Lisa Shea Forums General Discussion Politics Ancient Israelites - Palestinians or Israelis???

I have just read a very interesting review of Shlomo Sand's [i]'Invention of the Jewish People'[/i] in [i]The Sunday Times[/i]. I decided to check it out on the Internet, and have added some links, below, where you can read more. I was particularly intrigued by the notion that '[i]Some modern Palestinians are more likely to be descended from the ancient Israelites than are modern Israelis who have migrated from Russia[/i]'. What are your thoughts on the book, the author, the reviews and the ideas? * From The Sunday Times ~ November 15, 2009 The Invention of the Jewish People by Shlomo Sand ~ The Sunday Times review by Max Hastings [quote]Every nation cherishes its own myths and legends. .... Israel’s favoured historical narrative possesses ­special significance, because it defines the state’s ­proclaimed right to existence. Shlomo Sand, who teaches contemporary history at Tel Aviv University, rejects most of this as myth. His book, first published in Hebrew, has caused widespread outrage ..... He disputes the claim that Israel existed for thousands of years as a nation. This, he says, relies chiefly on a ­willingness to suppose that the Old Testament story is broadly valid, in defiance of archeological and other ­historical evidence. The author suggests that there was steady economic migration from Palestine after the fall of the Temple, but most Jews remained, eventually to be converted to Islam following the Muslim conquest in the 7th century and afterwards. Some modern Palestinians are more likely to be descended from the ancient Israelites than are modern Israelis who have migrated from Russia ... http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/non-fiction/article6912556.ece [/quote] Shlomo Sand ~ From Wikipedia [quote]Sand was born in Linz, Austria, to Polish Jewish survivors of the Holocaust. In his book Matai ve’ech humtza ha’am hayehudi? (The Invention of the Jewish People), "[Sand] tries to prove that the Jewish people never existed as a "nation-race" with a common origin, but rather is a colorful mix of groups that at various stages in history adopted the Jewish religion. He argues that for a number of Zionist ideologues, the mythical perception of the Jews as an ancient people led to truly racist thinking".[Shattering a 'national mythology' by Ofri Ilani, Haaretz, March 2008] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shlomo_Sand [/quote] Shattering a 'national mythology' by Ofri Ilani [quote]'According to the Tel Aviv University historian, Prof. Shlomo Sand, .... the queen's [Jewess Dahia al-Kahina, a leader of the Berbers in the Aures Mountains] tribe and other local tribes that converted to Judaism are the main sources from which Spanish Jewry sprang. This claim that the Jews of North Africa originated in indigenous tribes that became Jewish - and not in communities exiled from Jerusalem - is just one element of the far- reaching argument set forth in Sand's new book. 'In this work, the author attempts to prove that the Jews now living in Israel and other places in the world are not at all descendants of the ancient people who inhabited the Kingdom of Judea during the First and Second Temple period ..... ' "After being forcibly exiled from their land, the people remained faithful to it throughout their Dispersion and never ceased to pray and hope for their return to it and for the restoration in it of their political freedom" - thus states the preamble to the Israeli Declaration of Independence. This is also the quotation that opens the third chapter of Sand's book, entitled "The Invention of the Diaspora." Sand argues that the Jewish people's exile from its land never happened.' From the article: Shattering a 'national mythology' ~ By Ofri Ilani http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/966952.html [/quote] Shlomo Sand’s ‘The Invention of the Jewish People,’ reviewed by Jack Ross [quote]Last Spring, I asked my father over dinner why it was such an outrageous proposition, leaving aside whether or not true, that Judaism is solely a matter of confession, as opposed to an ethnonational identity. He answered with some trepidation “because it contradicts 2,000 years of history.” Shlomo Sand may well be remembered – and very possibly within our lifetime – for knocking down the idol of “the Jewish people” as did Spinoza to classical rabbinic orthodoxy. ... Tony Judt: “In cool, scholarly prose, he has, quite simply, normalized Jewish history. In place of the implausible myth of a unique nation with a special destiny – expelled, isolated, wandering and finally restored to its rightful home – he has reconstructed the history of the Jews and convincingly reintegrated that history into the general story of humankind. The self-serving and mostly imaginary Jewish past that has done so much to provoke conflict in the present is revealed, like the past of so many other nations, to be largely an invention.” by Jack Ross on October 10, 2009 http://mondoweiss.net/2009/10/shlomo-sands-the-invention-of-the-jewish-people-reviewed-by-jack-ross.html [/quote] Leading Israeli historian evaluates the national myth of the Jewish exile from the promised land [quote]All modern nation states have a story of their origins, passed down through both official and popular culture, and yet few of these accounts have proved as divisive and influential as the Israeli national myth “.... this well-documented and fearless book explodes is the myth of a unique Jewish people, miraculously preserved, in contrast to all the other peoples......” — Jacques Julliard, Le Nouvel Observateur http://www.versobooks.com/books/nopqrs/s-titles/sand_shlomo_invention_of_the_jewish_people.shtml [/quote] See: http://inventionofthejewishpeople.com/

I would think in our modern world of DNA testing that it would be quite interesting to do tests on a variety of Jewish people, and see where all of their roots trace to. You would think for example that Jewish people along the way had interbred with locals. So their descendants would be half Jewish, but half something else.

That sort of comes down to the question with for example Obama - he is half Kenyan, half "American" (mostly English). So I'm always curious why we call him African American, when we could just as easily call him "white", since he is half and half.

Do people choose their "favorite" ancestors and side with them?

My ex husband always called himself Irish, even though you had to go back to 1832 to find an ancestor who was actually born in Ireland. Everyone else was born in the US. Even along the way there was, for example, his grandmother who was full blooded Italian. So if he had a "sort of Irish" grandfather, a full blooded Italian grandmother, and then the other two grandparents were solid long term Americans (mostly English), shouldn't he therefore be an "English / American" person?

i've always thought that its fairly obvious to anyone with a reasonable grasp of european history that the palestinians would be more closely related to the ancient israelites than the modern day israelites are.

long before the days of moses (if he existed that is), the original israelites left their homeland due to drought famine and possibly persecution and emigrated to egypt, which is why they were there to help build the pyramids in the first place. there is virtually no evidence that they were ever slaves there, in fact they held considerable power and influence as the hyksos ruling class , as they seem to wherever they go. a new pharao reduced their status to that of peasants, and they marched off in a huff, apparently under the leadership of moses (if he existed). others still say that there is no archaeological evidence whatsoever that hebrews even existed at this time, in egypt, or during the exodus, and the whole thing is nothing more than a folk myth. which seems likely to me. i can't help being amused by the fact that there is a very likely site for the real mount sinai in saudi arabia.

in any case in 586 bc nebuchadnezzar ii invaded judah and exiled the populus to babylon, so to my mind the decendants of the exodus israelites, which are the ones the orthodox jews make such a fuss about, are probably to be found in modern day iraq. of the 50,000 jews granted their freedom, only about 5,000 returned to judah.

around 200 bc there was a maccabean revolt (celebrated in hanukka) which restored judaism for a hundred years or so, until the romans rocked up in 64 bc, adding their own complex bloodlines. between then and 1917, the area was alternately controlled by arabs ottomans and christians, so one can safely assume that the bloodlines of the 5,000 or so who returned from babylon have been diluted out of existence...

the zionist myth was dreamt up in the 1800's by emancipated jews, who, not content with fighting for equality in their then homelands felt they were special enough to deserve their own country. as early as 1897 the zionist congress proclaimed it intended to steal palestine from the palestinians and turn it into the jewish homeland.

in world war one lloyd george promised palestine to the jews in return for fighting against the germans, so as early as 1917 the english were already promising someone elses land to the jews. it is no surprise that ten years later the league of nations assigned the palestine mandate to the british who were already allowing right wing nationalist jewish parties to raise taxes in the area. even before ww2 the british were trying to pull their usual partition trick to separate the area into palestine and israel - completely illegally.

when after ww2 the british were trying to juggle their treaties with the arab world, there was a huge jewish uprising in the area, leading most famously to the king david hotel bombing. thanks to the violent behaviour of zionists, the british tried to stem the flow of jewis immigrants, mostly from russia and poland by imprisoning the migrants in cyprus. too late. they abdicated control of the situation to the un, which partitionaed the area illegally, and gave palestinian land to the jewish immigrants.

within months, the local arabs understandably mounted a war of resitance, and israel was at war with all of its neighbours. this made life hot for jews in arab states, who fled to their new jewish homeland. since then, israel has embarked on a collossal illegal landgrab, starting many 'jewish settlements', or, as senible people would call them, colonial outposts, which are widely known to be illegal under international law. buut israel doesn't care, because arabs are dogs, and jews are god's people.


so, in my opinion, although many orthodox jews 'know' their history simply because the torah tells them what it is, the jewish state has no bloodline to the people who allegedly left egypt under moses (if he existed). israeli ancestry does not go beyond eastern europe and refugees from the holocaust and arab states, beyond which it gets diluted out beyond significance. the state of israel is an illegal land grab which has been conceived over the past 150 years by right wing nationalists - it is not the promised land as bequeathed by god.

do people choose their favourite ancestors? of course they do. by tracing themselves back to the exodus orthodox jews are impressing on the world that they are a special case and deserve a country. this would be harder to do on a basis of religious adherents scattered across europe and the middle east plotting how to establish their own theocracy at the expense of the rightful owners of the land, who are actually the best candidates for being the descendants of the exodus people(if the exodus actually happened).

zionism has no historical or archaeological basis so instead they choose to base themselves on ot fairy stories which sound brilliant and are' typically for scriptures, hard to refute. it is right wing nationalism of the worst kind, and has displaced the best part of a million palestinians, and killed many thousands of them. i think the worlds support for the state of israel is a disgrace and illustrative of western disregard for arab lives, and western spinelessness in the face of the jewish lobby which is all powerful in the western media and governments. which is why i very much doubt that dna profiling will ever happen - zionism works very hard to supress unfavourable publicity, which is why i am probably about to be called an antisemite. again. oh well.

It certainly seems logical.

The same thing happens with some of my relatives.

they call them plastic irish in ireland.

Really?:)

yep.

I wonder how people choose which particular ancestry trail to latch onto. Is it usually the male trail, since that is where the name comes down? With my ex it was pretty much only the male in each generation which was still Irish (or half Irish, or quarter Irish, or so on).

My father wanted to go visit his German roots because in the early 1800s his Waller family came from Germany. But it's all the male line in that chain, not the women or the parents of the women.

I am English.

My ancestors come from England, Wales, Ireland, Scotland, Greece, probably Slovenia, and most likely other places, too.

I trace any & all lines that I can find.
It's absolutely fascinating.

But I am English.