Where do you think Jewish people come from?

[BlessedIsTheFruit]

Antisemitism is at full volume at the moment and I caveat this post with saying that I have absolutely no wish to make Jewish MNers feel uncomfortable but as an an atheist with no connection to Israel this really makes my blood boil.

I see so many SM posts about the Jews having 'colonized' Israel and Judea & Samaria, not having any claim to the land, not being indigenous and of course being 'Europeans settlers'.

They can't answer where they actually come from though so I thought anyone on here who shares their views might be able to give an answer and how they came to that conclusion.

I understand that Jews are an ethnicity with Judaism as their religion. Being Jewish is not a religion. Jews are still today spread out all over the world with the majority living in Israel and the US.

This has come into focus since the UK Government sanctions on Jewish businesses in Judea & Samaria recently with Jewish communities living there classed as 'illegal settlers'.

It's almost as if Jews and Judea have no connection at all.

So AIBU to ask where the Jews originated from if not from there?

I don't feel this belongs on the CITME board as although the war in Gaza has amplified beliefs, this not directly about that.

No , there are differences. The right to automatically move there only applies to Jews (I understand why, but it is a difference), for one.

Arabic actually originally was an official language! Imo it should not have been changed . It was only changed 8 years ago, in 2018.

I definitely agree with this. Occupation would ideally end but the Palestinians have been failed by all their leaders, as well as the UN. Israelis need assurance they can be safe. Hopefully the current efforts will have better results ...

Re Arabs being doctors are pharmacists: part of the issue is that Christian Arabs do much better than Muslim Arabs due to church schools being strong. Arabs in general do face discrimination but the education issue is due to multiple factors.

Jewish people have different ethnic groups : Ashkenazi, Mizrahi, Beta, Bene etc but they do all share common ancestry.

I don't see much hope either. Both sides are too entrenched. But we thought that about Northern Ireland too.

I know not the direct topic, but these articles on the schools issue are interesting:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/31/world/middleeast/israel-schools-jews-arabs.html

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/israel-middle-east/articles/arab-jewish-school

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/israel-middle-east/articles/israeli-arabs-jewish-schools

Yes, exactly. But Northern Ireland took centuries to resolve... Things come and go. Back in the 90s, it was so close to a resolution. Eventually we might get back to a point where an agreement will become feasible again.

That's right. But every country sets its own immigration law. For example, Armenia allows ethnic Armenians from anywhere in the world to freely move there but not, say, ethnic Azeris.

And also true about the Nation State law which changed the status of Arabic to special language. Many Israelis oppose that law and I hope it will be repealed - it was unecessary and cause bad feeling among non-Jewish minorities

Germany is still paying, excuse me if it's been said already I haven't had a chance to read the full thread yet

The Poland & Greece reparations is a bit of a grey area, no pun, due to the Soviet pressure at the time

Lol I've give up reminding people that Islam is new as it doesn't fit what people want to hear.

💯

Germany did and do pay reparations. If you have ever been to Germany you would know how open they are about the holocaust, and there are numerous sights and plaques all over dedicated to victims of the holocaust including the non-Jewish victims. Germany have acknowledged their awful history far better than Britain has.

Pot, kettle, black. You call any argument against your support for the illegal settlements in the West Bank 'terrorist propaganda'. Your bias is blatant. You pretend to ask a legitimate question but you attack every poster who disagrees with you.

Luckily, the tide is turning against this hard-right messianic Israeli government.

Happy? No. Of course not. But as the world collectively decided Jewish people don’t belong in Spain, Iraq, Afghanistan, England, etc etc at various points in history it’s unclear to me where people think we ‘do’ belong. Hamas certainly thinks we belong nowhere and should be wiped out. We have been kicked out of almost every other country in the Middle East (years before the current war). We obviously will never feel safe in Europe. So no. Obviously I don’t love the background (of America or Australia or Pakistan or or or) but we are here now and can’t fix our past. And any solution Hamas has suggested is pretty horrific.

Ur of the Chaldees is where Abram came from, I believe.

Having got that out of my system, there are (at least) two things which make this a really difficult situation to solve.

Firstly, Jews absolutely need a country. Over a thousand years of history tells us that, for reasons I don't fully understand, almost whenever a country starts to go bad, Jews are among the first to be persecuted. It's not just the Holocaust, it's hundreds of years of discrimination, expulsion and suspicion. So if they are not going to have the country of Israel, where can they have which will be a safe haven?

Secondly, there are people on both sides who think they have a divine right to the land. Some Jews believe God gave it to them. Some Muslims hold the view that any land which has ever been ruled by Muslims must never be allowed to pass out of Muslim control. I am not sure how prevalent those views are, but I suspect their existence (on both sides) is why the two state solution never seems to get off the ground.

Unless the UN or someone (probably the US) wants to get back to colonisation and enforce a two state solution (which will mean both sides hate and attack them and given Israel has a very good military I'm not sure it would even be possible) I think that part of the world will continue to be a brutal mess. I wish there was an answer but I don't think there is.

Except they're not. However it is the Jewish people's ancestral homeland from where they were forcibly displaced

But the discourse on this has to include what’s happening in Gaza. It’s not anti-semitic to include two genocides in the discussion. You’re asking about the jewish homeland; people are suggesting that Israelis indiscriminately killing and displacing the people who also live there is not helpful.
I completely agree that Israel is a home for Jewish people, going back millennia, and it is also a home for Palestinians, going back millennia.

People can’t expect to come on here and say ”how dare you discount the extermination of Jews in the 1930s and 40s” (which I haven’t actually seen anyone do on this thread. I think there is generally - for once- a good understanding of the constant discrimination and forced movement of Jews throughout history) and then immediately go on to say the genocide in Gaza is all a lie and propaganda, whilst movements are made to do the same thing in the West Bank.

You can’t have this discussion whilst pretending war/genocide surrounding this very subject is not happening right now

Hello! I presume I’m one of them… us bots still need to decide what’s for dinner, find stuff for our husbands that is right in front of their noses, and do the school run. Except my school run involves taking my turn putting on a stab vest and standing outside huge metal gates to protect the kids and teachers inside.

jolly nice to meet you

I never understood why the term "ethno-religion" is used in this context. I think it would be better to use a term that combines "religion" and "culture" because those are things you can adopt.

I am not going to share the ethnic background of a Ashkenazi Jewish person by converting to Judaism. Though I am pretty sure my conversion would allow me citizenship in Israel.

I feel for you, it’s bloody awful. No one should have to do this outside schools and synagogues.

It's not just an "interesting" version, it's far more based in fact than your little fantasy. Perhaps if you read some books rather than getting your education on tiktok. "One Palestine, complete" by Tom Segev is a good acount of what happened during the British mandate and in the run up to the State of Israel. It has absolutely nothign to do with the US and certainly not because Britain didn't take refugees. How absurd.

The UN brought Jews to Palestine and gave them land? WTAF? That never happened and the UN had no authority to make it happen. The UN voted on partition after the British requested it try to find a solution as they couldn't. The UN commission (no Britis involved) thought partition the fairest way forward and it was voted on and passed as a resolution. Rejected by the Arabs - but with no counter proposal. They rejected ANY jewish self determination in mandatory Palestine. It was their way or the highway, no compromise. They thought they'd win it all and they lost.

What is interesting though is that the Palestinian Arabs never declared a state. The Palestinian Zionists did, on the day the Brits left. Why didn't the Palestinan Arabs declare a state of Palestine in 1948. They certainly could have if they'd have wanted.

Their mother's vaginas.

You don't have a claim to a place just because your ancestors used to live there. I don't see America giving America back or the Australians giving Australia back etc etc.

I don't give a damn where your religion came from, I care that you're brutally murdering, torturing and raping people including children. It's not anti-Semitism because I think the same of all the men doing that shit no matter who you pray to. If your god is ok with that then I'd rather spend eternity in hell

I’m definitely not a Zionist bot! There have been some useful books / resources shared on this thread.

Thank you - the saddest part is that it’s so normal, we don’t even think about it.

i had to take my son for a catch-up vaccination, which was held at a regular local primary school. We just walked in from
the street. He was stunned, and so worried for the kids there that there wasn’t security on the door ☹️

this whole thread has been so refreshingly supportive and reinforced my suspicions that most of our lovely fellow Brits do support us - even if they’d rather keep quiet than face abuse for stating their support. So, thank you - it’s a great feeling to wake up to

You don't have a claim to a place just because your ancestors used to live there

I know you're applying that statement to the Israeli Jews you've just committed blood libel against, but that's the entire basis of Palestinian discontent dismissed there. Israel exists now, several generations have been born there.