Israel
American Heritage Dictionary:
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Is·ra·el2
A country of southwest Asia on the eastern Mediterranean Sea. It was established in 1948 following the British withdrawal from Palestine, which had been divided by recommendation of the United Nations into Jewish and Arab states. Discord with neighboring Arab countries that had rejected the UN partition led to numerous wars, notably in 1948-1949, 1956-1957, 1967, and 1973. In the Six-Day War of 1967 Israel occupied the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Jerusalem's Old City, the Golan Heights, and the Sinai Peninsula. The Golan Heights and Jerusalem were later annexed, and the Sinai was returned to Egypt in 1982. A 1993 Israeli-Palestinian accord granted limited Palestinian autonomy in the Gaza Strip, and a similar accord calling for Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank was signed in 1994. Jerusalem is the capital and Tel Aviv-Yafo the largest city. Population: 6,430,000.
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Israel
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The instrumental version of the national anthem of Israel.
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Oxford Dictionary of Dance:
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Israel
Ballet performances date back to the 1920s when Rina Nikova, a Russian émigrée dancer, founded her own company in Jerusalem and staged classically based works with biblical themes. During the 1930s settlers from central Europe like Gertrud Kraus and Tilla Rossler established some modern dance activity via various studios and solo performances and vigorously opposed the establishment of classical dance as being out of sympathy with the country's character. The 1930s also saw the origins of a folk dance movement, by Rivka Sturman, Gurit Kadman, and others, who drew on Arab and Druze steps as well as their own choreographic invention to create dances that symbolized the link between the new Jewish settlers and the land. The most successful use of indigenous dance forms was that of Sara Levi-Tanai who founded the Inbal Dance Theatre in 1949. At the beginning she fused modern ballet technique with the softer, grounded style of Yemenite dance but later drew on a wider range of folk traditions. After the late 1940s American modern dance became a major influence with the arrival of some US dancers in Israel and trips by Israeli dancers to study at New York's Juilliard School and with Graham. Kraus and Talley Beatty formed the short-lived Israel Ballet Theatre in 1951 and Anna Sokolow staged several works for the Lyrical Theatre (1962-4). Most of the latter's dancers joined the Batsheva Dance Company which was founded by Bethsabee de Rothschild in 1964, and was the first permanent professional modern dance company in Israel. Its style was grounded in Graham technique and it had works by Graham, Sokolow, Cranko, Tetley, Robbins, Cohan, Butler, and Morrice in its repertory. It has been sponsored by the State since 1974. Batsheva is currently run by Ohad Naharin whose choreography has a distinctive surreal theatricality. In 1968 Rothschild founded a second company, the Bat-Dor Dance Company, with Jeannette Ordman as its artistic director. Batsheva lost its right to perform the Graham repertoire after Graham died, though Bat-Dor has now been licensed to stage her works.
In 1967 the Classical Ballet Company, now the Israel Ballet, was formed by B. Yampolsky and Hillel Markman and other classical dance was encouraged by the introduction of the English RAD syllabus into dance teaching and the opening of the Russian-oriented Haifa dance centre in 1969 by Lisa Schubert. She also founded the Piccolo Ballet in 1975. In more recent years a number of small dance companies have emerged despite the disruptions caused to arts activity by ongoing hostilities with the Arab states. The Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company, based in Tel Aviv from the late 1960s, began as a repertory company but now largely performs work by its resident choreographer Rami Be'er (who was also appointed director in 1997), including the full-length work Black Angels made in 1992 to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the expulsion of the Jews from Spain. In 1993 the company was the first Israeli group to dance in Beijing. Koldemema (Voice of Silence) was founded in 1975 by ex-Batsheva dancer and choreographer Moshe Efrat. In 1992 the performing duo Liat Dror and Nir Ben-Gal expanded to an ensemble and have established an international reputation with their European style of hard-edged risk-taking choreography. The dance scene has been lively and various enough to sustain the annual Karmiel Dance Festival, established in 1987.
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Yitzhak Rabin
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From our Archives: Today's Highlights, November 4, 2005
Columbia Encyclopedia:
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Yitzhak Rabin
Israel (ĭz'rēəl), officially State of Israel, republic (2005 est. pop. 6,277,000, including Israelis in occupied Arab territories), 7,992 sq mi (20,700 sq km), SW Asia, on the Mediterranean Sea. (The area figure used above does not include the Golan Heights or the West Bank, which are occupied by Israel.) It is bordered by Lebanon in the north, Syria and Jordan in the east, the Mediterranean Sea on the west, Egypt on the southwest, and the Gulf of Aqaba (an arm of the Red Sea) on the south. The capital and largest city of Israel is Jerusalem. This article deals primarily with the events in Israel from 1948 to the present. For the earlier history of the region, see Palestine.
Land and People
The country is a narrow, irregularly shaped strip of land with four principal regions: the plain along the Mediterranean coast; the mountains, which are east of this coastal plain; the Negev, which comprises the southern half of the country; and the portion of Israel that forms part of the Jordan Valley, in turn a part of the Great Rift Valley. North of the Negev, Israel enjoys a Mediterranean climate, with long, hot, dry summers and short, cool, rainy winters. This northern half of the country has a limited but adequate supply of water, except in times of drought. The Negev, however, is a semiarid desert region, having less than 10 in. (25 cm) of rainfall a year.
The most important river in Israel is the Jordan. Other smaller rivers are the Yarkon, the Kishon, and the Yarmuk, a tributary of the Jordan. Other bodies of water include the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea (part of which belongs to neighboring Jordan and the West Bank). Owing to interior drainage and a high rate of evaporation, the waters of the Dead Sea have about eight times as much salt as the ocean.
The highest point in Israel is Mt. Meron (3,692 ft/1,125 m) near Zefat. The lowest point is the shore of the Dead Sea, which is c.1,400 ft (425 m) below sea level, the lowest point on the surface of the earth. In addition to Jerusalem, other important cities include Tel Aviv-Jaffa (see separate entries on Tel Aviv, Jaffa), Haifa, Beersheba, and Netanya).
Israel proper is made up of about 76% Jews, about 18% Arabs, and the rest Druze and others. While the Jewish population as of 1948 consisted mostly of those from central and E Europe (not including Russia), Jews from African and Asian countries came in increasing numbers after 1948. The majority of the current Jewish population was born in Israel. Around 500,000 Russian Jews have arrived in recent years, as have most of the small population of Ethiopian Jews (see Falashas). The Arab population is primarily Sunni Muslim; a smaller proportion are Christians. Hebrew is the official language, while Arabic is used officially for the Arab minority and English is widely spoken.
Economy
Agriculture in Israel largely depends on extensive irrigation to compensate for the shortage of rainfall. Agricultural exports include citrus and other fruits, vegetables, and cut flowers. Other sizable crops are cotton, wheat, barley, peanuts, sunflowers, grapes, and olives. Poultry and livestock also are raised.
Most of the land (apart from the land belonging to non-Jews) is held in trust for the people of Israel by the state and the Jewish National Fund. The latter was set up in 1901 to buy land in Palestine for Jews to cultivate, and now implements a wide range of forest and land development activities. The Israel Land Authority leases the land to kibbutzim, which are communal agricultural settlements; to moshavim, which are cooperative agricultural communities; and to other agricultural or rural villages.
High-technology industries are Israel's fastest-growing businesses, with emphasis on computers, software, aviation, telecommunications, biotechnology, medical electronics, and fiber optics. Diamond cutting and polishing is also important, and a number of light industries produce wood and paper products, processed foods, tobacco, precision instruments, metal and plastic goods, chemicals, textiles, and footwear. The Dead Sea has minerals of commercial value, such as potash, magnesium bromide, and salt. Tourism, which is one of Israel's largest sources of revenue, is also important.
Major exports include machinery and equipment, software, high-technology and military products, cut diamonds, agricultural products, chemicals and pharmaceuticals, and textiles and apparel. Leading imports are raw materials, military equipment, rough diamonds, fuels, grain, and consumer goods. Although Israel imports more than it exports, the balance of trade is far more favorable now than it was in the early years of the state. The United States is by far the country's largest trading partner, as well as its major source of economic and military aid. Other important trading partners are Belgium, Germany, Great Britain, and Hong Kong.
Government
Israel has no constitution; it is governed under the 1948 Declaration of Establishment as well as parliamentary and citizenship laws. The president is head of state, a largely ceremonial role, and is elected by the legislature for a seven-year term with no term limits. The government is headed by the prime minister, generally the leader of the largest party following legislative elections. The unicameral legislature consists of the 120-seat Knesset, whose members are elected by popular vote for four-year terms. The prime minister appoints a cabinet that must be approved by the Knesset; both the prime minister and the president are responsible to the Knesset. Administratively, the country is divided into six districts.
History
Beginnings of the Israeli State
The state of Israel is the culmination of nearly a century of activity in Zionism. Following World War I, Great Britain received (1922) Palestine as a mandate from the League of Nations. The struggle by Jews for a Jewish state in Palestine had begun in the late 19th cent. and had become quite active by the 1930s and 40s, when Jewish immigration greatly increased as a result of the events in Europe. Jewish-Arab violence in the area led to the establishment of guerrilla forces on both sides, and there were Jewish terror attacks on the British.
The militant opposition of the Arabs to the division of Palestine to create a Jewish state (and the inability of the British to solve the problem eventually led to the establishment (1947) of the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine, which devised a plan to divide Palestine into a Jewish state, an Arab state, and a small internationally administered zone including Jerusalem. The General Assembly adopted the recommendations on Nov. 29, 1947. The Jews accepted the plan; the Arabs rejected it. As the British began to withdraw early in 1948, Arabs and Jews prepared for war.
On May 14, 1948, when the British high commissioner for Palestine departed, the state of Israel was proclaimed at Tel Aviv. Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, and Iraq invaded Israel, as most Palestinian Arabs were driven from Jewish territory. By the time armistice agreements were reached (Jan., 1949), Israel had increased its holdings by about one-half. Jordan annexed the Arab-held area adjoining its territory, and Egypt occupied the coastal Gaza Strip in the southwest.
The New Nation
A government was formed at Tel Aviv, with Chaim Weizmann as president and David Ben-Gurion as prime minister. The capital was moved (Dec., 1949) to Jerusalem to strengthen Israel's claim to that city. Following the Lausanne Conference of 1949, Israel allowed the return of 150,000 Arab refugees, mostly to reunite families. One major aim of the government was to gather in all Jews who wished to immigrate to Israel. This led to the 1950 Law of the Return, which provided for free and automatic citizenship for all immigrant Jews. Border incidents with Egypt, Syria, and Jordan continued.
Trouble in the Gaza area reached new heights in the mid-1950s despite UN intervention, and in 1956, Egyptian President Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal. On Oct. 29, 1956, Israel made a preemptive attack on Egyptian territory and within a few days had conquered the Gaza Strip and the Sinai peninsula, while Britain and France invaded the area of the Suez Canal. Israel eventually yielded to strong pressure from the United States, the USSR, and the United Nations and removed its troops from Sinai in Nov., 1956, and from Gaza by Mar., 1957, as UN forces were sent to the Sinai and Gaza to keep peace between Egypt and Israel. Through this war, Israel succeeded in keeping open its shipping lanes via Elat and the Gulf of Aqaba to the Red Sea.
In 1962, Israel became the scene of the celebrated trial of Adolf Eichmann. In 1963, Ben-Gurion resigned as prime minister and was succeeded in that office by Levi Eshkol. Eshkol had to cope with increased guerrilla incursions into Israel from Syria and the shelling of Israeli villages by the Syrian army from the Golan Heights.
Renewed Hostilities
In May, 1967, Nasser mobilized the Egyptian army in Sinai. The UN then acceded to his demand to withdraw from the Israeli-Egyptian border, where it had been stationed since 1956. Egypt next blockaded the Israeli port of Elat (on the Gulf of Aqaba) by closing the Strait of Tiran.
On June 5, 1967, Israel struck against Egypt and Syria; Jordan subsequently attacked Israel. In six days, Israel occupied the Gaza Strip and the Sinai peninsula of Egypt, the Golan Heights of Syria, and the West Bank and Arab sector of E Jerusalem (both under Jordanian rule), thereby giving the conflict the name of the Six-Day War. Israel unified the Arab and Israeli sectors of Jerusalem, and Arab guerrillas stepped up their incursions, operating largely from Jordan. After Eshkol's death in 1969, Golda Meir became prime minister. There followed an inconclusive period when there was neither peace nor war in the area.
On Oct. 6, 1973, on the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur, Egypt and Syria attacked Israeli positions in the Sinai and the Golan Heights. Other Arab states sent contingents of soldiers to aid in the attack on Israel. Egypt succeeded in sending troops in force across the Suez Canal to the east bank before being halted by Israeli troops. Toward the end of the fighting, the Israelis managed to send their own troops across the Suez Canal to the west bank, encircling Egypt's Third Army on the east bank and clearing a path to Cairo. They also drove the Syrians even further back toward Damascus. A cease-fire called for by the UN Security Council on Oct. 22 and 23 went into effect shortly thereafter.
Attempts at Peace
In Dec., 1973, the first Arab-Israeli peace conference opened in Geneva, Switzerland, under UN auspices. An agreement to disengage Israeli and Egyptian forces was reached in Jan., 1974, largely through the "shuttle diplomacy" mediation of U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Israeli troops withdrew several miles into the Sinai, a UN buffer zone was established, and Egyptian forces reoccupied the east bank of the Suez Canal and a small, adjoining strip of land in the Sinai. A similar agreement between Israel and Syria was achieved in May, 1974, again through the efforts of Kissinger. Under its terms, Israeli forces evacuated the Syrian lands captured in the 1973 war (while continuing to hold most of the territory conquered in 1967, such as the Golan Heights) and a UN buffer zone was created.
Golda Meir resigned and was succeeded (1974) by Yitzhak Rabin, who formed a coalition government. In 1977, the Likud party under the leadership of Menachem Begin defeated the Labor party for the first time in Israeli elections. As prime minister, Begin strongly supported the development of Jewish settlements in the Israeli-occupied territories and opposed Palestinian sovereignty.
Egypt began peace initiatives with Israel in late 1977, when Egyptian President Sadat visited Jerusalem. A year later, with the help of U.S. President Jimmy Carter, terms of peace between Egypt and Israel were negotiated at Camp David, Md. (see Camp David accords). A formal treaty, signed on Mar. 26, 1979, in Washington, D.C., granted full recognition of Israel by Egypt, opened trade relations between the two countries, returned the Sinai to Egyptian control (completed in 1982), and limited Egyptian military buildup in the Sinai.
The 1980s to the Present
Israeli troops briefly invaded (1979) Lebanon in an unsuccessful attempt to eliminate Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) bases and forces used in raids on N Israel. On June 6, 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon in a second attempt. Israeli troops advanced to Beirut and surrounded the western part of the city, which housed PLO headquarters, and a siege ensued. Israeli troops began a gradual move out of Lebanon (completed in 1985) after PLO forces withdrew from Beirut. A 6-mi (10-km) deep security zone within S Lebanon was established to protect N Israeli settlements.
Begin had been returned to office in 1981, but he resigned in 1983 and was replaced by Likud's Yitzhak Shamir. Undecisive majorities in the 1984 elections led to a sharing of the prime ministership by Shamir and Shimon Peres of the Labor party. Shamir, who regained sole prime ministership after the 1988 elections, strongly upheld the policy of increased Jewish settlement in the occupied territories. Large numbers of emigrants from Ethiopia and, primarily, the Soviet Union increased Israel's population by nearly 10% in three years (1989-92), leading to increased unemployment and a lack of housing.
In Dec., 1987, a popular Arab uprising (Intifada) began against Israeli rule in the occupied territories. During the Persian Gulf War in early 1991, Israel suffered Iraqi missile attacks, as Iraq unsuccessfully attempted to disrupt the allied coalition and widen the war. Peace talks between Israel, Syria, Lebanon, and a joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation began in Aug., 1991.
Rabin reentered the political scene in 1992, becoming prime minister after the defeat of the Likud party and the establishment of a Labor-led coalition. He pursued Arab-Israeli peace negotiations, in which significant progress was made. In 1993, Israel and the PLO signed an accord providing for joint recognition and for limited Palestinian self-rule in the Gaza Strip and Jericho. In 1995, Israel and the PLO agreed on a transition to Palestinian self-rule in most of the West Bank, although acts of terrorism continued to darken Israeli-Palestinian relations. In 1994 a treaty with Jordan ended the 46-year-old state of war between the two nations.
In Nov., 1995, Rabin was assassinated by a right-wing Israeli extremist who opposed the West Bank peace accord with the PLO; Peres, who was foreign minister, became prime minister. In early 1996, Israel was hit by a series of suicide bombs, and Shiite Muslims launched rocket attacks into Israel from Lebanon. Retaliating, Israel blockaded the port of Beirut and launched a series of attacks on targets in S Lebanon.
The 1996 elections, in which the prime minister was elected directly for the first time, resulted in a narrow victory for Likud's Benjamin Netanyahu, who opposed Labor's land-for-peace deals. In an attempt to allay fears about Israel's future policies, Netanyahu pledged to continue the peace process. After setbacks and delays, most of Hebron was handed over to Palestinian control in Jan., 1997, and, under an accord signed in 1998, Israel agreed to withdraw from additional West Bank territory, while the Palestinian Authority pledged to take stronger measures to fight terrorism. Further negotiations over territory, however, were essentially stalled.
In the May, 1999, elections, Labor returned to power under Ehud Barak, a former army chief of staff. He formed a broad-based coalition government, promising to ease tensions between secular and ultra-Orthodox Jews in Israel, as well as to move the peace process forward. In September, Barak and Yasir Arafat, the Palestinian leader, signed an agreement to finalize their borders and determine the status of Jerusalem within a year; Israel also began implementation of a plan to hand over additional West Bank territory, which was completed in Mar., 2000.
Barak's coalition was weakened in May, 2000, when three right-of-center parties pulled out of the government. In the same month, Israeli forces withdrew from the buffer zone that had long been maintained in S Lebanon. In July, negotiations in the United States between Israel and the Palestinians ended without success, and Israeli-Palestinian relations turned extremely acrimonious when a September visit by Ariel Sharon to the Haram esh-Sherif (the Temple Mount to Jews) in Jerusalem sparked riots that escalated into a new, ongoing cycle of violence in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and Israel itself. Barak resigned in Dec., 2000, in an attempt to reestablish a electoral mandate, but he was trounced in the Feb., 2001, election by Ariel Sharon, who formed a national unity government.
Despite Israeli military incursions into Palestinian territory and attacks on Palestinian authorities and forces, Palestinian attacks on Israelis in Israel and the occupied territories did not end, and in 2002 Sharon's government ordered the reoccupation of West Bank towns in a new attempt to stop those attacks. In Oct., 2002, Labor members of the government accused Sharon of favoring Israeli settlers in the occupied territories over the poor, and withdrew their support. Left with a minority government, Sharon called for parliamentary elections in early 2003, and in January Likud won a substantial victory at the polls. The following month Sharon formed a four-party, mainly right-wing coalition government.
In May, 2003, Sharon's government accepted the internationally supported "road map for peace" with some limitations; the plan envisioned the establishment of a Palestinian state in three years. Talks resumed with Palestinian authorities, who also negotiated a three-month cease-fire with Palestinian militants, and Israel made some conciliatory moves in Gaza and the West Bank. Suicide bombings and Israeli revenge attacks resumed, however, in August, and in October Israel attacked Syria for the first time in 20 years, bombing what it termed a terrorist training camp in retaliation for suicide bombings.
Israel's ongoing construction of a 400-mi (640-km) fence and wall security barrier in the West Bank, potentially enclosing some 15% of that territory, brought widespread international condemnation in late 2003, and a July, 2004, advisory opinion by the International Court of Justice (requested by Palestinians and the UN General Assembly) termed its construction illegal under international law because it was being constructed on Palestinian lands. Meanwhile, an Israeli court ruling (June) ordered the wall to be rerouted in certain areas because of the hardship it would cause Palestinians.
In March the killing of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin heightened tensions in the occupied territories, especially the Gaza Strip. Sharon's plan to withdraw from the latter, while supported by most Israelis, was rejected in a nonbinding vote (May, 2004) by Likud party members. The plan then resulted in defections from his coalition, but Sharon vowed to complete the withdrawal, which was being undertaken for security reasons, by the end of 2005. In Oct., 2004, he secured parliamentary approval for the plan. The plan also called for abandoning a few settlements in the West Bank while expanding others there. Sharon formed a new coalition that included the Labor party, which supported the Gaza withdrawal, in Jan., 2005. He subsequently agreed to a truce with Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas, and in Mar., 2005, Israeli forces began withdrawing from Jericho and other West Bank towns. The planned Gaza withdrawal sparked protests by settlers and their allies beginning in June, but in August the evacuation of the settlements proceeded relatively straightforwardly. Israeli troops withdrew from Gaza the following month.
In Nov., 2005, Shimon Peres lost his Labor party leadership post to Amir Peretz, a trade union leader. Peretz pulled Labor from the government, prompting new elections, and Sharon withdrew from Likud to form the centrist Kadima [Forward] party, in an attempt to force a realignment of Israeli politics and retain the prime ministership. In Jan., 2006, however, Sharon suffered an incapacitating stroke and was hospitalized. Ehud Olmert, the deputy prime minister, became acting prime minister and leader of the new party.
The Kadima party won a plurality in the Mar., 2006, elections, with Labor placing second. In April, Sharon was declared permanently incapacitated; Olmert became prime minister, and in May formed a new coalition government. Escalating rocket attacks from Gaza and the capture by Hamas guerrillas of an Israeli soldier led to an Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip in June, 2006, as well as other actions against Hamas and the Palestinians. Israel continue to mount attacks into Gaza in the succeeding months.
In July, Lebanese Hezbollah forces captured two Israeli soldiers, and Israel launched air attacks against targets throughout Lebanon and sent troops as far as 18.5 mi (30 km) into S Lebanon; Hezbollah responded mainly with rocket attacks against N Israel, including Haifa and Tiberias, but also offered resistance on the ground against Israeli forces. A UN-mediated cease-fire took effect in mid-August, and by early October Israel had essentially withdrawn from Lebanon. The invasion's aim of disarming Hezbollah and winning the release of the captured Israeli soldiers was in the main unattained, and Hezbollah's sustained resistance to Israeli forces enhanced the group's prestige in the Arab world. Amnesty International accused both sides of war crimes in the fighting, mainly because of their attacks on civilians.
As a result of the fighting in Gaza and Lebanon and the rise of Hamas in the Palestinian Authority, Olmert suspended his planned unilateral withdrawal from parts of the West Bank, and brought (Oct,. 2006) a far-right party into his government to strengthen the coalition in the Knesset. Also in October, Israeli police accused Israeli President Moshe Katsav of sexual assault and other crimes, prompting an investigation and leading to calls for Katsav to resign (which he refused to do). The Israeli group Peace Now asserted in November that, according to government documents, nearly 40% (and perhaps more) of the land on which Israel's West Bank settlements were built was privately owned Palestinian land, in violation of Israeli law. More current information given by the government to the group in Mar., 2007, indicated that private land made up more than 30% of the settlements but did not indicate how much was Palestinian-owned (the vast bulk of the private land in the first set of documents was Palestinian).
In Jan., 2007, the head of the Israeli armed forces resigned, taking responsibility for the unsuccessful anti-Hezbollah campaign of 2006; his resignation led the opposition to call for the prime minister and defense minister to resign as well. (An independent report, released in Apr., 2007, was critical of the prime minister's and defense minister's handling of the invasion.) Late in Jan., 2007, Katsav secured a suspension of his duties as president after Israel's attorney general said he was considering charging Katsav with rape and other crimes; a plea deal in June allowed him to plead guilty to lesser charges and avoid prison but forced him to resign. (In Apr., 2008, however, Katsav withdrew from the plea bargain and decided to contest any charges; he was convicted of rape in Dec., 2010.) and Shimon Peres was elected president earlier the same month.
The takeover of the Gaza Strip by Hamas forces (also in June, 2007) led to increased talks with the Palestinian Authority and other moves designed to strengthen President Abbas, as well as Israeli restrictions on cross-border trade into the Gaza Strip. In September, Israeli jets attacked a military site in N Syria that some reports suggested was part of nuclear program. Under U.S.-sponsorship, an international Mideast peace conference was held in Annapolis, Md., in Nov., 2007, in an attempt to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. In early 2008, in response to Hamas rocket attacks, Israel tightened its blockade of goods into the Gaza Strip, but that move and Israeli retaliatory attacks failed to stop the rocket attacks. In June, 2008, however, Egypt brokered a cease-fire between Israel and Gaza's Palestinian factions that included an easing of border restrictions, and the cease-fire largely held until November.
Also in June, Olmert, facing the loss of Labor party support because of an investigation into his alleged receipt of bribes, agreed to face a vote for the leadership of Kadima in Sept., 2008, in order to preserve the governing coalition; he later decided not to run for party leader. Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni was elected Kadima party leader, but she was unable to form a new governing coalition.
In Nov., 2008, significant fighting between Palestinian and Israeli forces began in Gaza, with rocket attacks against neighboring portions of Israel and Israeli retaliatory strikes against the Gaza Strip. In Jan., 2009, Israeli forces invaded the territory in what Israel said was an attempt to stop rocket attacks against Israel (during the fighting one rocket attack reached Ashdod, 20 mi (32 km) from Gaza). The extent of the destruction and number of non-Hamas deaths resulting from the fighting led to criticism of Israel, and both Israel and Hamas were accused by human rights groups of committing war crimes.
Parliamentary elections in Feb., 2009, resulted in a narrow plurality for Kadima and significant gains for Likud and other right-wing parties. Likud leader and former prime minister Netanyahu forged a largely right-wing coalition (the Labor party also joined the government), and became prime minister in April.
Israel's continuing approval of new construction in the West Bank led to U.S. criticism in Nov., 2009, that Israel was frustrating peace negotiations. The government subsequently suspended new construction for 10 months, but the exclusion of East Jerusalem from the moratorium and the continuing construction of buildings already begun was denounced by the Palestinians. When the moratorium ended in Sept., 2010, there had been little progress if any in negotiations, and a year later the Palestinian Authority unsuccessfully sought recognition from, and full membership in, the United Nations. Israel was widely condemned internationally for a deadly raid in May, 2010, on a Turkish-organized convoy that was seeking to challenge Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip. The raid, which occurred in international waters, significantly strained Israel's already increasingly difficult relations with Turkey.
Bibliography
See J. García-Granados, The Birth of Israel (1948); D. Ben-Gurion, Israel: Years of Challenge (1965); S. N. Eisenstadt, Israeli Society (1971); A. Perlmutter, The Military and Politics in Israel (2d ed. 1977); H. M. Sachar, A History of Israel (1979); E. Orni and E. Efrat, The Geography of Israel (4th rev. ed. 1980); C. Herzog, The Arab-Israeli Wars (1982); S. McBride, ed., Israel in Lebanon (1983); A. Arian, Politics in Israel (1985); Y. Ben-Porath, ed., The Israeli Economy (1986); S. Segev, 1949: The First Israelis (1986); B. Kimmerling, ed., The Israeli State and Society (1988); M. Mandelbaum, Israel and the Occupied Territories (1988); T. Parker, The Road to Camp David (1989); T. Segev, Crossing the Jordan: Israel's Hard Road to Peace (1998); B. Morris, Righteous Victims (rev. ed. 2001) and The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947-1949 (rev. ed. 2004); G. Gorenberg, The Accidental Empire (2006); L. Stein, The Making of Modern Israel, 1948-1967 (2009); I Peleg and D. Waxman, Israel's Palestinians (2011).
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Reflecting the intense struggle of generations not only for survival but also for the establishment of a new social order, Israeli psychoanalysis is intertwined with modern Israeli history, the reestablishment of a nation. After the publication of the 1917 Balfur Declaration, which provided the basis for establishing a Jewish state in Palestine, the British Zionist Commission was appointed. Among its members was David Eder, the first secretary of the British Psychoanalytical Society, founded in 1913. He stayed in Palestine from 1918 to 1922, during which time he urged cooperation between Jews and Arabs and proposed extending medical and social services to all segments of the population. Together with A. Feigenbaum, who immigrated to Palestine from Vienna in 1920, he worked with teachers and educators, applying psychoanalytic theories.
After both had left Palestine, there was little or no active psychoanalytical work in Palestine until the arrival of Max Eitingon (1881-1943) in Jerusalem in 1933, following Hitler's rise to power. He proceeded to found the Palestine Psychoanalytic Society (later the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society) with the help of other refugees who, like himself, came to Palestine via Berlin (Moshe Wulff, Ilja Schalit, Anna Smelianski, Gershon and Gerda Barag, Vicky Ben-Tal, Ruth Jaffe, and others).
Eitingon hoped to set up the first chair of psychoanalysis at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, where Freud had been a member of the first board of governors. But the university authorities considered the inclusion of psychoanalysis in the university setting to be premature, as a chair of psychology had yet to be established. On December 5, 1933, Freud wrote to Judah Magnes, the rector of the university, "The plan to establish a chair for psychology indicates a barely disguised rejection of psychoanalysis and the University of Jerusalem would thus have followed the example of other official teaching institutions. It is then comforting to bear in mind that Dr. Eitingon is determined to pursue the practice of psychoanalysis in Palestine also independently of the University." Nonetheless, the attempt to introduce psychoanalysis into the university was a historic first.
Eitingon then decided to create an independent psychoanalytic institute modeled after the Berlin institute. In 1934 he founded a polyclinic and the Palestine Institute of Psychoanalysis, which became the eleventh member institute of the International Psychoanalytical Association. As in Berlin, the purpose was to offer treatment, training and supervision, and a forum for discussing psychoanalytic theory. The Israeli clinic still functions according to this model to the present (2004).
Eitingon served as president of the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society (Hachevra Hapsychoanalytit be Israel) during its first ten years. The formative years of the society and the institute were characterized by idealism, devotion, and hard work, often overshadowed by political and economic difficulties. Eitingon's spirit continued to prevail after him, and within a few years there were twenty analysts practicing in Palestine. Three groups were formed in the three major cities, and all three participated in the institute. Eitingon's concern and compassion for those who needed psychoanalytic treatment was maintained and handed down from one generation of analysts to the next (the first pioneer group even raised a small fund called the "Institute's Loan Fund" to offer needy patients a daily meal, as an empty stomach is not conducive to analysis). It should be noted that in the first ten years the language used at meetings was German, and for a while later as well, some analyses were carried out in a language in which either the analyst, the patient, or both were not fluent, and they sometimes even used different languages. Eitingon left a legacy of interdisciplinary and multicultural relations and interests that made the institute a vibrant intellectual and cultural center.
The second president of the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society was Moshe Wulff (1943-1953). Wulff was born in 1878 in Odessa, Russia, and later settled in Tel Aviv. He made many important contributions to psychoanalysis, one of them being "Fetishism and Object Choice in Early Childhood" (1946). On the basis of his findings, Wulff formulated a theory about the transition from infantile narcissism to the first genuine libidinal cathexis of an outside object. He also promoted the acceptance of analysis in Israel, especially in educational circles. After Wulff, the presidency of the society rotated for almost twenty years between Heinz Winnik, founder of the Israel Annals of Psychiatry and Related Sciences and a pioneer of psychiatric education in Israel, and Erich Gumbel, the first graduate of the institute.
In the 1950s Israeli analysts became increasingly involved in education and training. Heinz Winnik and Ruth Jaffe were the first psychoanalysts to head psychiatric hospitals. Erich Gumbel led an effort that began a three-year program in psychotherapy for non-analysts, and it still continues in 2004. Analysts began teaching at the School of Medicine in Jerusalem.
In the 1960s New Yorker Mortimer Ostow set up a group in the United States of corresponding members of the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society. These American analysts maintained a special relationship with the Israeli society through visits, symposiums, and financial assistance.
Almost as a rule, members of the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society have been continuously involved in social issues. A topic of special interest to analysts is the special conditions under which children were raised in kibbutzim. Shmuel Golan, a leading theoretician and practitioner in the kibbutzim, based his educational and developmental theories on psychoanalysis (1959). Shmuel Nagler, another psychoanalyst involved in work with kibbutzim, wrote of his clinical observations of kibbutz children (1963).
In the Six-Day War (1967), Yom-Kippur War (1973), Lebanon War (1982), and Gulf War (1991), psychoanalysts assumed a significant role in treating and researching combat-stress reactions and the consequences of social violence (Raphael Moses, Gad Tadmor). Other societal issues of great interest to Israeli analysts were the Israeli-Arab conflict, immigration, and survivors of the Holocaust and their children (Hillel Klein, Shamai Davidson, Raphael Moses, Dan Hertz, Ilani Kogan, Shalom Robinson, Martin Wangh, and Yolanda Gampel). The Israeli Psychoanalytic Society and the Freud Center cosponsored conferences and dialogues between Israeli and German analysts. Prominent in this dialogue was Hillel Klein, a survivor of Auschwitz. This dialogue has evolved into a working conference held under the title "Germans and Israelis: The Past and the Present."
In 1977 the International Psychoanalytical Association held its thirtieth congress in Jerusalem. This was the first IPA congress held outside Europe. At this time, after efforts by numerous analysts throughout the world, among them Martin Wangh, Hebrew University established a chair of psychoanalysis, thus realizing Freud's dream. Joseph Sandler was the first person to hold this chair. He stayed in Jerusalem with Anne-Marie Sandler, his wife, and contributed greatly to the further development of psychoanalysis in Israel. After Sandler, a number of distinguished psychoanalysts were appointed to this chair, including Albert Solnit, who developed psychoanalytical thought in the Ben Gurion University Medical School. In the 1990s the chair was held by Shmuel Erlich, a senior psychoanalyst and academician.
Over the past twenty years, among those who made major theoretical and clinical contributions to psychoanalysis through the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society were Pinchas Noy (who contributed to psychoanalysis in the fields of art and creativity), Rivka Eiferman, Rina Moses-Hrushevski, Emanuel Berman, Ruth Stein, and Shmuel Erlich. Those who contributed to the development of child analysis in Israel include Naomi Weiss, Eliezer Ilan (who was the director of the child guidance clinic in Jerusalem), Yecheskiel Cohen (who directed a residential treatment center where boys receive psychoanalytic treatment and education), Raanan Kulka, and Yolanda Gampel.
A theme that Israeli psychoanalysts are very involved with is the consequences of social violence. Psychoanalysis at the political border (Rangell and Moses-Hrushovski, 1996), presents, among other topics, the contributions of Israeli psychoanalysts to compelling issues confronting groups and nations.
In 2004 the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society has more than 100 members, and the Israeli Psychoanalytic Institute, as it is now called, has more than 70 candidates. The number of applicants has been five times higher than can be accepted. Throughout the years, analysts who completed their training in different institutes have immigrated from Argentina, France, Holland, and the United States, bringing different outlooks and perspectives from a variety of paradigms in psychoanalysis. If influence initially emanated from European, especially classical Freudian Berliner and Viennese, psychoanalysts, current major influences are Melanie Klein's model and Heinz Kohut's ideas. During the mid-1990s Donald Winnicott's and Wilfred Bion's concepts have achieved prominence in teaching and discussion in the society. The society and institute are growing and developing creatively; its members hold leading positions in psychiatry, psychology, and particularly academia.
Bibliography
Cohen, Yecheskiel. (1988). The "golden fantasy" and countertransference: Residential treatment of the abused child. Psychoanalytic Study of the Child, 43, 337-350.
Golan, Shmuel. (1959). Collective education in the kibbutz. Psychiatry, 22, 167-177.
Kulka, Raanan. (1988). Narcissism and neurosis—an opportunity for integration in psychoanalytic theory and technique. International Journal of Psycho-analysis, 69, 521-531.
Moses, Raphael. (1998). Psychoanalyse in Israel. Psychoanalytische Blätter, 9.
Moses-Hrushovski, Rina. (1994). Deployment: Hiding behind power struggles as a character defense. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.
Noy, Pinhas. (1973). Symbolism and mental representation. Annual of Psychoanalysis, 1, 125-158.
Rangell, Leo, and Moses-Hrushovski, Rena (Eds.). (1996). Psychoanalysis at the political border. Madison, CT: International Universities Press.
Wulff, Moshe. (1946). Fetishism and object choice in early childhood. Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 15, 450-471.
—YOLANDA GAMPEL
This entry consists of the following articles:
Top
Republic in the Middle East, formerly part of Palestine. Israel is bordered by Lebanon to the north, Syria and Jordan to the east, the Gulf of Aqaba (an arm of the Red Sea) to the south, Egypt to the southwest, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Its capital and largest city is Jerusalem.
- The state of Israel, a homeland for Jews worldwide, was proclaimed in 1948. Since then, conflict has arisen because of opposition by the surrounding Arab peoples to the formation of a Jewish state on what they consider Arab territory (see Arab-Israeli conflict).
- As a move toward permanent peace between Israel and the Arab states, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat met with U. S. President James Earl Carter in the United States and signed a peace treaty in 1979.
- The United States has been Israel's major supporter, but Israeli settlements on the West Bank strained U.S.-Israel relations.
- Periodic Palestinian intifadas against Israeli domination of the West Bank and Gaza Strip continue.
CIA World Factbook:
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Israel
Introduction
| Background: | Following World War II, the British withdrew from their mandate of Palestine, and the UN partitioned the area into Arab and Jewish states, an arrangement rejected by the Arabs. Subsequently, the Israelis defeated the Arabs in a series of wars without ending the deep tensions between the two sides. The territories Israel occupied since the 1967 war are not included in the Israel country profile, unless otherwise noted. On 25 April 1982, Israel withdrew from the Sinai pursuant to the 1979 Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty. In keeping with the framework established at the Madrid Conference in October 1991, bilateral negotiations were conducted between Israel and Palestinian representatives and Syria to achieve a permanent settlement. Israel and Palestinian officials signed on 13 September 1993 a Declaration of Principles (also known as the "Oslo Accords") guiding an interim period of Palestinian self-rule. Outstanding territorial and other disputes with Jordan were resolved in the 26 October 1994 Israel-Jordan Treaty of Peace. In addition, on 25 May 2000, Israel withdrew unilaterally from southern Lebanon, which it had occupied since 1982. In April 2003, US President BUSH, working in conjunction with the EU, UN, and Russia - the "Quartet" - took the lead in laying out a roadmap to a final settlement of the conflict by 2005, based on reciprocal steps by the two parties leading to two states, Israel and a democratic Palestine. However, progress toward a permanent status agreement was undermined by Israeli-Palestinian violence between September 2003 and February 2005. An Israeli-Palestinian agreement reached at Sharm al-Sheikh in February 2005, along with an internally-brokered Palestinian ceasefire, significantly reduced the violence. In the summer of 2005, Israel unilaterally disengaged from the Gaza Strip, evacuating settlers and its military while retaining control over most points of entry into the Gaza Strip. The election of HAMAS in January 2006 to head the Palestinian Legislative Council froze relations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA). Ehud OLMERT became prime minister in March 2006; he shelved plans to unilaterally evacuate from most of the West Bank following an Israeli military operation in Gaza in June-July 2006 and a 34-day conflict with Hizballah in Lebanon in June-August 2006. OLMERT in June 2007 resumed talks with the PA after HAMAS seized control of the Gaza Strip and PA President Mahmoud ABBAS formed a new government without HAMAS. OLMERT in September 2008 resigned in the wake of several corruption allegations, but remained prime minister until the new coalition government under former Prime Minister Binyamin NETANYAHU was completed in late March 2009, following the February general election. |
Geography
| Location: | Middle East, bordering the Mediterranean Sea, between Egypt and Lebanon |
| Geographic coordinates: | 31 30 N, 34 45 E |
| Map references: | Middle East |
| Area: | total: 20,770 sq km land: 20,330 sq km water: 440 sq km |
| Area - comparative: | slightly smaller than New Jersey |
| Land boundaries: | total: 1,017 km border countries: Egypt 266 km, Gaza Strip 51 km, Jordan 238 km, Lebanon 79 km, Syria 76 km, West Bank 307 km |
| Coastline: | 273 km |
| Maritime claims: | territorial sea: 12 nm continental shelf: to depth of exploitation |
| Climate: | temperate; hot and dry in southern and eastern desert areas |
| Terrain: | Negev desert in the south; low coastal plain; central mountains; Jordan Rift Valley |
| Elevation extremes: | lowest point: Dead Sea -408 m highest point: Har Meron 1,208 m |
| Natural resources: | timber, potash, copper ore, natural gas, phosphate rock, magnesium bromide, clays, sand |
| Land use: | arable land: 15.45% permanent crops: 3.88% other: 80.67% (2005) |
| Irrigated land: | 1,940 sq km (2003) |
| Total renewable water resources: | 1.7 cu km (2001) |
| Freshwater withdrawal (domestic/industrial/agricultural): | total: 2.05 cu km/yr (31%/7%/62%) per capita: 305 cu m/yr (2000) |
| Natural hazards: | sandstorms may occur during spring and summer; droughts; periodic earthquakes |
| Environment - current issues: | limited arable land and natural fresh water resources pose serious constraints; desertification; air pollution from industrial and vehicle emissions; groundwater pollution from industrial and domestic waste, chemical fertilizers, and pesticides |
| Environment - international agreements: | party to: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Desertification, Endangered Species, Hazardous Wastes, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands, Whaling signed, but not ratified: Marine Life Conservation |
| Geography - note: | there are about 340 Israeli civilian sites - including 100 small outpost communities in the West Bank - as well as 42 sites in the Golan Heights, 0 in the Gaza Strip, and 29 in East Jerusalem (July 2008 est.); Lake Tiberias (Sea of Galilee) is an important freshwater source |
People
| Population: | 7,233,701 note: includes about 187,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank, about 20,000 in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, and fewer than 177,000 in East Jerusalem (July 2009 est.) |
| Age structure: | 0-14 years: 27.9% (male 1,031,629/female 984,230) 15-64 years: 62.3% (male 2,283,034/female 2,221,301) 65 years and over: 9.9% (male 311,218/female 402,289) (2009 est.) |
| Median age: | total: 29.1 years male: 28.4 years female: 29.8 years (2009 est.) |
| Population growth rate: | 1.671% (2009 est.) |
| Birth rate: | 19.77 births/1,000 population (2009 est.) |
| Death rate: | 5.41 deaths/1,000 population (2008 est.) |
| Net migration rate: | 2.37 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.) |
| Urbanization: | urban population: 92% of total population (2008) rate of urbanization: 1.7% annual rate of change (2005-10 est.) |
| Sex ratio: | at birth: 1.05 male(s)/female under 15 years: 1.05 male(s)/female 15-64 years: 1.03 male(s)/female 65 years and over: 0.77 male(s)/female total population: 1 male(s)/female (2009 est.) |
| Infant mortality rate: | total: 4.22 deaths/1,000 live births male: 4.39 deaths/1,000 live births female: 4.05 deaths/1,000 live births (2009 est.) |
| Life expectancy at birth: | total population: 80.73 years male: 78.62 years female: 82.95 years (2009 est.) |
| Total fertility rate: | 2.75 children born/woman (2009 est.) |
| HIV/AIDS - adult prevalence rate: | 0.1% (2007 est.) |
| HIV/AIDS - people living with HIV/AIDS: | 5,100 (2007 est.) |
| HIV/AIDS - deaths: | fewer than 200 (2007 est.) |
| Nationality: | noun: Israeli(s) adjective: Israeli |
| Ethnic groups: | Jewish 76.4% (of which Israel-born 67.1%, Europe/America-born 22.6%, Africa-born 5.9%, Asia-born 4.2%), non-Jewish 23.6% (mostly Arab) (2004) |
| Religions: | Jewish 76.4%, Muslim 16%, Arab Christians 1.7%, other Christian 0.4%, Druze 1.6%, unspecified 3.9% (2004) |
| Languages: | Hebrew (official), Arabic used officially for Arab minority, English most commonly used foreign language |
| Literacy: | definition: age 15 and over can read and write total population: 97.1% male: 98.5% female: 95.9% (2004 est.) |
| School life expectancy (primary to tertiary education): | total: 15 years male: 15 years female: 16 years (2006) |
| Education expenditures: | 6.9% of GDP (2004) |
Government
| Country name: | conventional long form: State of Israel conventional short form: Israel local long form: Medinat Yisra'el local short form: Yisra'el |
| Government type: | parliamentary democracy |
| Capital: | name: Jerusalem geographic coordinates: 31 46 N, 35 14 E time difference: UTC+2 (7 hours ahead of Washington, DC during Standard Time) daylight saving time: +1hr, begins last Friday in March; ends the Sunday between the holidays of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur note: Israel proclaimed Jerusalem as its capital in 1950, but the US, like nearly all other countries, maintains its Embassy in Tel Aviv |
| Administrative divisions: | 6 districts (mehozot, singular - mehoz); Central, Haifa, Jerusalem, Northern, Southern, Tel Aviv |
| Independence: | 14 May 1948 (from League of Nations mandate under British administration) |
| National holiday: | Independence Day, 14 May (1948); note - Israel declared independence on 14 May 1948, but the Jewish calendar is lunar and the holiday may occur in April or May |
| Constitution: | no formal constitution; some of the functions of a constitution are filled by the Declaration of Establishment (1948), the Basic Laws of the parliament (Knesset), and the Israeli citizenship law; note - since May 2003 the Constitution, Law, and Justice Committee of the Knesset has been working on a draft constitution |
| Legal system: | mixture of English common law, British Mandate regulations, and, in personal matters, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim legal systems; has not accepted compulsory ICJ jurisdiction |
| Suffrage: | 18 years of age; universal |
| Executive branch: | chief of state: President Shimon PERES (since 15 July 2007) head of government: Prime Minister Binjamin NETANYAHU (since 31 March 2009); Vice Prime Minister Silvan SHALOM (since 31 March 2009); Vice Prime Minister Moshe YAALON (since 31 March 2009) cabinet: Cabinet selected by prime minister and approved by the Knesset elections: president is largely a ceremonial role and is elected by the Knesset for a seven-year term (one-term limit); election last held 13 June 2007 (next to be held in 2014 but can be called earlier); following legislative elections, the president assigns a Knesset member - traditionally the leader of the largest party - the task of forming a governing coalition election results: Shimon PERES elected president; number of votes in first round - Shimon PERES 58, Reuven RIVLIN 37, Colette AVITAL 21; PERES elected president in second round with 86 votes (unopposed) |
| Legislative branch: | unicameral Knesset (120 seats; members elected by popular vote to serve four-year terms) elections: last held 10 February 2009 (next scheduled election to be held in 2013) election results: percent of vote by party - Kadima 23.2%, Likud-Ahi 22.3%, Yisrael Beiteinu 12.1%, Labor 10.2%, SHAS 8.8%, United Torah Judaism 4.5%, United Arab List 3.5%, NU 3.4%, Hadash 3.4%, The Jewish Home 3%, The New Movement-Meretz 3%, Balad 2.6%; seats by party - Kadima 28, Likud-Ahi 27, Yisrael Beiteinu 15, Labor 13, SHAS 11, United Torah Judaism 5, United Arab List 4, NU 4, HADASH 4, The Jewish Home 3, The New Movement-Meretz 3, Balad 3 |
| Judicial branch: | Supreme Court (justices appointed by Judicial Selection Committee - made up of all three branches of the government; mandatory retirement age is 70) |
| Political parties and leaders: | Balad [Azmi BISHARA]; Democratic Front for Peace and Equality (HADASH) [Muhammad BARAKEH]; Kadima [Tzipora "Tzipi" LIVNI]; Labor Party [Ehud BARAK]; Likud [Binyamin NETANYAHU]; National Union [Yaakov KATZ]; The Jewish Home (HaBayit HaYehudi) [Daniel HERSCHKOWITZ]; SHAS [Eliyahu YISHAI]; The New Movement-Meretz [Haim ORON]; United Arab List-Ta'al [Ibrahim SARSUR]; United Torah Judaism or UTJ [Yaakov LITZMAN]; Yisrael Beiteinu [Avigdor LIEBERMAN] |
| Political pressure groups and leaders: | B'Tselem [Jessica MONTELL, Executive Director] monitors human rights abuses; Peace Now [Yariv OPPENHEIMER, Secretary General] supports territorial concessions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip; YESHA Council of Settlements [Danny DAYAN, Chairman] promotes settler interests and opposes territorial compromise |
| International organization participation: | BIS, BSEC (observer), CERN (observer), EBRD, FAO, IADB, IAEA, IBRD, ICAO, ICC, ICCt (signatory), ICRM, IDA, IFAD, IFC, IFRCS, ILO, IMF, IMO, IMSO, Interpol, IOC, IOM, IPU, ISO, ITSO, ITU, ITUC, MIGA, OAS (observer), OECD (accession state), OPCW (signatory), OSCE (partner), PCA, SECI (observer), UN, UNCTAD, UNESCO, UNHCR, UNIDO, UNWTO, UPU, WCO, WFTU, WHO, WIPO, WMO, WTO |
| Diplomatic representation in the US: | chief of mission: Ambassador Salai MERIDOR chancery: 3514 International Drive NW, Washington, DC 20008 telephone: [1] (202) 364-5500 FAX: [1] (202) 364-5607 consulate(s) general: Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco |
| Diplomatic representation from the US: | chief of mission: Ambassador James B. CUNNINGHAM embassy: 71 Hayarkon Street, Tel Aviv 63903 mailing address: PSC 98, Box 29, APO AE 09830 telephone: [972] (3) 519-7575 FAX: [972] (3) 516-4390 consulate(s) general: Jerusalem; note - an independent US mission, established in 1928, whose members are not accredited to a foreign government |
| Flag description: | white with a blue hexagram (six-pointed linear star) known as the Magen David (Shield of David) centered between two equal horizontal blue bands near the top and bottom edges of the flag |
Economy
| Economy - overview: | Israel has a technologically advanced market economy with substantial, though diminishing, government participation. It depends on imports of crude oil, grains, raw materials, and military equipment. Despite limited natural resources, Israel has intensively developed its agricultural and industrial sectors over the past 20 years. Israel imports substantial quantities of grain but is largely self-sufficient in other agricultural products. Cut diamonds, high-technology equipment, and agricultural products (fruits and vegetables) are the leading exports. Israel usually posts sizable trade deficits, which are covered by large transfer payments from abroad and by foreign loans. Roughly half of the government's external debt is owed to the US, its major source of economic and military aid. Israel's GDP, after contracting slightly in 2001 and 2002 due to the Palestinian conflict and troubles in the high-technology sector, has grown by about 5% per year since 2003. The economy grew an estimated 4.2% in 2008, slowed by the global financial crisis. The government's prudent fiscal policy and structural reforms over the past few years have helped to induce strong foreign investment, tax revenues, and private consumption, setting the economy on a solid growth path. |
| GDP (purchasing power parity): | $200.7 billion (2008 est.) $193.2 billion (2007) $183.3 billion (2006) note: data are in 2008 US dollars |
| GDP (official exchange rate): | $188.7 billion (2008 est.) |
| GDP - real growth rate: | 3.9% (2008 est.) 5.4% (2007 est.) 5.1% (2006 est.) |
| GDP - per capita (PPP): | $28,200 (2008 est.) $27,600 (2007 est.) $26,700 (2006 est.) note: data are in 2008 US dollars |
| GDP - composition by sector: | agriculture: 2.7% industry: 31.7% services: 65.6% (2008 est.) |
| Labor force: | 2.95 million (2008 est.) |
| Labor force - by occupation: | agriculture: 2% industry: 16% services: 82% (30 September 2008) |
| Unemployment rate: | 6.1% (2008 est.) |
| Population below poverty line: | 21.6% note: Israel's poverty line is $7.30 per person per day (2005) |
| Household income or consumption by percentage share: | lowest 10%: 2.6% highest 10%: 24.2% (2007) |
| Distribution of family income - Gini index: | 38.6 (2005) |
| Investment (gross fixed): | 18% of GDP (2008 est.) |
| Budget: | revenues: $68.44 billion expenditures: $70.06 billion (2008 est.) |
| Fiscal year: | calendar year |
| Public debt: | 75.7% of GDP (2008 est.) |
| Inflation rate (consumer prices): | 4.7% (2008 est.) |
| Central bank discount rate: | 4% (31 December 2007) |
| Commercial bank prime lending rate: | 6.27% (31 December 2007) |
| Stock of money: | $15.36 billion (31 December 2006) |
| Stock of quasi money: | $154.3 billion (31 December 2007) |
| Stock of domestic credit: | $113.4 billion (31 December 2006) |
| Market value of publicly traded shares: | $236.4 billion (31 December 2007) |
| Agriculture - products: | citrus, vegetables, cotton; beef, poultry, dairy products |
| Industries: | high-technology projects (including aviation, communications, computer-aided design and manufactures, medical electronics, fiber optics), wood and paper products, potash and phosphates, food, beverages, and tobacco, caustic soda, cement, construction, metals products, chemical products, plastics, diamond cutting, textiles, footwear |
| Industrial production growth rate: | 4.1% (2008 est.) |
| Electricity - production: | 48.7 billion kWh (2006 est.) |
| Electricity - consumption: | 44.74 billion kWh (2006 est.) |
| Electricity - exports: | 1.844 billion kWh (2006 est.) |
| Electricity - imports: | 0 kWh (2007 est.) |
| Electricity - production by source: | fossil fuel: 99.9% hydro: 0.1% nuclear: 0% other: 0% (2001) |
| Oil - production: | 5,966 bbl/day (2007 est.) |
| Oil - consumption: | 232,300 bbl/day (2006 est.) |
| Oil - exports: | 82,910 bbl/day (2005) |
| Oil - imports: | 334,300 bbl/day (2005) |
| Oil - proved reserves: | 1.94 million bbl (1 January 2008 est.) |
| Natural gas - production: | 2.35 billion cu m (2006 est.) |
| Natural gas - consumption: | 2.27 billion cu m (2006 est.) |
| Natural gas - exports: | 0 cu m (2007 est.) |
| Natural gas - imports: | 0 cu m (2007 est.) |
| Natural gas - proved reserves: | 30.44 billion cu m (1 January 2008 est.) |
| Current account balance: | $1.893 billion (2008 est.) |
| Exports: | $54.16 billion f.o.b. (2008 est.) |
| Exports - commodities: | machinery and equipment, software, cut diamonds, agricultural products, chemicals, textiles and apparel |
| Exports - partners: | US 35%, Belgium 7.5%, Hong Kong 5.8% (2007) |
| Imports: | $62.52 billion f.o.b. (2008 est.) |
| Imports - commodities: | raw materials, military equipment, investment goods, rough diamonds, fuels, grain, consumer goods |
| Imports - partners: | US 13.9%, Belgium 7.9%, Germany 6.2%, China 6.1%, Switzerland 5.1%, UK 4.7%, Italy 4.1% (2007) |
| Reserves of foreign exchange and gold: | $38.66 billion (31 December 2008 est.) |
| Debt - external: | $91.25 billion (31 December 2008 est.) |
| Stock of direct foreign investment - at home: | $68.06 billion (2008 est.) |
| Stock of direct foreign investment - abroad: | $51.94 billion (2008 est.) |
| Currency (code): | new Israeli shekel (ILS); note - NIS is the currency abbreviation; ILS is the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) code for the NIS |
| Currency code: | ILS |
| Exchange rates: | new Israeli shekels (ILS) per US dollar - 3.56 (2008 est.), 4.14 (2007), 4.4565 (2006), 4.4877 (2005), 4.482 (2004) |
Communications
| Telephones - main lines in use: | 3.005 million (2006) |
| Telephones - mobile cellular: | 8.902 million (2007) |
| Telephone system: | general assessment: most highly developed system in the Middle East although not the largest domestic: good system of coaxial cable and microwave radio relay; all systems are digital; four privately-owned mobile-cellular service providers with countrywide coverage; mobile-cellular teledensity is 140 per 100 persons international: country code - 972; submarine cables provide links to Europe, Cyprus, and parts of the Middle East; satellite earth stations - 3 Intelsat (2 Atlantic Ocean and 1 Indian Ocean) (2007) |
| Radio broadcast stations: | AM 23, FM 15, shortwave 2 (1998) |
| Radios: | 3.07 million (1997) |
| Television broadcast stations: | 17 (plus 36 repeaters) (1995) |
| Televisions: | 1.69 million (1997) |
| Internet country code: | .il |
| Internet hosts: | 1.415 million (2008) |
| Internet Service Providers (ISPs): | 21 (2000) |
| Internet users: | 2 million (2007) |
Transportation
| Airports: | 47 (2008) |
| Airports - with paved runways: | total: 30 over 3,047 m: 2 2,438 to 3,047 m: 5 1,524 to 2,437 m: 7 914 to 1,523 m: 10 under 914 m: 6 (2008) |
| Airports - with unpaved runways: | total: 17 1,524 to 2,437 m: 1 914 to 1,523 m: 2 under 914 m: 14 (2008) |
| Heliports: | 3 (2007) |
| Pipelines: | gas 176 km; oil 442 km; refined products 261 km (2008) |
| Railways: | total: 853 km standard gauge: 853 km 1.435-m gauge (2006) |
| Roadways: | total: 17,870 km paved: 17,870 km (includes 146 km of expressways) (2007) |
| Merchant marine: | total: 11 by type: cargo 2, container 9 registered in other countries: 60 (Bermuda 3, Cyprus 4, Georgia 2, Honduras 1, Liberia 23, Malta 18, Panama 3, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines 2, Slovakia 4) (2008) |
| Ports and terminals: | Ashdod, Elat (Eilat), Hadera, Haifa |
Military
| Military branches: | Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Israel Naval Forces (INF), Israel Air Force (IAF) (2007) |
| Military service age and obligation: | 18 years of age for compulsory (Jews, Druzes) and voluntary (Christians, Muslims, Circassians) military service; both sexes are obligated to military service; conscript service obligation - 36 months for enlisted men, 21 months for enlisted women, 48 months for officers; reserve obligation to age 41-51 (men), 24 (women) (2008) |
| Manpower available for military service: | males age 16-49: 1,717,362 females age 16-49: 1,636,574 (2008 est.) |
| Manpower fit for military service: | males age 16-49: 1,474,966 females age 16-49: 1,404,712 (2009 est.) |
| Manpower reaching militarily significant age annually: | male: 61,223 female: 58,219 (2009 est.) |
| Military expenditures: | 7.3% of GDP (2006) |
Transnational Issues
| Disputes - international: | West Bank and Gaza Strip are Israeli-occupied with current status subject to the Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement - permanent status to be determined through further negotiation; Israel continues construction of a "seam line" separation barrier along parts of the Green Line and within the West Bank; Israel withdrew its settlers and military from the Gaza Strip and from four settlements in the West Bank in August 2005; Golan Heights is Israeli-occupied (Lebanon claims the Shab'a Farms area of Golan Heights); since 1948, about 350 peacekeepers from the UN Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO) headquartered in Jerusalem monitor ceasefires, supervise armistice agreements, prevent isolated incidents from escalating, and assist other UN personnel in the region |
| Refugees and internally displaced persons: | IDPs: 150,000-420,000 (Arab villagers displaced from homes in northern Israel) (2007) |
| Illicit drugs: | increasingly concerned about ecstasy, cocaine, and heroin abuse; drugs arrive in country from Lebanon and, increasingly, from Jordan; money-laundering center |
Gale World Cuisines:
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Israel
Typical Foods
Typical Menu for Passover Seder |
Recipes
Fresh OrangesBlintzes
Shakshooka (Egg-and-Tomato Dish)
Fava Bean Spread
Sesame Candy
Felafel
Tahini Sauce
Israeli Vegetable Salad
New Year's Honey Cake
Charoseth
Pita Sandwiches
Mandelbrot (Almond Cookies)
Geographic Setting and Environment
Located in the Middle East along the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea, Israel is slightly larger than the state of New Jersey. Although it is not extremely large, Israel has several different climates that are home to a wide variety of plants and animals.
Despite varied climatic conditions across the country, the climate is generally temperate. Temperatures rarely dip below 40°F and may reach as high as 120°F, depending on the location. Mild temperatures by the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River (which borders the country of Jordan to the east) allow citrus trees to grow fruits such as oranges, grapefruits, and lemons. Other areas grow figs, pomegranates, and olives. Animals such as jackals, hyenas, and wild boars roam in some areas of Israel.
Throughout the 1900s, about 200 million trees were planted in an effort to restore forests that were destroyed. Reforestation is helping to conserve the country's water resources and prevent soil erosion, making it easier for farmers to grow healthy crops for food.
History and Food
Israel's diverse population makes its cuisine unique. People from more than seventy different countries, with many different food and customs, currently live in Israel. Many people began arriving in 1948, when the country, then known as Palestine, gained its independence from Great Britain. At this time, large numbers of Eastern European Jews hoped to establish a Jewish nation in Israel. They brought traditional Jewish dishes to Israel that they had prepared in countries such as Poland, Hungary, and Russia. The Palestinians, most of whom were of Arab descent, enjoyed a cuisine adapted from North Africa and the Middle East.
The struggle to establish a Jewish nation heavily impacted the Israeli diet. People lived in small, crowded homes without most modern conveniences, including refrigerators. Because of the turmoil, Israel was not known for the quality of its food. Fresh fruit was considered one of the country's best meals. Israel's orchards produce some of the world's best citrus fruits. U.S. grocery stores often carry grapefruit and oranges with stickers identifying them as "grown in Israel."
See Fresh Oranges recipe.
See Blintzes recipe.
See Shakshooka (Egg-and-Tomato Dish) recipe.
Foods of the Israelis
Typical foods of the Middle East include flat bread, lentils, fresh fruit and nuts, raw vegetables, lamb, beef, and dairy products, including goat cheese and many types of yogurt. Some dishes feature grilled meats and fish, stuffed vegetables, and traditional spicy Mediterranean salads and spreads, such as fava bean spread. Typical dishes are stews, schnitzel (veal, chicken, or turkey cutlets), cheese-filled crepes (blintzes), matzo balls (dumplings eaten with chicken soup), and latkes (potato pancakes). Israel was called the "land of milk and honey" in the Bible. Sweets, such as candy made from honey and sesame seeds, are favorites among school children.
See Fava Bean Spread recipe.
See Sesame Candy recipe.
See Felafel recipe.
See Tahini Sauce recipe.
See Israeli Vegetable Salad recipe.
Food for Religious and Holiday Celebrations
More than 80 percent of Israelis are Jewish. Of these, a small percentage observe a set of dietary laws called kashruth (or "keeping kosher"). Although only a small percentage of Israel's population strictly observes these laws, the laws affect the availability of certain non-kosher foods throughout the country. The laws also affect both food preparation and availability of certain foods in some restaurants.
According to the rules of kashruth, meat and milk products cannot be served at the same meal. Also, the consumption of certain types of animals is banned. Meat must come from animals that have cleft (divided) hooves and chew their cud. Pork and other products that come from pigs are not to be eaten. Also, an animal must be slaughtered quickly and under supervision of religious authorities for its meat to be considered kosher.
Other restrictions include bans on the consumption of shellfish and of carrion birds (flesh-eating birds). Kosher households have two different sets of dishes and silverware, one for meat meals and the other for dairy meals, which must be kept separate at all times. Some households even have separate sinks for washing the two sets of dishes.
Another religious dietary restriction observed by Jews in Israel is the set of guidelines for the holiday of Passover, which occurs every spring. Leavened bread and many other foods are prohibited during this period, so unleavened bread (called matzo) is substituted. Some Jewish households may eliminate all banned foods from their homes every year before Passover and use a special set of dishes and cooking utensils throughout the holiday. Seder is the time during Passover when lavish meals and family gatherings are enjoyed.
See New Year's Honey Cake recipe.
See Charoseth recipe.
Mealtime Customs
In the late 1800s and early 1900s, breakfast was the most popular meal in what is modern-day Israel. Pioneer farmers from Russia and Poland would begin their work at dawn to beat the hot midday sun. After working for several hours, they would eat a hearty breakfast composed of bread, olives, cheese, and raw vegetables. This meal became famous as the "Israeli breakfast," and hotels still serve this type of meal to tourists. However, for many Israelis this breakfast has become increasingly rare, especially for those living in cities.
Main meals typically begin with a large assortment of appetizers, called mezze in Arabic, one of Israel's official languages. Meals may include dips and stuffed vegetables. In a full dinner, soup and a main dish that usually contains chicken or lamb follow the appetizers. Fresh fruit or Middle Eastern pastries, such as baklava, are delicious after-dinner treats.
Many restaurants offer alfresco (out-door) dining, where guests order appetizers and main dishes for the entire table to share. Cafés and outdoor food vendors are numerous throughout the country. The most popular Israeli fast food is felafel (a pita pocket filled with various pickles and fried balls of ground chickpeas), followed by shwarma (sliced turkey or lamb wrapped in pita bread). Another very popular snack food is the boureka, a pastry made of flaky filo dough stuffed with cheese, potato, or other fillings, then baked. Western-style fast food chains also operate in Israel.
See Pita Sandwiches recipe.
See Mandelbrot (Almond Cookies) recipe.
Politics, Economics, and Nutrition
Almost all—97 percent—of Israelis receive adequate nutrition, and even those living in rural areas have access to clean water. When occasional violence erupts between Palestinians and Israelis, food supplies may be interrupted. Otherwise, Israelis have no political or economic factors that restrict their access to nutrition.
Further Study
Books
Burstein, Chaya M. A Kid's Catalog of Israel. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1988.
Cooper, John. Eat and be Satisfied: A Social History of Jewish Food. London: Jason Aronson, 1993.
Randall, Ronne. Food and Festivals: Israel. Austin, TX: Raintree Steck-Vaughn, 1999.
Wigoder, Devorah Emmet. The Garden of Eden Cookbook. New York: Harper & Row: New York, 1988.
Web Sites
Epicurious.com. [Online] Available http://epicurious.com (accessed April 2001).
Jewish Virtual Library. "Israeli Foods." [Online] Available http://www.us-israel.org/jsource/Society_&_Culture/foodintro.html (accessed August 7, 2001).
Middle East Food. [Online] Available http://mideastfood.about.com (accessed April 2001).
Searchable Online Archive of Recipes (SOAR). [Online] Available http://soar.Berkeley.edu/recipes/ (accessed April 2001).
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Despite the fact that winemaking is referred to in the Old Testament, modern winemaking wasn't introduced in Israel until the 1880s. That's when Baron Edmond de Rothschild backed the planting of vineyards and the building of two wineries-one in Richon-le-Zion, southeast of Tel-Aviv, and the other in Zikhron-Jacob on Mount Carmel, south of Haifa. These vineyards and wineries were donated to Israel in 1906, and the Société Cooperative Vigeronne de Grandes Caves was established as a cooperative to produce the wines. The cooperative still produces a majority of Israeli wines under the brand name Carmel. The main winegrowing areas here are the region around the Sea of Galilee; the Mount Carmel area; the coastal area plains around Tel Aviv; the area around Jerusalem; and the area between Beersheba and Ascalon. The principal grape varieties here are carignan and grenache, along with clairette, muscat and sémillon. More recently planted grapes include cabernet sauvignon, merlot, pinot noir, chardonnay, chenin blanc, riesling and sauvignon blanc. Israeli wines have shifted from being primarily sweet and fortified to mostly dry table wines, many of which are varietal.
Beginning with the Balfour Declaration of November 2, 1917, there was a great influx of Jewish immigrants into Palestine, and this migration was intensified with the establishment of the State of Israel on May 14, 1948. Refugees from persecutions and the aftermath of two world wars brought the rich folklore of Europe into the new homeland. Stories of the Hasidim—the miracle-working mystical rabbis and their followers—existed side by side with legends of the Angel of Death, or the golem created by Rabbi Loew of Prague. As in the United States, mystical groups in Israel have kept alive the study of Kabbalah. The 1990s showed a resurgence of the study of Jewish mysticism, when celebrities such as Madonna and Roseanne announced their studies publicly.
Beyond the legends of miracles and occult phenomena that have a basically mystical purpose, speculation on the afterlife is alien to the general trend of Judaism and there has been little basis for studies of Spiritualism and psychical research. Since the 1960s, however, there has been a growing interest in parapsychology in Israel, given added topical interest by the furious controversies over the phenomena of Uri Geller, who encountered great opposition from scientists and psychologists who were convinced that he was a fraud. More information on Uri Geller's current activity can be found at his website: http://www.uri-geller.com/.
Enlightened scientific interest in parapsychology in Israel owes much to Professor H. S. Bergman, who was a great friend of the famous psychic Eileen Garrett, founder of the Parapsychology Foundation in the United States. With the cooperation of Bergman, F. S. Rothschild, Heinz C. Berendt and others, the Israel Parapsychology Society was formed. In 1965, Garrett visited the group in Jerusalem for the opening of the Parapsychology Foundation Library. Berendt published the first Hebrew-language book on parapsychology, Parapsychology—The World Beyond (Jerusalem, 1966).
In 1968 the Israel Society for Parapsychology was founded in Tel Aviv under the chairmanship of Margot Klausner. The society has organized lectures and courses on a wide range of subjects, such as clairvoyance, telepathy, reincarnation, dowsing, spiritual healing, meditation, and astrology. It also publishes a journal, Mysterious Worlds, and maintains a library of more than 1,200 volumes. The last known address of Israel Parapsychology Society is c/o Mr. Gilad Livneh, 28 Hapalmach St., 92542 Jerusalem, Israel.
In response to the explosion of interest of parapsychology and in opposition of extreme religious activism, beginning with the assassination of Israel's Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin, the Israeli Atheists Society was founded on November 7, 1996. This organization views atheism as the only way for Israel to reach humanistic civilization and to survive as a nation.
Sources:
Berger, Arthur S., and Joyce Berger. The Encyclopedia of Parapsychology and Psychical Research. New York: Paragon House, 1991.
The Israeli Atheists Society Introduction. http://atheism.org.il/english.htm. June 20, 2000.
National Anthem:
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National Anthem of: Israel
Kol od balevav penima
Nefesh Yehoudi homia
Oulefatei mizrach kadima
Ayin le Tsion tsofia
Od lo avdah tikvateinou
Hatikva bat schnot alpaïm
Lhiot am chofshi be artseinou
Erets Tsion ve'Yeroushalaïm
Od lo avdah tikvateinou
Hatikva bat schnot alpaïm
Lhiot am choshi be artseinou
Erets Tsion ve'Yeroushalaïm
Wikipedia on Answers.com:
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Israel
Coordinates: 31°N 35°E / 31°N 35°E
This article is about the modern country. For other uses, see Israel (disambiguation).
State of Israel
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Anthem: Hatikvah (הַתִּקְוָה; The Hope) |
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| Capital (and largest city) |
Jerusalem[a] 31°47′N 35°13′E / 31.783°N 35.217°E |
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| Official language(s) | Hebrew, Arabic[1] | |||||
| Ethnic groups (2011) | 75.3% Jewish 20.5% Arab 4.2% other[2] |
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| Demonym | Israeli | |||||
| Government | Parliamentary democracy[1] | |||||
| - | President | Shimon Peres | ||||
| - | Prime Minister | Benjamin Netanyahu | ||||
| - | Knesset Speaker | Reuven Rivlin | ||||
| - | Supreme Court President | Asher Grunis | ||||
| Legislature | Knesset | |||||
| Independence | from Mandatory Palestine | |||||
| - | Declaration | 14 May 1948 | ||||
| Area | ||||||
| - | Total | 20,770/22,072 km2 [1](154th) 8,019/8,522 sq mi |
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| - | Water (%) | 2 | ||||
| Population | ||||||
| - | 2012 estimate | 7,869,900[2][3] (97th) | ||||
| - | 2008 census | 7,412,200[2][4] | ||||
| - | Density | 371/km2 (32nd) 961/sq mi |
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| GDP (PPP) | 2011 estimate | |||||
| - | Total | $235.222 billion[5] (50th) | ||||
| - | Per capita | $30,975[5] (26th) | ||||
| GDP (nominal) | 2011 estimate | |||||
| - | Total | $242.897 billion[5] (40th) | ||||
| - | Per capita | $31,985[5] (27th) | ||||
| Gini (2008) | 39.2[1] (69th) | |||||
| HDI (2011) |  0.888 (very high) (17th) |
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| Currency | Shekel (₪) (ILS) |
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| Time zone | IST (UTC+2) | |||||
| - | Summer (DST) | IDT (UTC+3) | ||||
| Date formats | dd/mm/yyyy (AD) | |||||
| Drives on the | right | |||||
| ISO 3166 code | IL | |||||
| Internet TLD | .il | |||||
| Calling code | 972 | |||||
| 1 | ^ Excluding / Including the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem; see below. | |||||
| 2 | ^ Includes all permanent residents in Israel, the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem. Also includes Israeli citizens living in the West Bank. Excludes non-Israeli population in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. | |||||
Israel, officially the State of Israel (
/ˈɪzriːəl/; Hebrew: מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, Medīnat Yisrā'el, IPA: [me̞diˈnät jisʁäˈʔe̞l] (
listen); Arabic: دَوْلَة إِسْرَائِيل, Dawlat Isrāʼīl, IPA: [dawlat ʔisraːˈʔiːl]), is a parliamentary republic in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It borders Lebanon in the north, Syria in the northeast, Jordan and the West Bank in the east, Egypt and the Gaza Strip on the southwest, and the Gulf of Aqaba in the Red Sea to the south, and it contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area.[1][6] Israel is defined as a Jewish and Democratic State in its Basic Laws and is the world's only Jewish-majority state.[7]
Following the adoption of a resolution by the General Assembly of the United Nations on 29 November 1947 recommending the adoption and implementation of the United Nations plan to partition Palestine, on 14 May 1948 David Ben-Gurion, the Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization[8] and president of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, declared the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz Israel, to be known as the State of Israel, a state independent from the British Mandate for Palestine.[9][10][11] Neighboring Arab states invaded the next day in support of the Palestinian Arabs. Israel has since fought several wars with neighboring Arab states,[12] in the course of which it has occupied the West Bank, Sinai Peninsula, Gaza Strip and the Golan Heights. Portions of these territories, including east Jerusalem, have been annexed by Israel, but the border with the neighboring West Bank has not yet been permanently defined.[13][14][15][16][17] Israel has signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan, but efforts to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict have so far not resulted in peace.
Israel's financial centre is Tel Aviv,[18] while Jerusalem is the country's most populous city, and its capital (although not recognized internationally as such). The population of Israel, as defined by the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, was estimated in 2012 to be 7,869,900 people, of whom 5,923,500 are Jewish.[3] Arabs form the country's second-largest ethnic group. The great majority of Israeli Arabs are settled-Muslims, with smaller but significant numbers of semi-settled Negev Bedouins and Arab Christians. Other minorities include various ethnic and ethno-religious denominations such as Druze, Circassians, Samaritans, Maronites and others.
Israel is a representative democracy with a parliamentary system, proportional representation and universal suffrage.[19][20] The Prime Minister serves as head of government and the Knesset serves as Israel's unicameral legislative body. Israel has one of the highest life expectancies in the world.[21] It is a developed country, an OECD member,[22] and its economy, based on the nominal gross domestic product, was the 40th-largest in the world in 2011.[23] Israel has the highest standard of living in the Middle East.[24]
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Contents
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Etymology
Upon independence in 1948, the new Jewish state was formally named Medinat Yisrael, or the State of Israel, after other proposed historical and religious names including Eretz Israel ("the Land of Israel"), Zion, and Judea, were considered and rejected.[25] In the early weeks of independence, the government chose the term "Israeli" to denote a citizen of Israel, with the formal announcement made by Minister of Foreign Affairs Moshe Sharett.[26]
The name Israel has historically been used, in common and religious usage, to refer to the biblical Kingdom of Israel or the entire Jewish nation.[27] According to the Hebrew Bible the name "Israel" was given to the patriarch Jacob (Standard Yisraʾel, Isrāʾīl; Septuagint Greek: Ἰσραήλ; "struggle with God"[28]) after he successfully wrestled with the angel of the Lord.[29] Jacob's twelve sons became the ancestors of the Israelites, also known as the Twelve Tribes of Israel or Children of Israel. Jacob and his sons had lived in Canaan but were forced by famine to go into Egypt for four generations until Moses, a great-great grandson of Jacob,[30] led the Israelites back into Canaan in the "Exodus". The earliest archaeological artifact to mention the word "Israel" is the Merneptah Stele of ancient Egypt (dated to the late 13th century BCE).[31]
The area is also known as the Holy Land, being holy for all Abrahamic religions including Judaism, Christianity, Islam and the Bahá'í Faith. Prior to the 1948 Israeli Declaration of Independence, the whole region was known by various other names including Southern Syria, Syria Palestina, Kingdom of Jerusalem, Iudaea Province, Coele-Syria, Retjenu, Canaan and, particularly, Palestine.
History
Main article: History of Israel
Antiquity
Further information: History of ancient Israel and Judah, History of Israel, and History of Palestine
The notion of the "Land of Israel", known in Hebrew as Eretz Yisrael (or Eretz Yisroel), has been important and sacred to the Jewish people since Biblical times. According to the Torah, God promised the land to the three Patriarchs of the Jewish people.[32][33] On the basis of scripture, the period of the three Patriarchs has been placed somewhere in the early 2nd millennium BCE,[34] and the first Kingdom of Israel was established around the 11th century BCE. Subsequent Israelite kingdoms and states ruled intermittently over the next four hundred years, and are known from various extra-biblical sources.[35][36][37][38]
Between the fall of the northern Kingdom of Israel in 722 BCE and the Muslim conquests of the 7th century CE (a period of over 1500 years), the region came under Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Greek, Roman, Sassanid, and Byzantine rule.[39][40] Jewish presence in the region significantly dwindled after the failure of the Bar Kokhba revolt against the Roman Empire in 132 CE.[41] Nevertheless, there was a continuous small Jewish presence and Galilee became its religious center.[42][43] The Mishnah and part of the Talmud, central Jewish texts, were composed during the 2nd to 4th centuries CE in Tiberias and Jerusalem.[44] In 635 CE, the region, including Jerusalem, was conquered by the Arabs and was to remain under Muslim control for the next 1300 years.[45] Control of the region transferred between the Umayyads,[45] Abbasids,[45] and Crusaders throughout the next six centuries,[45] before being conquered by the Mamluk Sultanate, in 1260.[46] In 1516, the region was conquered by the Ottoman Empire, and remained under Turkish rule until the 20th century.[46]
Zionism and the British mandate
Further information: History of Zionism
Since the Diaspora, some Jews have aspired to return to "Zion" and the "Land of Israel",[47] though the amount of effort that should be spent towards such an aim was a matter of dispute.[48][49] The hopes and yearnings of Jews living in exile were articulated in the Hebrew Bible,[50] and is an important theme of the Jewish belief system.[48] After the Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492, some communities settled in Palestine.[51] During the 16th century, Jewish communities struck roots in the Four Holy Cities—Jerusalem, Tiberias, Hebron, and Safed—and in 1697, Rabbi Yehuda Hachasid led a group of 1,500 Jews to Jerusalem.[52] In the second half of the 18th century, Eastern European opponents of Hasidism, known as the Perushim, settled in Palestine.[53][54][55]
The first wave of modern Jewish migration to Ottoman-ruled Palestine, known as the First Aliyah, began in 1881, as Jews fled pogroms in Eastern Europe.[56] Although the Zionist movement already existed in practice, Austro-Hungarian journalist Theodor Herzl is credited with founding political Zionism,[57] a movement which sought to establish a Jewish state in the Land of Israel, by elevating the Jewish Question to the international plane.[58] In 1896, Herzl published Der Judenstaat (The State of the Jews), offering his vision of a future Jewish state; the following year he presided over the first World Zionist Congress.[59]
The Second Aliyah (1904–14), began after the Kishinev pogrom; some 40,000 Jews settled in Palestine, although nearly half of them later left.[56] Both the first and second waves of migrants were mainly Orthodox Jews,[60] although the Second Aliyah included socialist groups who established the kibbutz movement.[61] During World War I, British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour sent a letter that stated:[62]
His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."[63]
The Jewish Legion, a group primarily of Zionist volunteers, assisted in the British conquest of Palestine in 1917. Arab opposition to British rule and Jewish immigration led to the 1920 Palestine riots and the formation of a Jewish militia known as the Haganah (meaning "The Defense" in Hebrew), from which the Irgun and Lehi, or Stern Gang, paramilitary groups later split off.[64] In 1922, the League of Nations granted Britain a mandate over Palestine under terms similar to the Balfour Declaration.[65] The population of the area at this time was predominantly Arab and Muslim, with Jews accounting for about 11% of the population.[66]
The Third (1919–1923) and Fourth Aliyahs (1924–1929) brought an additional 100,000 Jews to Palestine.[56] Finally, the rise of Nazism and the increasing persecution of Jews in the 1930s led to the Fifth Aliyah, with an influx of a quarter of a million Jews. This was a major cause of the Arab revolt of 1936–1939 and led the British to introduce restrictions on Jewish immigration to Palestine with the White Paper of 1939. With countries around the world turning away Jewish refugees fleeing the Holocaust, a clandestine movement known as Aliyah Bet was organized to bring Jews to Palestine.[56] By the end of World War II, the Jewish population of Palestine had increased to 33% of the total population.[67]
Independence and first years
Further information: Israeli Declaration of Independence
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Wikisource has original text related to this article: |
After World War II, Britain found itself in fierce conflict with the Jewish community, as the Haganah joined Irgun and Lehi in an armed struggle against British rule.[68] At the same time, thousands of Jewish Holocaust survivors and refugees from Europe sought a new life in Palestine, but were turned away or rounded up and placed in detention camps by the British. In 1947, the British government announced it would withdraw from Mandatory Palestine, stating it was unable to arrive at a solution acceptable to both Arabs and Jews.[69] A plan was proposed to replace the British Mandate with "Independent Arab and Jewish States" and a "Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem" administered by the United Nations. On 29 November 1947 the General Assembly adopted a resolution recommending the adoption and implementation of the Plan of Partition with Economic Union as Resolution 181 (II).[70]
The Jewish community accepted the plan,[71] but the Arab League and Arab Higher Committee of Palestine rejected it.[72] On 1 December 1947, the Arab Higher Committee proclaimed a three-day strike, and Arab bands began attacking Jewish targets.[73] The Jews were initially on the defensive as civil war broke out, but gradually moved onto the offensive.[74] The Palestinian Arab economy collapsed and 250,000 Palestinian-Arabs fled or were expelled.[75]
On 14 May 1948, the day before the expiration of the British Mandate, David Ben-Gurion, the head of the Jewish Agency declared, "the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz-Israel, to be known as the State of Israel".[76][77] The only reference in the text of the Declaration to the borders of the new state is the use of the term, Eretz-Israel.
The following day, the armies of five Arab countries—Egypt, Syria, Transjordan, Lebanon and Iraq—attacked Israel, launching the 1948 Arab–Israeli War;[78][79] Saudi Arabia sent a military contingent to operate under Egyptian command; Yemen declared war but did not take military action.[80] After a year of fighting, a ceasefire was declared and temporary borders, known as the Green Line, were established.[81] Jordan annexed what became known as the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and Egypt took control of the Gaza Strip. The United Nations estimated that more than 700,000 Palestinians were expelled or fled from what would become Israel during the conflict.[82]
Israel was accepted as a member of the United Nations by majority vote on 11 May 1949.[83] In the early years of the state, the Labor Zionist movement led by Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion dominated Israeli politics.[84][85] These years were marked by an influx of Holocaust survivors and Jews from Arab lands, many of whom faced persecution and expulsion from their original countries.[86] Consequently, the population of Israel rose from 800,000 to two million between 1948 and 1958.[87] During this period, food, clothes and furniture had to be rationed in what became known as the Austerity Period. Between 1948–1970, approximately 1,151,029 Jewish refugees relocated to Israel.[88] Some arrived as refugees with no possessions and were housed in temporary camps known as ma'abarot; by 1952, over 200,000 immigrants were living in these tent cities.[89] The need to solve the crisis led Ben-Gurion to sign a reparations agreement with West Germany that triggered mass protests by Jews angered at the idea that Israel could accept monetary compensation for the Holocaust.[90]
In the 1950s, Israel was frequently attacked by Palestinian fedayeen, mainly from the Egyptian-occupied Gaza Strip,[91] leading to several Israeli counter-raids. In 1950 Egypt closed the Suez Canal to Israeli shipping and tensions mounted as armed clashes took place along Israel's borders. In 1956, Israel joined a secret alliance with Great Britain and France aimed at regaining control of the Suez Canal, which the Egyptians had nationalized (see the Suez Crisis). Israel overran the Sinai Peninsula but was pressured to withdraw by the United Nations in return for guarantees of Israeli shipping rights in the Red Sea and the Canal.[92][93]
In the early 1960s, Israel captured Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann in Argentina and brought him to Israel for trial.[94] The trial had a major impact on public awareness of the Holocaust.[95] Eichmann remains the only person ever to be executed by an Israeli court.[96]
Conflicts and peace treaties
Main articles: Wars involving Israel, Arab–Israeli conflict, Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and Positions on Jerusalem
Since 1964, Arab countries were trying to divert the headwaters of the Jordan river to deprive Israel of water resources, provoking tensions with Syria and Lebanon. Arab nationalists led by Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser refused to recognize Israel, and called for its destruction.[12][97] By 1966, Israeli-Arab relations had deteriorated to the point of actual battles taking place between Israeli and Arab forces.[98] In 1967, Egypt expelled UN peacekeepers, stationed in the Sinai Peninsula since 1957, and announced a partial blockade of Israel's access to the Red Sea. In May 1967 a number of Arab states began to mobilize their forces.[99] Israel saw these actions as a casus belli. On 5 June 1967, Israel launched a pre-emptive strike against Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Iraq. In a Six-Day War, Israeli military superiority was clearly demonstrated against their more numerous Arab foes. Israel succeeded in capturing the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights.[100] Jerusalem's boundaries were enlarged, incorporating East Jerusalem, and the 1949 Green Line became the administrative boundary between Israel and the occupied territories.
Following the war, Israel faced much internal resistance from the Arab Palestinians and Egyptian hostilities in the Sinai. Most important among the various Palestinian and Arab groups was the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), established in 1964, which initially committed itself to "armed struggle as the only way to liberate the homeland".[101][102] In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Palestinian groups launched a wave of attacks[103][104] against Israeli and Jewish targets around the world,[105] including a massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich. The Israeli government responded with an assassination campaign against the organizers, a bombing and a raid on the PLO headquarters in Lebanon.
On 6 October 1973, as Jews were observing Yom Kippur, the Egyptian and Syrian armies launched a surprise attack against Israel. The war ended on 26 October with Israel successfully repelling Egyptian and Syrian forces but suffering significant losses.[106] An internal inquiry exonerated the government of responsibility for failures before and during the war, but public anger forced Prime Minister Golda Meir to resign.[107]
In July 1976 Israeli commandos carried out a daring mission which succeeded in rescuing 102 hostages who were being held by PLO guerillas at Entebbe International Airport close to Kampala, Uganda.
The 1977 Knesset elections marked a major turning point in Israeli political history as Menachem Begin's Likud party took control from the Labor Party.[108] Later that year, Egyptian President Anwar El Sadat made a trip to Israel and spoke before the Knesset in what was the first recognition of Israel by an Arab head of state.[109] In the two years that followed, Sadat and Menachem Begin signed the Camp David Accords (1978) and the Israel–Egypt Peace Treaty (1979).[110] Israel withdrew from the Sinai Peninsula and agreed to enter negotiations over an autonomy for Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.[111]
On 11 March 1978, a PLO guerilla raid from Lebanon led to the Coastal Road Massacre, in which 38 Israeli civilians were killed and 71 injured. Israel responded by launching an invasion of southern Lebanon to destroy the PLO bases south of the Litani River. Most PLO fighters withdrew, but Israel was able to secure southern Lebanon until a UN force and the Lebanese army could take over. However, the PLO soon resumed its policy of attacks against Israel. In the next few years the PLO infiltrated back south and kept up a sporadic shelling across the border. Israel carried out numerous retaliatory attacks by air and on the ground.
Meanwhile, Begin's government actively encouraged Israelis to settle in the occupied West Bank, leading to increasing friction with the Palestinians in that area.[112] The Basic Law: Jerusalem, the Capital of Israel, passed in 1980, was believed by some to reaffirm Israel's 1967 annexation of Jerusalem by government decree and reignited international controversy over the status of the city. However, there has never been an Israeli government act which defined what it considers to be the extent of the territory of Israel and no act which specifically included East Jerusalem therein.[113] The position of the majority of UN member states is reflected in numerous resolutions declaring that actions taken by Israel to settle its citizens in the West Bank, and impose its laws and administration on East Jerusalem are illegal and have no validity.[114]
On 7 June 1981, the Israeli air force destroyed Iraq's sole nuclear power plant, which was under construction just outside Baghdad.
Following a series of PLO attacks in 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon once again to destroy the bases from which the PLO launched attacks and missiles into northern Israel.[115] In the first six days of fighting, the Israelis destroyed the military forces of the PLO in Lebanon and decisively defeated the Syrians. An Israeli government inquiry – the Kahan Commission – would later hold Begin, Sharon and several Israeli generals as indirectly responsible for the Sabra and Shatila massacres. In 1985 Israel responded to a Palestinian terrorist attack in Cyprus by bombing the PLO headquarters in Tunis. Israel withdrew from most of Lebanon in 1986, but maintained a borderland buffer zone in southern Lebanon until 2000. The First Intifada, a Palestinian uprising against Israeli rule,[116] broke out in 1987 with waves of uncoordinated demonstrations and violence occurring in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. Over the following six years, the Intifada became more organised and included economic and cultural measures aimed at disrupting the Israeli occupation. More than a thousand people were killed in the violence, many of them stone-throwing youths.[117] Responding to continuing PLO guerilla raids into northern Israel, Israel launched another punitive raid into southern Lebanon in 1988. Amid rising tensions over the Kuwait crisis, Israeli border guards fired into a rioting Palestinian crowd near the Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. 20 people were killed and some 150 injured. During the 1991 Gulf War, the PLO supported Saddam Hussein and Iraqi Scud missile attacks against Israel. Despite public outrage, Israel heeded US calls to refrain from hitting back and did not participate in that war.[118][119]
In 1992, Yitzhak Rabin became Prime Minister following an election in which his party called for compromise with Israel's neighbors.[120][121] The following year, Shimon Peres on behalf of Israel, and Mahmoud Abbas for the PLO, signed the Oslo Accords, which gave the Palestinian National Authority the right to govern parts of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.[122] The PLO also recognized Israel's right to exist and pledged an end to terrorism.[123] In 1994, the Israel-Jordan Treaty of Peace was signed, making Jordan the second Arab country to normalize relations with Israel.[124] Arab public support for the Accords was damaged by the continuation of Israeli settlements[125] and checkpoints, and the deterioration of economic conditions.[126] Israeli public support for the Accords waned as Israel was struck by Palestinian suicide attacks.[127] Finally, while leaving a peace rally in November 1995, Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by a far-right-wing Jew who opposed the Accords.[128]
At the end of the 1990s, Israel, under the leadership of Benjamin Netanyahu, withdrew from Hebron,[129] and signed the Wye River Memorandum, giving greater control to the Palestinian National Authority.[130] Ehud Barak, elected Prime Minister in 1999, began the new millennium by withdrawing forces from Southern Lebanon and conducting negotiations with Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat and U.S. President Bill Clinton at the 2000 Camp David Summit. During the summit, Barak offered a plan for the establishment of a Palestinian state, but Yasser Arafat rejected it.[131] After the collapse of the talks and a controversial visit by Likud leader Ariel Sharon to the Temple Mount, the Second Intifada began. Sharon became prime minister in a 2001 special election. During his tenure, Sharon carried out his plan to unilaterally withdraw from the Gaza Strip and also spearheaded the construction of the Israeli West Bank barrier.[132]
In July 2006, a Hezbollah artillery assault on Israel's northern border communities and a cross-border abduction of two Israeli soldiers precipitated the month-long Second Lebanon War.[133][134] On 6 September 2007, Israeli Air Force destroyed a nuclear reactor in Syria. In May 2008, Israel confirmed it had been discussing a peace treaty with Syria for a year, with Turkey as a go-between.[135] However, at the end of the year, Israel entered another conflict as a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel collapsed. The Gaza War lasted three weeks and ended after Israel announced a unilateral ceasefire.[136][137] Hamas announced its own ceasefire, with its own conditions of complete withdrawal and opening of border crossings. Despite neither the rocket launchings nor Israeli retaliatory strikes having completely stopped, the fragile ceasefire remained in order.[138]
Geography and climate
Main articles: Geography of Israel and Wildlife of Israel
Israel is at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea, bounded by Lebanon to the north, Syria to the northeast, Jordan to the east, and Egypt to the southwest. It lies between latitudes 29° and 34° N, and longitudes 34° and 36° E.
The sovereign territory of Israel, excluding all territories captured by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War, is approximately 20,770 square kilometers (8,019 sq mi) in area, of which two percent is water.[1] However Israel is so narrow that the exclusive economic zone in the Mediterranean is double the land area of the country.[139] The total area under Israeli law, when including East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, is 22,072 square kilometers (8,522 sq mi),[140] and the total area under Israeli control, including the military-controlled and partially Palestinian-governed territory of the West Bank, is 27,799 square kilometers (10,733 sq mi).[141] Despite its small size, Israel is home to a variety of geographic features, from the Negev desert in the south to the inland fertile Jezreel Valley, mountain ranges of the Galilee, Carmel and toward the Golan in the north. The Israeli Coastal Plain on the shores of the Mediterranean is home to seventy percent of the nation's population. East of the central highlands lies the Jordan Rift Valley, which forms a small part of the 6,500-kilometer (4,039 mi) Great Rift Valley.
The Jordan River runs along the Jordan Rift Valley, from Mount Hermon through the Hulah Valley and the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea, the lowest point on the surface of the Earth.[142] Further south is the Arabah, ending with the Gulf of Eilat, part of the Red Sea. Unique to Israel and the Sinai Peninsula are makhteshim, or erosion cirques.[143] The largest makhtesh in the world is Ramon Crater in the Negev,[144] which measures 40 by 8 kilometers (25 by 5 mi).[145] A report on the environmental status of the Mediterranean basin states that Israel has the largest number of plant species per square meter of all the countries in the basin.[146]
Temperatures in Israel vary widely, especially during the winter. The more mountainous regions can be windy, cold, and sometimes snowy; Jerusalem usually receives at least one snowfall each year.[147] Meanwhile, coastal cities, such as Tel Aviv and Haifa, have a typical Mediterranean climate with cool, rainy winters and long, hot summers. The area of Beersheba and the Northern Negev has a semi-arid climate with hot summers, cool winters and fewer rainy days than the Mediterranean climate. The Southern Negev and the Arava areas have desert climate with very hot and dry summers, and mild winters with few days of rain. The highest temperature in the continent of Asia (53.7 °C/128.7 °F) was recorded in 1942 at Tirat Zvi kibbutz in the northern Jordan river valley.[148]
From May to September, rain in Israel is rare.[149][150] With scarce water resources, Israel has developed various water-saving technologies, including drip irrigation.[151] Israelis also take advantage of the considerable sunlight available for solar energy, making Israel the leading nation in solar energy use per capita (practically every house uses solar panels for water heating).[152]
Four different phytogeographic regions exist in Israel, due to the country's location between the temperate and the tropical zones, bordering the Mediterranean Sea in the west and the desert in the east. For this reason the flora and fauna of Israel is extremely diverse. There are 2,867 known species of plants found in Israel. Of these, at least 253 species are introduced and non-native.[153] As of May 2007[update], there are 190 Israeli nature reserves.[154]
Politics
Main article: Politics of Israel
See also: Criticism of the Israeli government
Israel operates under a parliamentary system as a democratic republic with universal suffrage.[1] A member of parliament supported by a parliamentary majority becomes the prime minister—usually this is the chair of the largest party. The prime minister is the head of government and head of the cabinet.[155][156] Israel is governed by a 120-member parliament, known as the Knesset. Membership of the Knesset is based on proportional representation of political parties,[157] with a 2% electoral threshold, which in practice has resulted in coalition governments.
Parliamentary elections are scheduled every four years, but unstable coalitions or a no-confidence vote by the Knesset can dissolve a government earlier. The Basic Laws of Israel function as an uncodified constitution. In 2003, the Knesset began to draft an official constitution based on these laws.[1][158] The president of Israel is head of state, with limited and largely ceremonial duties.[155]
Legal system
Main article: Israeli judicial system
Israel has a three-tier court system. At the lowest level are magistrate courts, situated in most cities across the country. Above them are district courts, serving both as appellate courts and courts of first instance; they are situated in five of Israel's six districts. The third and highest tier is the Supreme Court, located in Jerusalem; it serves a dual role as the highest court of appeals and the High Court of Justice. In the latter role, the Supreme Court rules as a court of first instance, allowing individuals, both citizens and non-citizens, to petition against the decisions of state authorities.[159][160] Although Israel supports the goals of the International Criminal Court, it has not ratified the Rome Statute, citing concerns about the ability of the court to remain free from political impartiality.[161]
Israel's legal system combines three legal traditions: English common law, civil law, and Jewish law.[1] It is based on the principle of stare decisis (precedent) and is an adversarial system, where the parties in the suit bring evidence before the court. Court cases are decided by professional judges rather than juries.[159] Marriage and divorce are under the jurisdiction of the religious courts: Jewish, Muslim, Druze, and Christian. A committee of Knesset members, Supreme Court justices, and Israeli Bar members carries out the election of judges.[162] Administration of Israel's courts (both the "General" courts and the Labor Courts) is carried by the Administration of Courts, situated in Jerusalem. Both General and Labor courts are paperless courts: the storage of court files, as well as court decisions, are conducted electronically.
Israel's Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty seeks to defend human rights and liberties in Israel. Israel is the only country in the region ranked "Free" by Freedom House based on the level of civil liberties and political rights; the "Palestinian Authority-Administered Territories" was ranked "Not Free."[7][163] In 2012, Israel proper was ranked 92nd according to Reporters Without Borders' Press Freedom Index – the highest ranking in the region.[164]
Administrative divisions
Main article: Districts of Israel
The State of Israel is divided into six main administrative districts, known as mehozot (מחוזות; singular: mahoz) – Center, Haifa, Jerusalem, North, Southern, and Tel Aviv Districts. Districts are further divided into fifteen sub-districts known as nafot (נפות; singular: nafa), which are themselves partitioned into fifty natural regions.[165]
| Number | District | Main city | Sub-district | Population |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | North | Nazareth | Kinneret, Safed, Acre, Golan, Jezreel Valley | 1,242,100 |
| 2 | Haifa | Haifa | Haifa, Hadera | 880,000 |
| 3 | Center | Ramla | Rishon Lezion, Sharon (Netanya), Petah Tikva, Ramla, Rehovot | 1,770,200 |
| 4 | Tel Aviv | Tel Aviv | Tel Aviv | 1,227,000 |
| 5 | Jerusalem | Jerusalem | Jerusalem | 910,300 |
| 6 | South | Beersheba | Ashkelon, Beersheba | 1,053,600 |
| A | Golan Heights | Katzrin | 38,900 | |
| B | Judea and Samaria | Modi'in Illit | West Bank | 2,568,555[166] (327,750 Jewish settlers)[167] |
| C | Gaza Strip | Gaza | Gaza, Rafah | 1,657,155 [168] |
For statistical purposes, the country is divided into three metropolitan areas: Tel Aviv metropolitan area (population 3,206,400), Haifa metropolitan area (population 1,021,000), and Beer Sheva metropolitan area (population 559,700).[169] Israel's largest municipality, both in population and area,[170] is Jerusalem with 773,800 residents in an area of 126 square kilometers (49 sq mi) (in 2009).
Israeli government statistics on Jerusalem include the population and area of East Jerusalem, which is widely recognized as part of the Palestinian territories under Israeli occupation.[171] Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Rishon LeZion rank as Israel's next most populous cities, with populations of 393,900, 265,600, and 227,600 respectively.[170]
Israeli-occupied territories
Main article: Israeli-occupied territories
In 1967, as a result of the Six-Day War, Israel gained control of the West Bank (Judaea and Samaria), East Jerusalem, the Gaza strip and the Golan Heights. Israel also took control of the Sinai Peninsula, but returned it to Egypt as part of the 1979 Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty.
Following Israel's capture of these territories, settlements consisting of Israeli citizens were established within each of them. Israel applied civilian law to the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem, incorporating them into its sovereign territory and granting their inhabitants permanent residency status and the choice to apply for citizenship. In contrast, the West Bank has remained under military occupation, and Palestinians in this area cannot become citizens. The Gaza Strip is independent of Israel with no Israeli military or civilian presence, but Israel continues to maintain control of its airspace and waters. The Gaza Strip and the West Bank are seen by the Palestinians and most of the international community as the site of a future Palestinian state.[172][173] The UN Security Council has declared the annexation of the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem to be "null and void" and continues to view the territories as occupied.[174][175] The International Court of Justice, principal judicial organ of the United Nations, asserted, in its 2004 advisory opinion on the legality of the construction of the Israeli West Bank barrier, that the lands captured by Israel in the Six-Day War, including East Jerusalem, are occupied territory.[176]
The status of East Jerusalem in any future peace settlement has at times been a difficult hurdle in negotiations between Israeli governments and representatives of the Palestinians, as Israel views it as its sovereign territory, as well as part of its capital. Most negotiations relating to the territories have been on the basis of United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, which emphasises "the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war", and calls on Israel to withdraw from occupied territories in return for normalization of relations with Arab states, a principle known as "Land for peace".[177][178][179]
The West Bank was annexed by Jordan in 1948, following the Arab rejection of the UN decision to create two states in Palestine. Only Britain recognized this annexation and Jordan has since ceded its claim to the territory to the PLO. The West Bank was occupied by Israel in 1967 during the Six-Day War. The population are mainly Arab Palestinians, including refugees of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.[180] From their occupation in 1967 until 1993, the Palestinians living in these territories were under Israeli military administration. Since the Israel-PLO letters of recognition, most of the Palestinian population and cities have been under the internal jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority, and only partial Israeli military control, although Israel has on several occasions redeployed its troops and reinstated full military administration during periods of unrest. In response to increasing attacks as part of the Second Intifada, the Israeli government started to construct the Israeli West Bank barrier.[181] When completed, approximately 13 % of the Barrier will be constructed on the Green Line or in Israel with 87 % inside the West Bank.[182][183]
The Gaza Strip was occupied by Egypt from 1948 to 1967 and then by Israel after 1967. In 2005, as part of Israel's unilateral disengagement plan, Israel removed all of its settlers and forces from the territory. Israel does not consider the Gaza Strip to be occupied territory and declared it a "foreign territory". That view has been disputed by numerous international humanitarian organizations and various bodies of the United Nations.[184][185][186][187][188] Following June 2007, when Hamas assumed power in the Gaza Strip,[189] Israel tightened its control of the Gaza crossings along its border, as well as by sea and air, and prevented persons from entering and exiting the area except for isolated cases it deemed humanitarian.[189] Gaza has a border with Egypt and an agreement between Israel, the European Union and the PA governed how border crossing would take place (it was monitored by European observers).[190] Egypt adhered to this agreement under Mubarak and prevented access to Gaza until April 2011 when it announced it was opening its border with Gaza.
Foreign relations
Main article: Foreign relations of Israel
Israel maintains diplomatic relations with 157 countries and has 100 diplomatic missions around the world.[191] Only three members of the Arab League have normalized relations with Israel: Egypt and Jordan signed peace treaties in 1979 and 1994, respectively, and Mauritania opted for full diplomatic relations with Israel in 1999. Despite the peace treaty between Israel and Egypt, Israel is still widely considered an enemy country among Egyptians.[192] Under Israeli law, Lebanon, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Yemen are enemy countries[193] and Israeli citizens may not visit them without permission from the Ministry of the Interior.[194]
The Soviet Union and the United States were the first two countries to recognize the State of Israel, having declared recognition roughly simultaneously. The United States may regard Israel as its primary ally in the Middle East, based on "common democratic values, religious affinities, and security interests".[195] The United States has provided $68 billion in military assistance and $32 billion in grants to Israel since 1967, under the Foreign Assistance Act (period beginning 1962),[196] more than any other country for that period until 2003.[196][197][198] Their bilateral relations are multidimensional and the United States is the principal proponent of the Arab-Israeli peace process. The United States and Israeli views differ on some issues, such as the Golan Heights, Jerusalem, and settlements.[199]
India established full diplomatic ties with Israel in 1992 and has fostered a strong military, technological and cultural partnership with the country since then.[200] According to an international opinion survey conducted in 2009 on behalf of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, India is the most pro-Israel country in the world.[201][202] India is the largest customer of Israeli military equipment and Israel is the second-largest military partner of India after the Russian Federation.[203] India is also the third-largest Asian economic partner of Israel[204] and the two countries enjoy extensive space technology ties.[205][206] India became the top source market for Israel from Asia in 2010 with 41,000 tourist arrivals in that year.[207]
Germany's strong ties with Israel include cooperation on scientific and educational endeavors and the two states remain strong economic and military partners.[208][209] Under the reparations agreement, as of 2007[update] Germany had paid 25 billion euros in reparations to the Israeli state and individual Israeli holocaust survivors.[210] The UK has kept full diplomatic relations with Israel since its formation having had two visits from heads of state in 2007. Relations between the two countries were also made stronger by former prime minister Tony Blair's efforts for a two state resolution. The UK is seen as having a "natural" relationship with Israel on account of the British Mandate for Palestine.[211] Iran had diplomatic relations with Israel under the Pahlavi dynasty[212] but withdrew its recognition of Israel during the Islamic Revolution.[213]
Although Turkey and Israel did not establish full diplomatic relations until 1991,[214] Turkey has cooperated with the State since its recognition of Israel in 1949. Turkey's ties to the other Muslim-majority nations in the region have at times resulted in pressure from Arab and Muslim states to temper its relationship with Israel.[215] Relations between Turkey and Israel took a downturn after the Gaza War and Israel's raid of the Gaza flotilla.[216] IHH, which organized the flotilla, is a Turkish charity that some believe has ties to Hamas and Al-Qaeda.[217][218][219][220][221]
Relation between Israel and Greece have improved since 1995 due to the decline of Israeli-Turkish relations.[222] The two countries have a defence cooperation agreement and in 2010, the Israeli Air Force hosted Greece’s Hellenic Air Force in a joint exercise at the Uvda base. The joint Cyprus-Israel oil and gas explorations centered on the Leviathan gas field are also an important factor for Greece, given its strong links with Cyprus.[223] Israel is the second largest importer of Greek products in the Middle East.[224] In 2010, the Greek Prime minister George Papandreou made an official visit to Israel after many years, in order to improve bilateral relations between the two countries.[225]
Israel and Cyprus have a number of bilateral agreements and many official visits have taken place between the two countries. The countries have ties on energy, agricultural, military and tourism matters. The prospects of joint exploitation of oil and gas fields off Cyprus, as well as cooperation in the world's longest sub-sea electric power cable has strengthened relations between the countries.[226][227][228]
Azerbaijan is one of the few majority Muslim countries to develop bilateral strategic and economic relations with Israel. The relationship includes cooperation in trade and security matters and cultural and educational exchanges. Azerbaijan supplies Israel with a substantial amount of its oil needs, and Israel has helped modernize the Armed Forces of Azerbaijan. In the spring of 2012, the two countries reportedly concluded an arms deal worth $1.6 billion.[229][230] In 2005, Azerbaijan was Israel's fifth largest trading partner.[231][232]
In Africa, Ethiopia is Israel's main and closest ally in the continent due to common political, religious and security interests.[233] Israel provides expertise to Ethiopia on irrigation projects and thousands of Ethiopian Jews (Beta Israel) live in Israel.
As a result of the 2009 Gaza War, Mauritania, Qatar, Bolivia, and Venezuela suspended political and economical ties with Israel.[217][234]
Military
Main articles: Israel Defense Forces, Israeli security forces, and military operations conducted by the Israel Defense Forces
See also: Israel and weapons of mass destruction
Israel has the highest ratio of defense spending to GDP and as a percentage of the budget of all developed countries.[235][236] The Israel Defense Forces is the sole military wing of the Israeli security forces, and is headed by its Chief of General Staff, the Ramatkal, subordinate to the Minister of Defense. The IDF consist of the army, air force and navy. It was founded during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War by consolidating paramilitary organizations—chiefly the Haganah—that preceded the establishment of the state.[237] The IDF also draws upon the resources of the Military Intelligence Directorate (Aman), which works with the Mossad and Shabak.[238] The Israel Defense Forces have been involved in several major wars and border conflicts in its short history, making it one of the most battle-trained armed forces in the world.[239][240]
Most Israelis are drafted into the military at the age of 18. Men serve three years and women two to three years.[241] Following mandatory service, Israeli men join the reserve forces and usually do up to several weeks of reserve duty every year until their forties. Most women are exempt from reserve duty. Arab citizens of Israel (except the Druze) and those engaged in full-time religious studies are exempt from military service, although the exemption of yeshiva students has been a source of contention in Israeli society for many years.[242][243] An alternative for those who receive exemptions on various grounds is Sherut Leumi, or national service, which involves a program of service in hospitals, schools and other social welfare frameworks.[244] As a result of its conscription program, the IDF maintains approximately 176,500 active troops and an additional 445,000 reservists.[245]
The nation's military relies heavily on high-tech weapons systems designed and manufactured in Israel as well as some foreign imports. Since 1967, the United States has been a particularly notable foreign contributor of military aid to Israel: the US is expected to provide the country with $3.15 billion per year from 2013–2018.[246][247] The Arrow missile is one of the world's few operational anti-ballistic missile systems.[248]
Since the Yom Kippur War, Israel has developed a network of reconnaissance satellites.[249] The success of the Ofeq program has made Israel one of seven countries capable of launching such satellites.[250] Since its establishment, Israel has spent a significant portion of its gross domestic product on defense. In 1984, for example, the country spent 24%[251] of its GDP on defense. Today, that figure has dropped to 7.3%.[1]
Israel is widely believed to possess nuclear weapons[252] as well as chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction.[253] Israel has not signed the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons[254] and maintains a policy of deliberate ambiguity toward its nuclear capabilities.[255] Since the Gulf War in 1991, when Israel was attacked by Iraqi Scud missiles, all homes in Israel are required to have a reinforced security room impermeable to chemical and biological substances.[256]
The IDF has also been deployed on humanitarian missions, usually involving rescue workers and medical personnel, along with relief workers and body identifiers from ZAKA and the Israel Police. After the 2010 Haiti earthquake, a rescue team was dispatched to Haiti, which consisted of 40 doctors, 20 nurses and rescue workers, and two rescue planes loaded with medical equipment and a field hospital with X-ray equipment, intensive care units, and operating rooms. Other recent recipients of aid include Japan (a medical team after the 2011 tsunami), Congo 2008, Sri Lanka 2005 (tsunami), India and El Salvador 2001 (earthquakes), Ethiopia 2000, Turkey 1998 (earthquake), Kosovo 1999 (refugees) and Rwanda 1994 (refugees).[257]
Israel is consistently rated very low in the Global Peace Index, ranking 145th out of 153 nations for peacefulness in 2011.[258]
Economy
Main article: Economy of Israel
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Israel is considered one of the most advanced countries in Southwest Asia in economic and industrial development. In 2010, it joined the OECD.[22][259] The country is ranked 3rd in the region on the World Bank's Ease of Doing Business Index[260] as well as in the World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Report.[261] It has the second-largest number of startup companies in the world (after the United States)[262] and the largest number of NASDAQ-listed companies outside North America.[263]
In 2010, Israel ranked 17th among of the world's most economically developed nations, according to IMD's World Competitiveness Yearbook. The Israeli economy was ranked first as the world's most durable economy in the face of crises, and was also ranked first in the rate of research and development center investments.[264]
The Bank of Israel was ranked first among central banks for its efficient functioning, up from the 8th place in 2009. Israel was also ranked as the worldwide leader in its supply of skilled manpower.[264] The Bank of Israel holds $78 billion of foreign-exchange reserves.[265]
Despite limited natural resources, intensive development of the agricultural and industrial sectors over the past decades has made Israel largely self-sufficient in food production, apart from grains and beef. Other major imports to Israel, totaling $47.8 billion in 2006, include fossil fuels, raw materials, and military equipment.[1] Leading exports include electronics, software, computerized systems, communications technology, medical equipment, pharmaceuticals, fruits, chemicals, military technology, and cut diamonds;[266] in 2006, Israeli exports reached $42.86 billion,[1] and by 2010 they had reached $80.5 billion a year.[266]
Israel is a leading country in the development of solar energy.[267][268] Israel is a global leader in water conservation and geothermal energy,[269] and its development of cutting-edge technologies in software, communications and the life sciences have evoked comparisons with Silicon Valley.[270][271] According to the OECD, Israel is also ranked 1st in the world in expenditure on Research and Development (R&D) as a percentage of GDP.[272] Intel[273] and Microsoft[274] built their first overseas research and development centers in Israel, and other high-tech multi-national corporations, such as IBM, Cisco Systems, and Motorola, have opened facilities in the country. In July 2007, U.S. billionaire Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway bought an Israeli company Iscar, its first non-U.S. acquisition, for $4 billion.[275] Since the 1970s, Israel has received military aid from the United States, as well as economic assistance in the form of loan guarantees, which now account for roughly half of Israel's external debt. Israel has one of the lowest external debts in the developed world, and is a net lender in terms of net external debt (the total value of assets vs. liabilities in debt instruments owed abroad), which as of 2011[update] stood at a surplus of US$58.7 billion.[276][277]
Tourism
Main article: Tourism in Israel
Tourism, especially religious tourism, is an important industry in Israel, with the country's temperate climate, beaches, archaeological and historical sites, and unique geography also drawing tourists. Israel's security problems have taken their toll on the industry, but the number of incoming tourists is on the rebound.[278] In 2008, over 3 million tourists visited Israel.[279] Israel has the highest number of museums per capita in the world.[280]
Transport
Main article: Transport in Israel
Israel has 18,096 kilometers (11,244 mi) of paved roads,[281] and 2.4 million motor vehicles.[282] The number of motor vehicles per 1,000 persons was 324, relatively low with respect to developed countries.[282] Israel has 5,715 buses on scheduled routes,[283] operated by several carriers, the largest of which is Egged, serving most of the country. Railways stretch across 949 kilometers (590 mi) and are operated solely by government-owned Israel Railways[284] (All figures are for 2008). Following major investments beginning in the early-to-mid 1990s, the number of train passengers per year has grown from 2.5 million in 1990, to 35 million in 2008; railways are also used to transport 6.8 million tons of cargo, per year.[284]
Israel is served by two international airports, Ben Gurion International Airport, the country's main hub for international air travel near Tel Aviv-Yafo, Ovda Airport in the south, as well as several small domestic airports.[285] Ben Gurion, Israel's largest airport, handled over 12.1 million passengers in 2010.[286]
On the Mediterranean coast, Haifa Port is the country's oldest and largest port, while Ashdod Port is one of the few deep water ports in the world built on the open sea.[285] In addition to these, the smaller Port of Eilat is situated on the Red Sea, and is used mainly for trading with Far East countries.[285]
Science and technology
Main articles: Science and technology in Israel and List of Israeli universities and colleges
Israel's eight public universities are subsidized by the state.[287][288] The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel's oldest university, houses the Jewish National and University Library, the world's largest repository of books on Jewish subjects.[289] The Hebrew University is consistently ranked among world's 100 top universities by the prestigious ARWU academic ranking.[290] Other major universities in the country include the Technion, the Weizmann Institute of Science, Tel Aviv University (TAU), Bar-Ilan University, the University of Haifa, The Open University and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. Israel's seven research universities (excluding the Open University) are consistently ranked among top 500 in the world.[291] Israel has produced six Nobel Prize-winning scientists since 2002[292][292][293] and publishes among the most scientific papers per capita of any country in the world.[294][295]
Israel has embraced solar energy, its engineers are on the cutting edge of solar energy technology[268] and its solar companies work on projects around the world.[267][296] Over 90% of Israeli homes use solar energy for hot water, the highest per capita in the world.[152][297] According to government figures, the country saves 8% of its electricity consumption per year because of its solar energy use in heating.[298] The high annual incident solar irradiance at its geographic latitude creates ideal conditions for what is an internationally renowned solar research and development industry in the Negev Desert.[267][268][296]
Israel is one of the world's technological leaders in water technology. In 2011, its water technology industry was worth around $2 billion a year with annual exports of products and services in the tens of millions of dollars. The ongoing shortage of water in the country has spurred innovation in water conservation techniques, and a substantial agricultural modernisation, drip irrigation, was invented in Israel. Israel is also at the technological forefront of desalination and water recycling. The Ashkelon seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) plant, the largest in the world, was voted 'Desalination Plant of the Year' in the Global Water Awards in 2006. Israel hosts an annual Water Technology Exhibition and Conference (WaTec) that attracts thousands of people from across the world.[301][302] By the end of 2013, 85 percent of the country's water consumption will be from reverse osmosis. As a result of innovations in reverse osmosis technology, Israel is set to become a net exporter of water in the coming years.[303]
Israel has led the world in stem-cell research papers per capita since 2000.[304] In addition, Israeli universities are among 100 top world universities in mathematics (Hebrew University, TAU and Technion), physics (TAU, Hebrew University and Weizmann Institute of Science), chemistry (Technion and Weizmann Institute of Science), computer science (Weizmann Institute of Science, Technion, Hebrew University, TAU and BIU) and economics (Hebrew University and TAU).[305]
Israel has a modern electric car infrastructure involving a countrywide network of recharging stations to facilitate the charging and exchange of car batteries. It is thought that this will lower Israel's oil dependency and lower the fuel costs of hundreds of Israel's motorists that use cars powered only by electric batteries.[306][307][308] The Israeli model is being studied by several countries and being implemented in Denmark and Australia.[309]
In 2009 Israel was ranked 2nd among 20 top countries in space sciences by Thomson Reuters agency.[310] Since 1988 Israel Aerospace Industries have indigenously designed and built at least 13 commercial, research and spy satellites.[311] Most were launched to orbit from Israeli air force base "Palmachim" by the Shavit space launch vehicle. Some of Israel's satellites are ranked among the world's most advanced space systems.[312] In 2003, Ilan Ramon became Israel's first astronaut, serving as payload specialist of STS-107, the fatal mission of the Space Shuttle Columbia.
Demographics
Main article: Demographics of Israel
In 2012, Israel's population was an estimated 7,869,900 people, of whom 5,923,500 are Jews.[3] Arab citizens of Israel comprise 20.5% of the country's total population.[2]
Over the last decade, large numbers of migrant workers from Romania, Thailand, China, Africa and South America have settled in Israel. Exact figures are unknown, as many of them are living in the country illegally,[313] but estimates run in the region of 200,000.[314] As of April 2011[update], nearly 34,000 African refugees have entered Israel.[315]
Retention of Israel's population since 1948 is about even or greater, when compared to other countries with mass immigration.[316] Emigration from Israel (yerida) to other countries, primarily the United States and Canada, is described by demographers as modest,[317] but is often cited by Israeli government ministries as a major threat to Israel's future.[318][319]
As of 2009[update], over 300,000 Israeli citizens live in West Bank settlements[320] such as Ma'ale Adumim and Ariel, and communities that predated the establishment of the State but were re-established after the Six-Day War, in cities such as Hebron and Gush Etzion. 18,000 Israelis live in Golan Heights settlements.[321] In 2011, there were 250,000 Jews living in East Jerusalem.[322] The total number of Israeli settlers is over 500,000 (6.5% of the Israeli population). Approximately 7,800 Israelis lived in settlements in the Gaza Strip, until they were evacuated by the government as part of its 2005 disengagement plan.[323]
Israel was established as a homeland for the Jewish people and is often referred to as a Jewish state. The country's Law of Return grants all Jews and those of Jewish lineage the right to Israeli citizenship.[324] Just over three quarters, or 75.5%, of the population are Jews from a diversity of Jewish backgrounds. Approximately 68% of Israeli Jews are Israeli-born, 22% are immigrants from Europe and the Americas, and 10% are immigrants from Asia and Africa (including the Arab World).[325][326] Jews who left or fled Arab and Muslim countries and their descendants, known as Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews,[327] constitute approximately 50% of Jewish Israelis.[328][329][330] Jews from Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union and their Israeli-born descendants, or Ashkenazi Jews, form most of the rest of the Jewish population.
|
Largest cities or towns of Israel Israel Central Bureau of Statistics[331] |
|||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rank | City name | District | Pop. | ||||||
 Jerusalem |
1 | Jerusalem | Jerusalem | 780,200 |  Haifa |
||||
| 2 | Tel Aviv | Tel Aviv | 404,000 | ||||||
| 3 | Haifa | Haifa | 266,900 | ||||||
| 4 | Rishon LeZion | Central | 229,600 | ||||||
| 5 | Petah Tikva | Central | 210,300 | ||||||
| 6 | Ashdod | Southern | 208,500 | ||||||
| 7 | Beersheba | Southern | 194,800 | ||||||
| 8 | Netanya | Central | 185,000 | ||||||
| 9 | Holon | Tel Aviv | 183,100 | ||||||
| 10 | Bnei Brak | Tel Aviv | 156,700 | ||||||
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Languages
Main article: Languages of Israel
Israel has two official languages, Hebrew and Arabic.[1] Hebrew is the primary language of the state and is spoken by the majority of the population, and Arabic is spoken by the Arab minority. Many Israelis communicate reasonably well in English, as many television programs are broadcast in this language and English is taught from the early grades in elementary school. As a country of immigrants, many languages can be heard on the streets. Due to mass immigration from the former Soviet Union and Ethiopia (some 120,000 Ethiopian Jews live in Israel),[332] Russian and Amharic are widely spoken.[333] Between 1990 and 1994, the Russian immigration increased Israel's population by twelve percent.[334] More than one million Russian-speaking immigrants arrived in Israel from the former Soviet Union states between 1990 and 2004.[335] French is spoken by around 700,000 Israelis,[336] mostly originating from France and North Africa (see Maghrebi Jews).
Religion
Main article: Religion in Israel
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Israel and the Palestinian territories comprise the major part of the Holy Land, a region of significant importances to all Abrahamic religions – Jews, Christians, Muslims and Baha'is.
The religious affiliation of Israeli Jews varies widely: a social survey for those over the age of 20 indicates that 55% say they are "traditional", while 20% consider themselves "secular Jews", 17% define themselves as "Religious Zionists"; 8% define themselves as "Haredi Jews".[340] While the ultra-Orthodox, or Haredim, represented only 5% of Israel's population in 1990,[341] they are expected to represent more than one-fifth of Israel's Jewish population by 2028.[342]
Making up 16% of the population, Muslims constitute Israel's largest religious minority. About 2% of the population are Christian and 1.5% are Druze.[343] The Christian population primarily comprises Arab Christians, but also includes post-Soviet immigrants and the Foreign Labourers of multi-national origins and followers of Messianic Judaism, considered by most Christians and Jews to be a form of Christianity.[344] Members of many other religious groups, including Buddhists and Hindus, maintain a presence in Israel, albeit in small numbers.[345]
The city of Jerusalem is of special importance to Jews, Muslims and Christians as it is the home of sites that are pivotal to their religious beliefs, such as the Israeli-controlled Old City that incorporates the Western Wall and the Temple Mount, the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.[346]
Other locations of religious importance in Israel are Nazareth (holy in Christianity as the site of the Annunciation of Mary), Tiberias and Safed (two of the Four Holy Cities in Judaism), the White Mosque in Ramla (holy in Islam as the shrine of the prophet Saleh), and the Church of Saint George in Lod (holy in Christianity and Islam as the tomb of Saint George or Al Khidr).
A number of other religious landmarks are located in the West Bank, among them Joseph's tomb in Shechem, the birthplace of Jesus and Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem, and the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron.
The administrative center of the Bahá'í Faith and the Shrine of the Báb are located at the Bahá'í World Centre in Haifa and the leader of the faith is buried in Acre. Apart from maintenance staff, there is no Bahá'í community in Israel, although it is a destination for pilgrimages. Bahá'í staff in Israel do not teach their faith to Israelis following strict policy.[347][348][349]
Education
Main article: Education in Israel
Israel has a school life expectancy of 15 years[350] and a literacy rate of 97.1% according to the United Nations.[351] The State Education Law, passed in 1953, established five types of schools: state secular, state religious, ultra orthodox, communal settlement schools, and Arab schools. The public secular is the largest school group, and is attended by the majority of Jewish and non-Arab pupils in Israel. Most Arabs send their children to schools where Arabic is the language of instruction.[352]
Education is compulsory in Israel for children between the ages of three and eighteen.[353][354] Schooling is divided into three tiers – primary school (grades 1–6), middle school (grades 7–9), and high school (grades 10–12) – culminating with Bagrut matriculation exams. Proficiency in core subjects such as mathematics, Bible, Hebrew language, Hebrew and general literature, English, history, and civics is necessary to receive a Bagrut certificate.[287] In Arab, Christian and Druze schools, the exam on Biblical studies is replaced by an exam in Islam, Christianity or Druze heritage.[355] In 2003, over half of all Israeli twelfth graders earned a matriculation certificate.[356] The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Tel Aviv University are ranked among the world's top 100 universities by the Times Higher Education.[357] Israel ranks third in the world in the number of academic degrees per capita (20 percent of the population).[358][359]
Culture
Main article: Culture of Israel
Israel's diverse culture stems from the diversity of the population: Jews from around the world have brought their cultural and religious traditions with them, creating a melting pot of Jewish customs and beliefs.[360] Israel is the only country in the world where life revolves around the Hebrew calendar. Work and school holidays are determined by the Jewish holidays, and the official day of rest is Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath.[361] Israel's substantial Arab minority has also left its imprint on Israeli culture in such spheres as architecture,[362] music,[363] and cuisine.[364]
Literature
Main article: Israeli literature
Israeli literature is primarily poetry and prose written in Hebrew, as part of the renaissance of Hebrew as a spoken language since the mid-19th century, although a small body of literature is published in other languages, such as English. By law, two copies of all printed matter published in Israel must be deposited in the Jewish National and University Library at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In 2001, the law was amended to include audio and video recordings, and other non-print media.[365] In 2006, 85 percent of the 8,000 books transferred to the library were in Hebrew.[366]
The Hebrew Book Week (He: שבוע הספר) is held each June and features book fairs, public readings, and appearances by Israeli authors around the country. During the week, Israel's top literary award, the Sapir Prize, is presented.
In 1966, Shmuel Yosef Agnon shared the Nobel Prize in Literature with German Jewish author Nelly Sachs.[367] Leading Israeli poets have been Yehuda Amichai, Nathan Alterman and Rachel Bluwstein. Internationally famous contemporary Israeli novelists include Amos Oz and David Grossman.
Israel has also been the home of two leading Palestinian poets and writers: Emile Habibi, whose novel The Secret Life of Saeed the Pessoptimist, and other writings, won him the Israel prize for Arabic literature; and Mahmoud Darwish, considered by many to be "the Palestinian national poet."[368] Darwish was born and raised in northern Israel, but lived his adult life abroad after joining the Palestine Liberation Organization.
Music and dance
Main article: Music of Israel
Israeli music contains musical influences from all over the world; Sephardic music, Hasidic melodies, Belly dancing music, Greek music, jazz, and pop rock are all part of the music scene.[369][370]
The nation's canonical folk songs, known as "Songs of the Land of Israel," deal with the experiences of the pioneers in building the Jewish homeland.[371]The Hora (הורה) circle dance introduced by early Jewish settlers was originally popular in the Kibbutzim and outlying communities. It became a symbol of the Zionist reconstruction and of the ability to experience joy amidst austerity. It now plays a significant role in modern Israeli folk dancing and is regularly performed at weddings and other celebrations, and in group dances throughout Israel.
Modern dance in Israel is a flourishing field, and several Israeli choreographers such as Ohad Naharin, Rami Beer, Barak Marshall and many others, are considered to be among the most versatile and original international creators working today. Famous Israeli companies include the Batsheva Dance Company and the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company.
Among Israel's world-renowned[372][373] orchestras is the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, which has been in operation for over seventy years and today performs more than two hundred concerts each year.[374] Israel has also produced many musicians of note, some achieving international stardom. Itzhak Perlman, Pinchas Zukerman and Ofra Haza are among the internationally acclaimed musicians born in Israel.
Israel has participated in the Eurovision Song Contest nearly every year since 1973, winning the competition three times and hosting it twice.[375] Eilat has hosted its own international music festival, the Red Sea Jazz Festival, every summer since 1987.[376]
Israel is home to many Palestinian musicians, including internationally acclaimed oud and violin virtuoso Taiseer Elias, singer Amal Murkus, and brothers Samir and Wissam Joubran. Israeli Arab musicians have achieved fame beyond Israel's borders: Elias and Murkus frequently play to audiences in Europe and America, and oud player Darwish Darwish (Prof. Elias's student) was awarded first prize in the all-Arab oud contest in Egypt in 2003. The Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance has an advanced degree program, headed by Taiseer Elias, in Arabic music.
Cinema and theatre
Main article: Cinema of Israel
Ten Israeli films have been final nominees for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards since the establishment of Israel. The 2009 movie Ajami was the third consecutive nomination of an Israeli film.[377]
Continuing the strong theatrical traditions of the Yiddish theater in Eastern Europe, Israel maintains a vibrant theatre scene. Founded in 1918, Habima Theatre in Tel Aviv is Israel's oldest repertory theater company and national theater.[378]
Palestinian Israeli filmmakers have made a number of films, some of them very controversial, dealing with the Arab-Israel conflict and the status of Palestinians within Israel. Mohammed Bakri's 2002 film Jenin, Jenin, about an Israeli military action in the West Bank town of Jenin, won the Best Film award at the Carthage International film festival, but was widely criticized within Israel for distorting the story of the battle. Ajami, a 2009 film about violence and discrimination in a mixed Jewish-Arab neighborhood in south Tel Aviv-Jaffa, was written and directed jointly by Palestinain Scandar Copti and Jewish Israeli Yaron Shani. It won an honorable mention in the Cannes Film Festival. The Syrian Bride, about a Druze wedding between families on opposite sides of the Israel-Syrian ceasefire line in the Golan Heights, was directed by a Jewish Israeli (Eran Riklis), but had an almost completely Druze cast.
Museums
See also: List of museums in Israel
The Israel Museum in Jerusalem is one of Israel's most important cultural institutions[379] and houses the Dead Sea scrolls,[380] along with an extensive collection of Judaica and European art.[379] Israel's national Holocaust museum, Yad Vashem, is the world central archive of Holocaust-related information.[381] Beth Hatefutsoth (the Diaspora Museum), on the campus of Tel Aviv University, is an interactive museum devoted to the history of Jewish communities around the world.[382]
Apart from the major museums in large cities, there are high-quality artspaces in many towns and kibbutzim. Mishkan Le'Omanut on Kibbutz Ein Harod Meuhad is the largest art museum in the north of the country.[383]
Several museums are devoted to Islamic culture, including the Rockefeller Museum, which specializes in archaeological remains from the Ottoman and other periods of Middle East history, and the L. A. Mayer Institute for Islamic Art, also in Jerusalem.
Sports
Main article: Sports in Israel
The Maccabiah Games, an Olympic-style event for Jewish athletes and Israeli athletes, was inaugurated in the 1930s, and has been held every four years since then. In 1964 Israel hosted and won the Asian Nations Cup; in 1970 the Israel national football team managed to qualify to the FIFA World Cup, which is still considered the biggest achievement of Israeli football.
Israel was excluded from the 1978 Asian Games due to Arab pressure on the organizers. The exclusion left Israel in limbo and it ceased competing in Asian competitions.[384] In 1994, UEFA agreed to admit Israel and all Israeli sporting organizations now compete in Europe.
The most popular spectator sports in Israel are association football and basketball.[385] The Israeli Premier League is the country's premier football league, and Ligat HaAl is the premier basketball league.[386] Maccabi Haifa, Maccabi Tel Aviv, Hapoel Tel Aviv and Beitar Jerusalem are the largest sports clubs. Maccabi Tel Aviv, Maccabi Haifa and Hapoel Tel Aviv have competed in the UEFA Champions League and Hapoel Tel Aviv reached the final quarter in the UEFA Cup. Maccabi Tel Aviv B.C. has won the European championship in basketball five times.[387] Israeli tennis champion Shahar Pe'er ranked 19th in the world after competing in Dubai.[388]
Chess is a a leading sport in Israel and is enjoyed by people of all ages. There are many Israeli grandmasters and Israeli chess players have won a number of youth world championships.[389] Israel stages an annual international championship and hosted the World Team Chess Championship in 2005. The Ministry of Education and the World Chess Federation agreed upon a project of teaching chess within Israeli schools, and it has been introduced into the curriculum of some schools.[390][391][392]The city of Beersheba has become a national chess center, with the game being taught in the city's kindergartens. Owing partly to Soviet immigration, it is home to the largest number of chess grandmasters of any city in the world. [393][394] The Israeli chess team won the silver medal at the 2008 Chess Olympiad[395] and the bronze, coming in third among 148 teams, at the 2010 Olympiad. Israeli grandmaster Boris Gelfand won the Chess World Cup in 2009 [396] and the 2011 Candidates Tournament for the right to challenge the world champion. He is currently playing for the title of World Champion.
Krav Maga, a martial art developed by Jewish ghetto defenders during the struggle against fascism in Europe, is used by the Israeli security forces and police. Its effectiveness and practical approach to self-defense, have won it widespread admiration and adherence round the world.
To date, Israel has won seven Olympic medals since its first win in 1992, including a gold medal in windsurfing at the 2004 Summer Olympics.[397] Israel has won over 100 gold medals in the Paralympic Games and is ranked about 15th in the all-time medal count. The 1968 Summer Paralympics were hosted by Israel.[398]
Cuisine
Main article: Israeli cuisine
Israeli cuisine includes local dishes as well as dishes brought to the country by Jewish immigrants from around the world. Since the establishment of the State in 1948, and particularly since the late 1970s, an Israeli fusion cuisine has developed.
Israeli cuisine has adopted, and continues to adapt, elements of various styles of Jewish cuisine, particularly the Mizrahi, Sephardic, and Ashkenazi styles of cooking, along with Moroccan Jewish, Iraqi Jewish, Ethiopian Jewish, Indian Jewish, Iranian Jewish and Yemeni Jewish influences. It incorporates many foods traditionally eaten in the Arab, Middle Eastern and Mediterranean cuisines, such as falafel, hummus, shakshouka, couscous, and za'atar, which have become common ingredients in Israeli cuisine.
See also
Notes
| a. | ^ The Jerusalem Law states that "Jerusalem, complete and united, is the capital of Israel" and the city serves as the seat of the government, home to the President's residence, government offices, supreme court, and parliament. United Nations Security Council Resolution 478 (20 August 1980; 14–0, U.S. abstaining) declared the Jerusalem Law "null and void" and called on member states to withdraw their diplomatic missions from Jerusalem. The United Nations and all member nations refuse to accept the Jerusalem Law (see Kellerman 1993, p. 140) and maintain their embassies in other cities such as Tel Aviv, Ramat Gan, and Herzliya (see the CIA Factbook and Map of Israel). The U.S. Congress subsequently adopted the Jerusalem Embassy Act, which said that the U.S. embassy should be relocated to Jerusalem and that it should be recognized as the capital of Israel. However, the US Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel concluded that the provisions of the act "invade exclusive presidential authorities in the field of foreign affairs and are unconstitutional". Since passage of the act, all Presidents serving in office have determined that moving forward with the relocation would be detrimental to U.S. national security concerns and opted to issue waivers suspending any action on this front. The Palestinian Authority sees East Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state. The city's final status awaits future negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (see "Negotiating Jerusalem," Palestine–Israel Journal). See Positions on Jerusalem for more information. |
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- ^ Rosenzweig, p. 1 "Zionism, the urge of the Jewish people to return to Palestine, is almost as ancient as the Jewish diaspora itself. Some Talmudic statements ... Almost a millennium later, the poet and philosopher Yehuda Halevi ... In the 19th century ..."
- ^ a b Geoffrey Wigoder, G.G. (ed.), "Return to Zion", The New Encyclopedia of Judaism (via Answers.Com) (The Jerusalem Publishing House), http://www.answers.com/topic/return-to-zion, retrieved 8 March 2010
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- ^ From the King James Version of the Bible: "the Lord your God will bring you back from captivity ... and gather you again from all the peoples ... and will bring you into the land which your fathers possessed and you shall possess it" (Deut. 30:1–5).
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Israel
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n. - Israel
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以色列
中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 以色列
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이스라엘 (1948년에 창건된 유대인의 나라; 수도 Jerusalem), 이스라엘 왕국 (B.C. 10-8세기경 Palestine의 북부에 있었음), 이스라엘 (Jacob의 별명; 창세기 XXXII, 28)
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