Israel

Monotheism- The Israelites were monotheists, meaning that they believed in the One Almighty God. Others on the Fertile Crescent were polytheists, which means that they believed in many gods and goddesses.

Answer:

Judaism differed from other ancient religions in the following ways:

1) It was the only religion in which God spoke to the entire assembled nation (Exodus ch.19) of over two million people.

2) It made a complete break from the surrounding idolatry. Their monotheism (belief in One God) set the Jews apart because other ancient nations did not share it. We've heard (for example) of the Greek mythology and Roman mythology. What not everyone is aware of is that idolatry tended to go hand in hand with cruel, licentious and excessive behavior, since the caprices which were narrated concerning the idols were adopted as an excuse to imitate those types of behavior.

Compare that to God, who reveals His attributes in the Torah as wise, kind, holy, and pure. God is One, so the command to imitate His attributes (Deuteronomy 8:6) was (and is) a straightforward matter once one is even minimally familiar with the Torah.

Accordingly, Judaism was:

3) The only ancient religion in which a large percentage of its adherents were literate and scholars.

4) It was the only religion in which the people were ruled by God, with no need for a king, for several centuries (see Judges 8:23 and 1 Samuel 8:4-7).

5) The concept of morality was also the work of the Hebrews' religion, including the dignity and value of a person. It is the responsibility of the community to support the widow, the orphan, the poor, and the stranger passing through.

6) Under the law of Judaism, everyone had recourse to the courts. A child, widow, wife, etc., could initiate legal action against any citizen to redress perpetrated harm. Compare this to those societies in which (at most) only mature, land-owning males had rights.

7) Government is accountable to a higher authority. In other ancient societies, the monarch was all-powerful. Among the Israelites, however, the king was under the constant scrutiny of the Divinely-informed prophets, who didn't hesitate to castigate him publicly for any misstep in the sight of God. And, other than for the crime of rebellion, the king couldn't punish any citizen by his own decision. He was obligated by the Torah-procedures like everyone else (Talmud, Sanhedrin 19a).

8) A robber repays double to his victim, or works it off. Unlike in many other ancient societies, in Judaism debtors are not imprisoned or harmed. They are made to sell property and/or work to repay what they owe. Compare this to the Roman practice by which anyone could accuse a man of owing them money and the debtor could be killed.

It is important to note that every one of the above existed in Judaism thousands of years earlier than in other nations. Here's just one example: Aristotle, who was among the greatest of the Greeks, and Seneca, the famous Roman, both write that killing one's young babies is perfectly acceptable.

There are three major reasons why Israel was able to capture so much territory from its adversaries in the Six Day War:

Israeli Preparation: Israelis realized that if Israel were to lose any conflict with the Arab States, Israel would cease to exist as an independent state. Therefore, Israeli generals and leaders spent years pouring over plans to defend the State and what methods of attack could most effectively quell the opposition. Israeli leaders had detailed topological surveys of the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights which were used when taking those territories. By contrast, Arab political leaders and generals spent much more time saber-rattling and declaring that they were going to destroy Israel without forming any plan to actually achieve that.

Surprise Attack: Although Egypt and Syria were definitely preparing to attack Israel and had made overtly hostile moves, Israel's first move of carpet-bombing the entire Egyptian Air Force took the Arabs by surprise. This swift move guaranteed Israel air superiority and made the Israeli tank and infantry divisions freer to move. This in turn led to more forceful advances. The Arabs did not recover from the advantage Israel had acquired from being the first-mover.

Incompetent Arab Generals: In the Sinai Peninsula, particularly, there were hugely conflicting reports about Arab losses and confusion. As a result, the Egyptian command ordered the tank divisions to withdraw without a clear method of retreat. Many in the Egyptian tank-core believed that they were denied a proper engagement with Israel, which they may have been able to win. Instead, they formed an easy-to-target-from-the-air column of tanks moving slowly to avoid getting stuck in the sand. In this way, Israel was able to compel an Egyptian evacuation from the Sinai Peninsula with only a third the number of tanks that the Egyptians had.

Israel's Ultra-Orthodox community wanted the Israeli government to subsidize their Torah study, provide them unlimited welfare for their families, refuse to negotiate with the Palestinians (especially concerning a divided Jerusalem), and to promote halakhic laws in the Israeli State.

• Answer 2

a) The ultra-Orthodox do not expect any greater percentage of funding than the non-religious community gets. Universities and secular culture are funded to the tune of billions of shekels yearly, while the religious community would be happy with a much more modest amount.
b) No one asks for unlimited welfare, period.
c) While there are religious groups who do not agree with having Jewish-Arab negotiations, that by no means holds true for the majority. The ultra-Orthodox should not be confused with the modern-Orthodox.
To address the Question:
The ultra-Orthodox include a number of communities: Hassidim, religious Sephardim, the Litvish yeshivas, and more. It is misleading and improper to attempt to lump them together.

A few things that may be said are:
1) The ultra-Orthodox would like to see more compliance with the Torah in the public sphere, since Israel is nominally Jewish in that regard. They don't presume to dictate what people do in privacy, but they do believe for example that shopping malls should be closed on the Sabbath, as Israeli law already states. Those malls which flout the city ordinances and remain open on the Shabbat are creating unfair competition for the law-abiding small businesses.

2) Most ultra-Orthodox are fully in favor of coming to some kind of agreement with the Palestinians. They managed to live alongside the Arabs before the creation of the state of Israel and would be content to do so now too. The majority of ultra-Orthodox are not militaristic. The Agudah and Degel Hatorah (United Torah-Judaism) were and are in favor of coming to a negotiated peace arrangement.

3) Many Jewish immigrants were encouraged or pressured (especially in the 1950s) to leave their Orthodoxy. This still happens, through such avenues as the media, which are largely very anti-Torah. Obviously, we religious Israelis would like to see that change.

The official, gov't sponsored majority school system (mamlakhti) is secular. Rates of alcohol-use, drug use and violence (for example) are much higher than among religious school students. Here too, we would like to see change. However, the secular establishment is so "allergic" to Torah that they prefer to endure the ills of their society (teen suicides, teen abortions, etc.), rather than try encouraging stronger Judaism as a solution.

The government has sponsored such forbidden things as digging up graves, public Sabbath-violations, and tens of other examples.

Unlike in the U.S.A., when a politician here (except in the minority religious parties) invokes mention of God, it creates a political brouhaha, as if a contemptible thing has been committed.

The religious community is discriminated against in housing, allocations, school funding, etc.

These are just a very few examples.

Israel Finkelstein is one of the foremost archaeologists in Israel, a leading authority on Middle Eastern archaeology and co-director of excavations at Megiddo. He is the Jacob M. Alkow Professor of the Archaeology of Israel in the Bronze Age and Iron Ages at the Tel Aviv University.

Finkelstein received his Ph.D from Tel Aviv University in 1983, with a dissertation on The Izbet Sartah Excavations and the Israelite Settlement in the Hill Country.

His extensive archaeological field experience, recorded by the Tel Aviv University, includes:

• 1971 Educational excavation at Tel Beer-sheba, under Prof. Y. Aharoni
• 1972-74 Archaeological surveys in Sinai, under Dr. Z. Meshel
• 1973-78 Area Supervisor, Aphek excavations
• 1976-78 Field Director, the Izbet Sartah excavations
• 1976-78 Director of the archaeological survey of Byzantine monastic remains in Southern Sinai
• 1977 Director of the rescue excavations at the mound of ancient Bene-Beraq
• 1979-80 Co-director of the Tel Ira excavations
• 1980-87 Director of the Southern Samaria Survey
• 1981-84 Director of the Shiloh excavations
• 1985-86 Director of the Kh. ed-Dawwara excavations
• 1987 Director of the Dhahr Mirzbaneh excavation
• 1992-present Co-director, the Megiddo Excavations
• 1995, 1999 Co-director, the Megiddo Regional Survey
• 2006 Co-director, excavations at Atar Haroa, the Negev Highlands

Finkelstein is the author or co-author of a number of respected publications on the archaeology and early history of Israel.

Another view:

Finkelstein despite his popularity in certain circles is also noted for his tendency to be a 'revisionist' in that he denies established opinions according to his supposedly anti-Biblical bias. This is not to say that his work is totally bereft of credibility, but he has a strong tendency to speak with authority in overriding both great archaeologists of the past, proven facts, and to invest tenuous details with absolute certainty, particularly when they contradict the Bible.

The title 'revisionist' is applied to him by other, more cautious archaeologists, who know the evidence and the numerous cases in the past where the Bible has been thought to be wrong.