Israel

In the King James version we read

Exo 16:1 And they took their journey from Elim, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came unto the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departing out of the land of Egypt.

and

Exo 16:15 And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, It is manna: for they wist not what it was. And Moses said unto them, This is the bread which the LORD hath given you to eat.

and

Exo 16:35 And the children of Israel did eat manna forty years, until they came to a land inhabited; they did eat manna, until they came unto the borders of the land of Canaan.

So they got the manna one month and fifteen days after they left Egypt, and they got it for forty years - so forty years, one month and fifteen days - but this is usually rounded off to 'forty years' when people speak of it.

At this point in time, concerning the Palestinian Authority, the ball is in Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu's court. If he were to stop the construction of the settlements between Jerusalem and Ma'ale Adumim, it might be seen as a good enough good-faith gesture to restart negotiations.

As concerns Hamas, there is nothing that can bring them to the table for any serious peace negotiations since they believe that any negotiations for a peaceful solution of Israel violates their duty to protect the Palestinian interest on the whole territory of Mandatory Palestine.

The tension have started mainly from founding Israel in an area which includes both Jewish and Arab people. The countries in this area are associated with religions, and so there was a fight for the shared territory.

The tension is also caused from the difference in religions themselves, there are areas in Israel sacred to all three religions, and there is an argument who should occupy them.

The main formal motive of Israel is self defense, while the Arabs around it have different reasons. In Gaza they call for independency and equal rights. In Lebanon they want Israel to allow Palestine people from Lebanon to live in Israel, an so on.

My personal opinion: There is a lot of suffering in the middle east, and suffering makes you look for someone to blame. It's easier to hate the ones who are different.

The former kingdom of Judah is now part of modern Israel and partly in the Palestinian Territory. Judah was a small inland enclave surrounding the city of Jerusalem and quite separate from the kingdom of Israel to its north.

Biblical tradition holds that in former times, Judah and Israel had formed a United Monarchy, also known as Israel, but noted archaeologists such as Israel Finkelstein say that this was never the case. Judah and Israel were always separate and had their own separate culture, pottery styles and even their own separate dialects of the Hebrew language.

No.

Israel as an independent state was created in 1948, three years after Hitler was dead and the Nazi regime crushed.

In terms of territory, the German Afrika Corps, under Gen. Erwin Rommel, was decisively defeated at the Battle of El Alamein in Egypt. This prevented the Nazis from invading Palestine from the Egyptian side. Also Syria and Lebanon came under Free-French control in July 1941 as a result of the Syria-Lebanon Campaign, effectively preventing the Germans from invading from the north. (These territories had been under Vichy French control from June 1940, but Germany was concentrated outside of the Middle East in late 1940 and early 1941. In Mid-1941, the Nazis tried to establish a Fascist State in Iraq, but failed as a result of the Anglo-Iraqi War of 1941.

There were three patriarchs: Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The book of Genesis (from ch.11 onwards centers around them.
Abraham (18th century BCE) came from ancestry that had been God-fearing a couple of centuries earlier but had afterwards slipped into idolatry (Joshua 24:2). Nimrod, the idolatrous tyrant, had brought Abraham's father (Terah) from the Semitic ancestral seat near the conjunction of the Balikh and the Euphrates, and instated him in a position of power in his army in the royal Babylonian city of Ur, where Abraham was born. Nimrod persecuted any who would question his idolatrous cult.
The Kuzari (Rabbi Judah HaLevi, 1075-1141) states that Abraham was gifted with high intelligence; and, as Maimonides (1135-1204) describes, Abraham didn't blindly accept the ubiquitous idolatry. The whole populace had been duped, but the young Abraham contemplated the matter relentlessly, finally arriving at the conclusion that there is One God and that this should be taught to others as well. This is what is meant by his "calling out in the name of the Lord" (Genesis ch.12). As a young man, he remonstrated with passersby in public, demonstrating to them the falsehood of their idols; and our tradition tells how he was threatened and endangered by Nimrod but eventually put Nimrod to shame.
Subsequently, Terah relocated to Harran; and it is here that Abraham began to develop a circle of disciples (Rashi commentary, on Genesis 12:5).
Later, God told Abraham in prophecy to move to the Holy Land, which is where Abraham raised his family.
He continued his contemplations, eventually arriving at the attitudes and forms of behavior which God later incorporated into the Torah given to Moses. Abraham, with God's help, singlehandedly trounced the supremacy of the evil Nimrod. He received God's promise of inheriting the Holy Land (Genesis 13). He strove to raise a family (Genesis ch.15, 17, and 24) which would serve God (Genesis 18:19); and God eventually blessed his efforts, granting him many children (ibid., ch.16, 21 and 25), as He had promised (Genesis ch.17). Abraham founded the Jewish people and lived to see his work live on in the persons of Isaac and Jacob; and he taught many other disciples as well (Talmud, Yoma 28b). He saved the population of the south of Canaan from invading foreign kings (Genesis 14); and he was feared by neighboring kings (ibid., ch.12 and 20). Abraham gave tithes (Genesis ch.14), made a covenant with God (Genesis ch.15 and 17), welcomed guests into his home (Genesis ch.18) unlike the inhospitable Sodomites (Genesis ch.19), prayed for people (Genesis ch.18), rebuked others when necessary (Genesis ch.20), eulogized and buried the deceased (Genesis ch.23), and fulfilled God's will unquestioningly (Genesis ch.22). He became renowned as a prince of God (Genesis 23:6).
All of these forms of behavior were based upon the ways of God, which Abraham comprehended through his contemplations. These, and similar personality traits, were the teachings of Abraham and his descendants.
It is therefore clear why God expresses His love for Abraham (Isaiah 41:8) and calls Himself the God of Abraham (Genesis 26:24), and says that Abraham obeyed Him fully (Genesis 26:5). And this is why, according to our tradition, Abraham is credited with having begun the religion which became known as Judaism. However, Abraham and his descendants observed their traditions voluntarily, until the Giving of the Torah to Moses 3325 years ago, when God made it obligatory.
Isaac is the second of the three Forefathers and (like Abraham and Jacob) one of the greatest personages in Judaism.
Isaac (Yitzhak) was a son of Abraham (Genesis ch.21); and God said that His covenant with Abraham would continue with Isaac (Genesis 17:18-19). Isaac had facial features that were identical to Abraham (Rashi commentary, Genesis 25:19).
God tested Abraham by asking him to offer Isaac as an offering (see Genesis ch.22); and this readiness for self-sacrifice bestowed a special holiness upon Isaac (Talmud, Yevamot 64).
Isaac married Rebecca (Genesis ch.24), his second cousin. Rebecca gave birth to two sons, Esau and Jacob (Genesis ch.25).
God spoke to Isaac, confirming His covenant with him (Genesis ch.26).
Despite harassment from the Philistines, Isaac enjoyed great success (ibid.). He reopened all the wells which his father had dug and the Philistines had stopped up (ibid.). The king of the Philistines, unable to ignore Isaac's phenomenal success, petitioned him to make a mutual treaty of non-aggression (ibid.).
In his advanced years, Isaac sought to bless his elder son Esau (Genesis ch.27). Rebecca took pains to thwart this and to ensure that Jacob would receive the blessing, since she had learned through prophecy (Genesis 25:23) that Jacob would be more favored by God. Later it became apparent that Isaac admitted Rebecca's having done the right thing, since he blessed Jacob again (Genesis 28:1-4) even after he found out what had happened (see Genesis 27:6-16).
Isaac sent Jacob to the ancestral family seat in Mesopotamia to choose a wife (Genesis ch.28). Though Jacob didn't return for over twenty years (Genesis 31:38), God granted Isaac extra years, so that he lived on for two decades after Jacob's return.
Isaac was buried next to his father Abraham (Genesis 49:31).
Jacob, son of Isaac, was the last of the Patriarchs (Talmud, Berakhot 16b). He spent a lot of time in the tents (Genesis 25:27) studying his ancestors' teachings (Rashi commentary, ibid.); and eventually, like Abraham and Isaac before him, reached the level of prophecy, in which God spoke to him and promised His protection (Genesis 28:10-15).
When the opportunity presented itself, Jacob asked his brother Esau to sell him his first-born birthright (Genesis 25:29:34), since he sensed that Esau wasn't pious enough to fully deserve it. Thus began the fulfillment of the prophecy which Rebecca had heard, that Jacob would become the dominant of her two sons (Genesis 25:22-23).
Jacob's life was replete with tribulations. He managed to come out ahead despite the wiles of the deceitful Laban (Genesis 29:25 and 31:41) and the danger presented by the angry Esau (Genesis 27:41 and 32:12). There were painful events with his daughter Dinah (Genesis 34:1-7) and with his being separated for two decades from his beloved son, Joseph (Genesis ch.37); and his wife Rachel died at a young age in childbirth (Genesis 35:16-19).
These troubles were a portent for the tribulations of the Jews in their times of exile. But Jacob received, in prophecy, God's affirmation of His covenant and blessing (Genesis 28:13-14; 35:9-12; 46:2-4), signifying that the exile would eventually end.
These three, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, were the founders of the Israelite (Jewish) people, both physically and spiritually; and God calls himself "the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob" (Exodus ch.3) eighteen times in the Torah.
It is their ways and traditions that the Torah preserves.

Mainly because there is not now, and historically has never been, any other place in the world

where Jews have been completely free to be Jewish and to live as Jews.

The Pixies did not specify why they canceled their concert in Israel, but the cancellation occurred a couple of days after the raid of an international flotilla by the Israeli army, and there was enough political pressure on the Pixies to cancel their concert in Israel even before that, so the reason for cancellation is most likely political.

No, in a very strong, vehement way. Israel represented many negative things to them such as, Arab repression, Jewish ascendance, Western Imperialism, and Division of the Unified Arab Lands.

The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians destabilizes the region and results in increased militarization among nations.

The way this question is phrased, it would seem that Israelis take some kind of perverse pleasure in seeing Gazans starve. Israelis take no joy in this. To them, the Blockade on Gaza is an issue of security. Israelis believe, like most people, that they have the right to live in their country without fear of being attacked by rockets overhead. Unfortunately, the Hamas government in Gaza actively condones this violent activity. Even with the blockade a small number of rockets still arrive daily and used against Israeli citizens.

The Israeli government also sends in supervised shipments of food and electricity to Gaza precisely to prevent the absolute starvation of Gazans. However, providing the Gazan people with excess materials or loosening the blockade has been shown in the past to strengthen the militant activities of Hamas and allow for greater acquisition of smuggled weapons. The only position that Israel has is to contain the situation and hope for change.

Actually, in the early years of the twentieth century, the Zionist leader Herzl proposes that a temporary Jewish state be set up in British Uganda, from where they would one day launch an exodus to Palestine. Another proposal was that they be settled in a remote area of Australia. It seems that the territories of smaller nations were expendable.

That is not a question, rather it is a subject with a question mark at the end.

Zionism is the belief that the Jews should have political self-sovereignty and is the patriotic sentiment behind the Establishment of the State of Israel.

The Zionist leadership was ardently secularist with one or two critical exceptions. These leaders included Theodor Herzl (who developed the concept of Modern Jewish Nationalism or Zionism), Eliezer ben Yehuda (who developed the Modern Hebrew Language), Ze'ev Jabotinsky (Jewish Advocate to the British and Leader of the Palmach), Menachem Begin (Leader of the Irgun and future Israeli Prime Minister), and the Halutzim in general (the Jewish pioneers who arrived in the British Mandate of Palestine in the 1920s and 1930s). On the religious side, there was primarily Rabbi Avraham Kook (First Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi of Israel and .founder of Religious Zionism) who was treading a new theological doctrine to back up Zionism with Jewish religious values.

No. Israel was not at war or declaring war on anyone in 1980. In 1981, Israel entered the Lebanese Civil War after a barrage of rockets coming from southern Lebanon under PLO control.

All are Palestinians in both sides.

The Palestinian Arabs were frustrated and aggrieved. They believed (and many still do) that all of the land belonged to them and being forced to share it with an invader from outside of the country would be ridiculous. The UN Partition Plan in particular accorded the Jewish State much more land than the Jews controlled at that time and was seen as catering to their interests. In fact, the Jewish State was 56% of the overall land. The Arabs completely rejected the plan. Additionally, the creation of Israel directly resulted in the Jewish-Arab Engagement of 1947-1949 which resulted in 720,000 Palestinians becoming refugees. This event is commemorated by Palestinians are the Nakba or Great Catastrophe.

The Israeli Jews were very excited by the creation of Israel which they saw as the realization of nearly 70 years of nationalist endeavors and nearly 2000 years of yearning for Jewish self-rule in Israel. In their view, it was a momentous occasion that would see the end of the Diasporic History of Judaism and create a true, unified polity of Jews from around the world. With the pain of the Holocaust so close, Israeli independence also provided many Jews with the sense that they would now be the defenders of their own of country, and not the victims of governments beyond their control. Israeli Independence Day is a huge celebration within Israel and Israel's Memorial Day is an important day whose commemoration occurs the day before Independence Day.

Yes. The Oslo Accords. However, no treaty that fully addresses even one of the major sticking points has been proffered and signed.

The United Nations has passed a large number of different resolutions at different times to end different Arab-Israeli Wars. The original Resolution 181, was a proposal to prevent Arab-Israeli War by dividing the territory preemptively. There are a vast number of other United Nations Resolutions concerning Israel and can be found at the link below.

Bil Clinton

Yes: June 5-10, 1967.