Israeli History

[verrid]

I have read a couple things on the internet about Israeli history,but most of it is from the internet so I dont consider it a good source of information.
The negative sources contend that Israel is a European outpost in the middle east,and the pro-Israel evangelical ones say that Israel has a population (Yemenite Jews) that are descended from Jewish Arabs which came to Israel by the millions and they account for the fact that 50 or 60 percent of Israelis are descended from these Yemenite Jews.
I do notice however that most Israelis do seem darker than your average European Jews such as the ones I have in my own family.
I have not read any extensive history books on Israel and have never visited this beautiful land .
Is any of this hearsay true and are there any good books to read on the subject that dont have the anti-semetic slant which keeps me from reading most of the time??

[Rick]

This was in the news recently and helps to bolster the fact that Jews (of one variety or another ), have always been in the land...
...Israel has unveiled an underground archaeological site near Jerusalem's most disputed shrine that will soon be open to tourists. The site includes a wall that archaeologists say dates to the first Jewish temple. The discoveries are just more proof that, despite Muslim control of the area right now, it was first given to the Jews by God -- as the Bible clearly teaches. Archaeologist Eli Weissbart tells Associated Press that tourists will see ancient infrastructure and artifacts at the underground site. "We found, unexpectedly, an old ritual bath ... which was being used in the days of Maccabees ... more than 2,000 years ago," he says. "People came here [to use the bath] in order to purify [themselves] before entering the temple." Visitors to the center, which opens in a few weeks, will also be treated to a sound-and-light show of Jewish biblical history, and a new glass monument to the twelve tribes of Israel. [Fred Jackson/AP]

www.iclnet.org/pub/resources/text/history/israel.html
www.acu.edu:9090/~armstrongl/geography/israel.htm
www.masada2000.org/historical.html
www.science.co.il/Israel-history.asp
vlib.iue.it/history/asia/Israel/


If you find items like this relating to Israeli/Jewish history interesting, I have collected a few others, and would be happy to post them.

[Rick]

Here is an interesting little bit on the wire today;

Archaeologists Unveil Ancient Church Site

MEGIDDO PRISON, Israel - Israeli prisoner Ramil Razilo was removing rubble from the planned site of a new prison ward when his shovel uncovered the edge of an elaborate mosaic, unveiling what Israeli archaeologists said Sunday may be the Holy Land's oldest church.
The discovery of the church in the northern Israeli town of Megiddo, near the biblical Armageddon, was hailed by experts as an important discovery that could reveal details about the development of the early church in the region. Archaeologists said the church dated from the third century, decades before Constantine legalized Christianity across the Byzantine Empire.
"What's clear today is that it's the oldest archaeological remains of a church in
Israel, maybe even in the entire region. Whether in the entire world, it's still too early to say," said Yotam Tepper, the excavation's head archaeologist.
Israeli officials were giddy about the discovery, with Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon calling the church "an amazing story."

Vatican officials also hailed the find.
"A discovery of this kind will make Israel more interesting to all Christians, for the church all over the world," said Archbishop Pietro Sambi, the Vatican envoy to Jerusalem. "If it's true that the church and the beautiful mosaics are from the third century, it would be one of the most ancient churches in the Middle East."
Razilo, who is serving a two-year sentence for traffic violations, was one of about 50 prisoners brought into the high-security Megiddo Prison to help excavate the area before the construction of new wards for 1,200 Palestinian prisoners.
Razilo was shocked to uncover the edge of the mosaic. The inmates worked for months to uncover all the parts of the mosaic — the floor of the church, he said.
"We continued to look and slowly we found this whole beautiful thing," said Razilo, who used a sponge and a bucket of water to clean dirt off the uncovered mosaics Sunday.

Two mosaics inside the church — one covered with fish, an ancient Christian symbol that predates the cross — tell the story of a Roman officer and a woman named Aketous who donated money to build the church in the memory "of the god, Jesus Christ."
Pottery remnants from the third century, the style of Greek writing used in the inscriptions, ancient geometric patterns in the mosaics and the depiction of fish rather than the cross indicate that the church was no longer used by the fourth century, Tepper said.
The church's location, not far from the spot where the New Testament says the final battle between good and evil will take place, also made sense because a bishop was active in the area at the time, said Tepper, who works with the Israel Antiquities Authority.
The inscription, which specifies that Aketous donated a table to the church, indicates the house of worship predated the Byzantine era, when Christians began using altars in place of tables in their rituals, Tepper said. Remnants of a table were uncovered between the two mosaics.
The building — most of which was destroyed — also was not built in the Basilica style that was standard under the Byzantines, he added.
Stephen Pfann, a biblical scholar and professor at the Holy Land University, said the second and third centuries were transitional periods where people sought to define their religious beliefs and modes of worship. Iconography and inscriptions found in Nazareth and Caperneum — places where Jesus lived — show that people went there to worship, although most did so secretly.
"This was a time of persecution and in this way it is quite surprising that there would be such a blatant expression of Christ in a mosaic, but it may be the very reason why the church was destroyed," Pfann said.
The dig will continue as archaeologists try to uncover the rest of the building and its surroundings, including what they believe could be a baptismal site, Tepper said.

Joe Zias, an anthropologist and former curator with the antiquities authority, questioned the dating of the find, saying there is no evidence of churches before the fourth century. The building may have been in use earlier, but most likely not for Christian religious purposes, he said.
"They're going to be hard, hard-pressed to prove it ... because the evidence argues otherwise," Zias said.
By RAMIT PLUSHNICK-MASTI, [AP]

(theres one in every crowd )
Rick

[Rick]

You won't see this on the evening news or read in the "New York Times"......WOW!

'Now, the Stones Will Speak'
Discovery offers glimpse of both ancient Israel and the travails of the modern state

For those who hate Israel, one of the most dangerous things a Jew can do in Jerusalem is to start digging. Because the more you dig there, the worse it gets for those who would like to pretend that Israelis are alien colonists imposing their rule on the so-called indigenous people of the region.
That's why an interest in archaeology has always been a key factor in the century-long struggle to recreate and then maintain Jewish sovereignty in the land of Israel.
You might think arguments claiming that the Jews were alien to the place are limited to the nonsensical propaganda that emanates from the less enlightened portions of the Islamic world. Claims from the Muslim Wakf that administers the Temple Mount in Jerusalem that the place has been a mosque since the days of Adam and Eve are, we hope, laughed off by those who read the mainstream press.
Upending David
But though few in this country outside of academia have noticed, the notion of Israel being the historical homeland of the Jewish people has been under attack from far more reputable sources. In recent decades, a new front in the war on Israel was opened in intellectual journals and classrooms. Its goal? To trash the notion that the Bible's accounts of the history of ancient Israel have the slightest value, and to debunk the idea that the United Kingdom of David ever existed.
For a growing number of academics and intellectuals, King David and his kingdom, which has served for 3,000 years as an integral symbol of the Jewish nation, is simply a piece of fiction.
Building on the work of deconstrutionists, who have turned the study of literature into a morass of moral relativism and intellectual cant that seeks to undermine the very idea of historic truth, a new school of historians has arisen since the 1970s. Their purpose is to challenge not only the veracity of the biblical narrative, but the very idea of Jewish nationhood having its roots in the distant past.
As professor Jonathan Rosenbaum, president of Gratz College here in Philadelphia and himself a leading authority on Ancient Near East studies, said: "If you can upend the idea that King David was a historic figure and that ancient Israel was real, then you can delegitimize modern Israel."
And in the spirit of the post-Zionist fashion that has swept over Israel in the last decade, these ideas have been embraced by a number of influential Israeli archaeologists, too. Most prominently, Israel Finkelstein of Tel Aviv University has written that the idea of the Davidic kingdom is not based on fact, and that David's Jerusalem was nothing but a "poor village."
But last week, the debunkers of Jewish history got some bad news. And all it took was for a dedicated archaeologist to start digging.
Dr. Eilat Mazar, senior fellow of the Jerusalem-based Shalem Center's Institute for the Archaeology of the Jewish People, made public the results of the dig she had been conducting since February in an area south of the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem, where scholars believe the city of David existed. What she produced ought to help quiet those who think Jewish history is bunk.
The bullah, or seal, inscribed with the name "Jerucal ben Shelemiah, ben Shevi".
Amid the soil and rocks of the place that is now the village of Silwan, Mazar uncovered the ruins of the building she's sure was the palace of David itself - the very same structure that was built, according to the Bible, by King Hiram of Tyre for Israel's greatest king, around 1,000 BCE.
"It was obvious from the first glance that we are not speaking about a private house," recounts Mazar via phone from Jerusalem. "The walls are huge. The construction involved was massive."
Directly underneath the structure that was uncovered were "masses of pottery" all dating to the 11th and 12th centuries BCE, the era that archaeologists call Iron Age I, which predates the era of David. By its position in the site, this pottery, which was a unique find in of itself, makes it clear that "Iron I was over or almost over by the time the building was started," said Mazar.
"I had to ask myself, 'What do we have in hand?' " she says.
Mazar, 48, is the granddaughter of pioneering Israeli archaeologist Benjamin Mazar. She grew up in the world of digs and worked with her grandfather as a research assistant on his excavations on the Temple Mount.
She had talked with him before his death 10 years ago about the possibility of this project and, building upon the work of past generations of archaeologists and by reading a crucial verse in the book of Samuel II (Chapter 5, Verse 17), decided that if David had gone down from where he was to his fortress, then Silwan was the spot where David's abode might be found.
The dig was sponsored by the Hebrew University and Shalem, financed by American investor Roger Hertog and carried out with the help of the Ir David Foundation, which owns the land. But after years of work and planning, the proof was waiting in the ground.
"Once I started to excavate," says Mazar, "it was as if I had written nothing. Now, the stones will speak, not me."
And speak they do.
For those who contend that what she found was more likely the Jebusite fort David conquered or something else that predates his kingdom, Mazar said that the placement of the Iron I pottery right underneath it makes such a conclusion "problematic."
"How come I didn't find any remains of any construction underneath it? It doesn't make any sense. If this is the fortress, it was erected a day before King David captured the city.
"[This] fantastic building [is a] big, obvious answer to those who say Jerusalem was an unimportant settlement."
'A Name Is a name'
Just as telling was an artifact only 1 centimeter long, uncovered from a slightly later period. It was an impression of an ancient seal, or "bullah," which bore the name of Jerucal, son of Shelemiah, son of Shevi.
Who was he? Nothing less than a minister of the Kingdom of Judah in its last days before the Babylonian destruction of the city in 586 BCE. We know of him only because he is mentioned in the book of Jeremiah. But the bullah proves his existence isn't a literary flight of fancy.
The find shows again, as many other archaeological discoveries have also proven, that the Tanach is a credible historic source. For Mazar, this tiny piece of clay - found amid thousands of years of remains - "goes straight to the point" to understanding the role of the biblical text in reconstructing history.
"Layer by layer, we must take the Bible much, much more seriously than was ever thought, and treat it as a most important historic document that contains a lot of realistic descriptions," declares Mazar.
Any source that is the work of human hands (as scholars consider the Bible) is fallible, but, she says to those who doubt its role in understanding Jewish history, "a name is still a name."
While Mazar and the Shalem Center have tried to steer the discussion of the find away from politics, she knows firsthand that contemporary struggles are never far away from the study of Israel's past.
As spokeswoman for the nonpartisan Committee Against the Desecration of Antiquities on the Temple Mount, Mazar tried to alert the world in recent years to the vandalism being done to site by the Muslim Wakf. Much to her amazement, her pleas fell on deaf ears and the government of Israel refused to intervene. The result is that, due to politics, a treasure trove of antiquities in this sacred place may well be lost to us forever.
Similarly, Mazar knows there will be those who will assault her work for nonscientific reasons. As Rosenbaum noted, many modern scholars now seem to think that if you have an argument between those who claim the earth is flat and those who see it as round, "both are equally legitimate." Thus, it can be asserted, despite the archaeological evidence of the Bible's historicity, "there is no such thing as biblical history and no such thing as ancient Israelites."
Though Mazar says she "welcomes controversy over the meaning of the evidence," she urges her colleagues to deal with facts and not fantasies.
But by uncovering the remains of David's palace, Mazar has struck a blow not only for the cause of archaeology, but helped make clear just how deep the Jewish roots of this place run.
- Jonathan S. Tobin

The "stones cry out"
Rick

[Chizuk Emunah]

Outstanding! Gotta love it.

I'm glad the article mentioned Israel Finkelstein by name. Whenever there is a show about acient Israel on the Discovery Channel or History Channel, they often feature this archealogist and tout him as an "expert", and all he does is bash Israel's history.

I find it amazing that our own people would be so quick to dismiss our history.

[Firestorm]

Has anybody else here seen a TV documentary called "The Naked Archaeologist" hosted by Simcha Jacobovici? Much of it is shot in Israel at ar dig sites, museums etc. and he interviews many people involved with biblical archaeology and history. In my area (Calgary, Canada) we get it on Vision TV-Channel 54 (you might get this if you live in Montana). It's brilliant. I've no idea exactly where this guy stands faithwise, but he's quite intellectually honest. He was talking to someone else on the show about how the spread of the written alphabet in the Middle East seemed to correspond to the route taken by the Children of Israel from Egypt to the promised land. All this other guy was splutter and blubber unable to answer Dr. Jacobovici's questions. (It was defintely one of the funniest things I've seen on documentary TV!) You all should bug PBS to broadcast this in your locality.

[Rick]

It's amazing how archaeology consistantly reinforces the accuracy of scripture and not disprove it, as some in the field would like to do.

Goliath's name found in archaeological dig

RAMAT GAN, Israel (Reuters) - An Israeli researcher said he has made a Goliath of a find -- the first archaeological evidence suggesting the biblical story of David slaying the Philistine giant actually took place.

A shard of pottery unearthed in a decade-old dig in southern
Israel carried an inscription in early Semitic style spelling "Alwat and "Wlt," likely Philistine renderings of the name Goliath, said Aren Maeir, who directed the excavation.
"This is a groundbreaking find," he said of the rust-colored ceramic. "Here we have very nice evidence the name Goliath appearing in the Bible in the context of the story of David and Goliath ... is not some later literary creation."
Maeir, head of the archaeology department at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv, told Reuters that his excavators found the shard, possibly part of a bowl, about two meters (6.5 ft) underground at Tell es-Shafi.
The mound where the dig took place is widely believed to be the site of the ancient city of Gath, which the Bible calls Goliath's hometown.
The biblical story of the epic Philistine giant's defeat at the hands of a much smaller David, who went on to become king of Israel, has long been a popular metaphor for the triumph of good over evil against all odds.
The specimen, from about 900 BC, isn't old enough to have belonged to Goliath, himself -- believed to have lived around 1,000 BC, Maeir said.
But he added: "It is the first time in the land of Israel that we have (found) the name Goliath, or a name like Goliath."
"I haven't found Goliath's skeleton with the hole in the center of his forehead, but it's the first archaeological evidence form a Philistine site which lends strong credibility" to the story, the U.S.-born researcher said.
The Book of Samuel I 17:4-10 spoke of "a champion out of the camp of the Philistines, named Goliath, of Gath," a heavily armed giant who challenged an Israelite soldier to a duel.
David, at the time a shepherd, took up Goliath's challenge and "prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and a stone" (Samuel I 17:50).
Maeir said the shard is also the oldest Philistine inscription ever found in Israel.
"Up until now most of what we know about the Philistines is from the Bible's point of view. ... We get a very, very subjective view. They're the bad people, the barbarians, we don't get anything nice about them," he said.
"When we look at the Philistines from an archaeological point of view we get evidence of a very rich, dynamic, fascinating and advanced culture."
Maier said he spent several months verifying his find with other experts and planned to discuss it at a conference in the United States later this month.

Kinda' put's a big hole in the idea that the Bible is a collection of fairy tales........................

[Rick]

An interesting research development from Hebrew Univ.

www.worldnet daily.com/ news/article. asp?ARTICLE_ ID=54197
Sunday, February 11, 2007
MUCH ABOUT HISTORY
Temple's location found, says Israeli archaeologist
Study of ancient cisterns pinpoints sacred site, – Muslim Dome of the Rock outside confines
Using maps created in 1866 by a British explorer and passages from the Jewish Mishnah, an Israeli archaeologist and professor at Hebrew University says he has pinpointed the location of the sacred Jewish Temple, twice built and twice destroyed in ancient times.

While popular consensus places the Temple, built by King Solomon in the 10th century B.C. and rebuilt by Jews who returned from Babylon in the 5th century B.C., on the site of the present Muslim Dome of the Rock, Prof. Joseph Patrich says archaeological remains show its exact location – and the consensus is wrong.

According to Patrich, the Temple, its corresponding courtyards, chambers and gates were oriented in a more southeasterly direction, sitting diagonally on what is the modern Temple Mount. The difference in orientation and the placement further eastward varies from the east-facing orientation of other scholars who believe the Temple was closer to today's Western Wall.

However, that difference is why, Patrich says, the Temple did not sit over the rock believed by Jews to be the site where Abraham was prepared to sacrifice his son Isaac and where Muslims believe Muhammad ascended into heaven.

Patrich's siting of the Temple is derived from information collected by British engineer Sir Charles Wilson in 1866 on behalf of the Palestine Exploration Fund. Wilson mapped a series of ancient cisterns below the present Temple Mount platform. One of those, Patrich says, preserves a vestige of the Temple that stood until it was destroyed by Rome in A.D. 70.

The cistern mapped by Wilson, approximately 15 feet wide, 170 feet long and 45 feet deep, was located near the Temple Mount's southeast corner. It was oriented in a southeasterly direction with branches extending north and south.

"Until now no one has ever thought that the location of the cistern on the Temple Mount and its unique shape were derived from the shape and location of the altar and sanctuary," Patrich told YNetNews.

According to the archaeologist, this cistern is the only one found on the Temple Mount that corresponds to descriptions in the Jewish Mishnah – the rabbinic oral tradition compiled in the 3rd century A.D. – of daily purification and sacrificial duties carried out by the priests on the altar in the Temple courtyard.

The Mishnah says water was drawn by a waterwheel mechanism from a cistern and held in a large basin, or laver, for daily purification by the Temple's priests before they ascended the nearby ramp to the altar to offer sacrifices.

Patrich believes the placement of the waterwheel and laver can be reconstructed from Wilson's map of the giant southeast-trending cistern and from that, the location of the altar and the Temple itself.

Patrich's siting has the Temple further east and south of locations proposed by other scholars and diagonal, rather than perpendicular to the Temple Mount's eastern and western walls. It also leaves the rock in the Dome of the Rock outside of the confines of the Temple itself.

Patrich said his research on the Temple's location is strictly academic, and political connotations should not be attributed to it.

Could a Third Temple and The Dome of the Rock coexist on the Temple Mount?

[Chizuk Emunah]

Hmm.... Interesting theory. Guess we'll have to see what happens.

Have you seen this? Palestinian State?

[Rick]

I had not seen that, very unsettling, , makes the hair stand up.......

And the Bat Tziyon (Yerushalayim) is left as a sukkah in a kerem (vineyard), as a shack in a cucumber field, as an ir (city) under siege.[Isa 1:8]

Because yamim (days) will come upon you when your oyevim (enemies) will construct a siege against you and they will surround you and will hem you in from all directions.[Luk 19:43], [see also Isa 29:3; Jer 6:6; Ezek 4:2; 28:6]

Trust in Adonai. His perfect plan will come to pass, in His way and His time.

Why should I fear in the days of rah, when the avon (iniquity) of my akev (supplanters, deceivers) surrounds me?
[Psa 49:5]

Though I walk in the midst of tzoros, Thou wilt preserve me alive; Thou shalt stretch forth Thine yad against the wrath of mine enemies, and Thy Yamin (Right Hand) shall save me.[Psa 138:7]

[R' Y'hoshua Moshe]

Patrich said his research on the Temple's location is strictly academic, and political connotations should not be attributed to it.

Ya, right.

I don't think the Dome Of The Rock should be allowed to exist in Yerushalayim. Will it exist next to the holy Temple? I have my doubts.

Shalom chaverim,

Reuel

[Otto]

You might like this

www.conceptwizard.com/conen/conflict_2.html

[R' Y'hoshua Moshe]

Shalom Otto,

Todah rabbah! Thank you for sharing this. I would also encourage everyone to visit the link. This is an easy and accurate way to understand the Middle East peace problem.

[Rick]

2,200 YEAR OLD GREEK INSCRIBED STONE LETTER AT ISRAEL MUSEUM
On exhibit at Jerusalem's Israel Museum is a 2,200 year old Greek inscribed stone
letter, which provides information concerning the Maccabean Revolt, celebrated each
year at Chanukah. Deciphered and interpreted by Prof. Hanna Cotton-Paltiel of
Jerusalem's Hebrew University and Prof. Michael Woerrle from the German
Archaeological Institute in Munich, the letter speaks about orders given to
Heliodorus, minister of the King of Syria, Seleucus I in 175 BCE, to seize the
treasure in the Temple, but who was, instead, driven from the sanctuary by the
miraculous appearance of a fearsome horseman accompanied by two mighty youths. It is
not known when the 80 centimeter high stone was found, but it is believed to have
been found in the area between the
Judean Hills and the Mediterranean. (Extracted from JPost, 5/7/07)

[R' Y'hoshua Moshe]

That is amazing! Thank you for sharing this.

Shalom,

Reuel