on each other but on nature also.

Creating a a crisis for the entire life-support of our civilation and our species 

As with all wars nature is strikes back – and it is already doing so with growing force and fury.

——————-

We can not avert climate cataclysm and restore our planet without trillions, that are now being spent on Wars, nor can we use resources to lock in policies that burden poorer countries with a mountain of debt on a broken planet. 

It is time to flick the “green switch”.

As nearly every inch of our planet has been affected by human activity now is the time to transform humankind’s relationship with the natural world – and with each other.

We have a chance to not simply reset the world economy but to transform it. It is time in a race against time to put a price on carbon.

IF NOT CLIMATE CHANGE WILL BECOME MORE COMPLICATED BEFORE IT IS FINISHED.

RESULTING IN MASS MIRTATION WITH THE OUT BRAKE OF MORE WARS THAN WE ARE WITINESSING TO DAY. 

Here is a list of concerns.

The earth climate system seems chaotic, with the potential to head off in many different directions.

Melting ice will have a huge impact, either by raising sea levels or amplifying global warming itself.

The whole western Antarctic ice sheet could fall apart.

El Nino may get stuck on or off, triggering megadroughts or superhurricans.

The Amazon could dissaper in a furness of wild fires.

The oceans could become lifeless acid baths.

Smog may strangle the Asian monsoon.

Methane could be waithing to explode. 

The gulf stream could change direction with North Atlantic freez over.

None of these will happen in isolation and past climate history does not provide a blueprint for the future. There are no easy anologues.

The distinctive nature of our predicament goes a long way beyond the current wars. 

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( Four minute read)

All wars are unpredictable.  

Israel has the military capability to wipe out Hamas, but doing so could perhaps be even riskier than not, given that an even more extreme organization could come into power — or that Israel could be put into the position of governing the territory itself.

Is this the final solution to the holocaust?

The dispute is rooted in pre-biblical times. Though its borders have shifted over the years, Palestinian territories used to be what is now Israel, Gaza and the West Bank.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict so far has claimed tens of thousands of lives and displaced many millions of people and has its roots in a colonial act carried out more than a century ago.

More than 100 years ago, on November 2, 1917, Britain’s then-foreign secretary, Arthur Balfour,

He committed the British government to “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people” and to facilitating “the achievement of this object”.

In essence, a European power promised the Zionist movement a country where Palestinian Arab natives made up more than 90 percent of the population.

Both Israeli Jews’ and Palestinian Arabs’ history, culture and identity are linked to the Palestinian territories. Jewish migration from eastern and central Europe surged from 1922 to 1947 as Jews fled persecution and the destruction of their communities, most notably during World War II.

As the number of Jewish immigrants increased, many Palestinians were displaced. They began pushing back and violence resulted.

Israel was declared a state in 1948, though the land is still referred to as Palestine by those who do not recognise Israel’s right to exist. Palestinians also use the name Palestine as an umbrella term for the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.

Hamas is an acronym for Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiya, or Islamic resistance movement, now designated a terrorist group by Israel, the United States, the European Union and the UK, as well as other powers.

Hamas is a Palestinian militant group which rules the Gaza Strip. It is sworn to Israel’s destruction and wants to replace it with an Islamic state.

Hamas has fought several wars with Israel since it took power in Gaza in 2007.

About 80% of the population of Gaza now depends on international aid, according to the UN, and about one million people rely on daily food aid.

Hamas is backed by Iran, which funds it and provides weapons and training.

As one of Israel’s most implacable foes, Iran clearly has a vested interest in seeing the Jewish state suffer.

If it emerged that Iran was behind the attacks, it could widen the conflict into a regional confrontation.

Just five days into the war, what comes next is impossible to predict, but given what’s known about previous conflicts and the capabilities of both sides, the coming weeks are likely to be bloody.

Extreme religious nationalists who are part of Israel’s right-wing coalition government have repeatedly called for the annexation of Palestinian territory so it is hard to see how there can be a positive outcome for Hamas or Gaza from the events this weekend. The Hamas operation is a reality-changing event in the Middle East that may oblige Iran to move from the phase of ongoing support and co-ordination to a more direct involvement.

The conflict pits Israeli demands for security in what it has long regarded as a hostile region against Palestinian aspirations for a state of their own.

Israel’s founding father David Ben-Gurion proclaimed the modern State of Israel on May 14, 1948, establishing a safe-haven for Jews fleeing persecution and seeking a national home on land to which they cite deep ties over generations. In the war that followed, some 700,000 Palestinians, half the Arab population of what was British-ruled Palestine, fled or were driven from their homes, ending up in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria as well as in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

The simultaneous use of rockets, drones, vehicles and powered hang-gliders suggested that the operation’s planners had studied other recent examples of hybrid warfare, perhaps including Ukraine.

Iran and Hamas staunchly oppose the growing prospect of a historic peace deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia – something which might be thwarted if Israel’s military response to the attacks provokes widespread anger in the Arab world. The violence will scupper any deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Up to now the war is limited to battles between Israeli and Hamas forces but as the war continues it could compel Arab nations to choose a side.

A worst-case scenario is that it could draw in the powerful Lebanese militant group, Hezbollah.

While this radical upsurge of violence is fresh, it is just the latest instalment that stems from a deeply unsettled past. Up to now Israel’s asymmetric response is supposed to serve a deterrent purpose, without   the country declared war.

What unfolds in the coming days and weeks has its seed in history.

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( Two minute read)

Auschwitz, to day is a monument to human depravity, to the end product of hatred, intolerance and dehumanization.

Jewish people call the Holocaust the ‘Shoah’, which means ‘destruction’ or ‘catastrophe’ in which it’s estimated that 6 million Jewish people died.

Jews believe a man called Abraham was the the first person to make a covenant with God. Abraham was a Hebrew. Jews believe God named Abraham’s grandson Israel. After this, the Hebrews became known as the Israelites. Abraham is considered the father of the Jewish people and the Israelites are his descendants.

Jews’ social segregation and their refusal to acknowledge the gods worshipped by other peoples aroused resentment. Unlike polytheistic religions, which acknowledge multiple gods, Judaism is monotheistic—it recognizes only one God.

The founders of Zionism and the leaders of the State of Israel had presumed that the normalization of the Jewish condition—that is, the achievement of statehood and with it a flag and an army—would seriously diminish anti-Semitism. However, from the Yom Kippur War of 1973 onward, the existence of the Israeli state seemed to have the opposite effect, fuelling rather than quenching the long-standing fires of anti-Semitic hatred.

It now appears that we are on the threshold of another Holocaust not a Jewish one but the annihilation of of Palestinians. It is universally believed that such a genocide as the Holocaust must never be allowed to happen again. We can no longer say we do not know that hatred and intolerance lead to war and genocide. We cannot afford to stand still for one moment.

With the out brake of hostility this line has not yet been crossed but current events must serve as a wakeup call.

Today we cannot say that we do not know what happens when hatred in all its forms rears its head.

Even though the vehemence of the anger and attacks against Israel appeared not to differentiate between Israelis and Jews, the United Nations and International Community musts issue a warning that there will be no acceptance of such a course of action by Israel. 

The persistence of anti-Semitism into the 21st century and the marked rise in anti-Semitic incidents in the early decades of the century have prompted new consideration of how to define and combat the phenomenon, which has both incorporated old tropes and taken on new forms.

Double standards (judging Israel by one standard and all other countries by another), delegitimization (the conclusion that Israel had no right to exist), or demonization (regarding the Israeli state not merely as wrongheaded or mistaken but as a demonic force in the contemporary world).

Antisemitism is not a Jewish illness.

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( Three minute read)

The dangers of the situation exploding is a result of the continued occupation [and] the Palestinian people being deprived of their legitimate rights.

Most of the world condemned the attacks on Israel by Hamas but the truth is that this war comes after nearly two decades of the US and world leaders overlooking the more than 2 million people living in Gaza who endure a humanitarian nightmare, with its airspace and borders and sea under Israeli control

Israel’s extreme-right government over the past year has escalated the already brutal daily pain of occupation. Instances of Israeli security forces and Israeli settlers antagonizing Palestinians through violence are on the rise, from the pogrom on the city of Huwara to a new tempo of lethal raids on Jenin.

Israeli far right government ministers have been pursuing annexationist policies and sharing raging rhetoric; both incite further violent response from Palestinians and appear at a time when new militant groups have emerged that claim the mantle of the Palestinian cause.

The now-regular presence of Israeli Jews praying at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, one of Islam’s holiest sites, have further pressurized the situation.

The question must thus be asked to the Israeli government, the Biden administration, and Arab leaders: How did they forget about Palestinians? How did they so brazenly ignore Gaza?

The last time there was a prolonged clash between Israel and Hamas, in May 2021, the conflict lasted 11 days, resulting in the deaths of about 250 people in Gaza and 13 in Israel.

Yet within hours of the surprise attack launched early Saturday by Hamas against Israel, hundreds had already been killed.

This fight will have far more ramifications than previous clashes.

Image’s of resistance to the occupation will be widely circulated in the Arab world, and will endure long beyond this war. Its symbolic power cannot be underestimated.

Negotiations between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization have been frozen since 2014, so the symbolism of Hamas breaking through Israeli security barriers and wreaking havoc on Israel — including the kidnapping of at least one Israeli soldier as well as civilians — will resonate across Palestine, the Arab world, and beyond.

No Arab army has entered the territory of Israel since the 1948 war.

Israel and the United States have wished away Palestinians.

The terrible bloodshed of today’s attacks underscores the cost of doing so.

Because the US has long designated Hamas, the Palestinian militant political group with an Islamist worldview, as a terrorist organization, US officials can’t contact them and must work through third countries. It means that the US knowledge base and expertise on Gaza is not just low — it’s absent.

Gaza is in essence a refugee camp (about 70 percent of those living in Gaza come from families displaced from the 1948 war) and an open-air prison, according to human rights groups.

The United Nations describes the occupied territory as a “chronic humanitarian crisis.” Israel has blockaded Gaza since Hamas assumed control of the territory in 2007, and neighbouring Egypt to the south has also imposed severe restrictions on movement.

The current Israeli government has aggravated these realities, by increasing pressure on the Palestinians on multiple fronts: in Jerusalem, squeezing Gaza, assaults on Palestinian villages by settlers, with settler-politicians leading ministries in the Israeli government; and with annexationist policies like the recent major policy change putting the Israeli civilian government (not the Israeli military) in charge of the occupied West Bank.

Hamas’s attacks on Israel won’t change life for Palestinians, and Israel’s government will now use the full force of its advanced military in response. And given Israel’s state of emergency, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is now in talks with the opposition parties to pull together a unity government for the country.

But even if some of the most extreme settler voices currently in the Israeli cabinet are replaced by more mainstream Israeli voices, harsh policies against Palestinians across the West Bank and Gaza will continue.

The dread Israelis are feeling right now, myself included, is a sliver of what Palestinians have been feeling on a daily basis under the decades-long military regime in the West Bank, and under the siege and repeated assaults on Gaza,”

The only solution, as it has always been, is to bring an end of apartheid, occupation, and siege, and promote a future based on justice and equality.

In my opinion just like Northern Ireland there is no two state solution.

The state of Israel was established in 1948 on land that was at that time part of the British mandated territory of Palestine.

Northern Ireland emerged in 1920–22 as a constituent part of the United Kingdom with its own devolved parliament. There are differing views because of the history of conflict over the decision to divide up the island of Ireland, a political and cultural argument which is still going on today, with a one state for all, with equality, the only solution.

It is not in spite of the horror that we have to change course — it is exactly because of it.

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