First of all, sweetheart, Nazi Germany never had Zionist policies. There has been a continuous Jewish population in Israel for a little over 3,000 years now, although there have been times when their numbers dropped very low. The modern migration of Jews back to Israel began sometime late in the 19th Century (that was the 18 hundreds). That was the time when the individual Jews and the small communities of Jews, who always knew that they werent actually welcome anywhere, began to share that realization with each other. If there were any who hadnt actually realized it yet, it was hard for them to miss the way that as soon as things began to go bad for this country or that one or the other one, there were always loud voices high up in that country who blamed all of the countrys problems on the Jews who lived there. So the idea began to take hold among the Jews that it might actually be possible to start rebuilding Jewish culture and society in the place where they always belonged, in Israel. As Czarist Russia was falling apart and things were going from bad to worse for Russian Jews, many of those who were able to leave Russia did so. My grandparents went to Argentina and to the US. Many other Russian Jews went to Israel. As Germany was going downhill in the 1920s and 30s and blaming it on the Jews, great numbers of Jews continued to ignore what was happening and believe that it would get better. Great numbers of other Jews who were able to leave Germany did that, and migrated to many other countries around the world, including Israel. By the time the Nazis had solidified power and created their policies specifically aimed at Jews, in the late 1930s, Jews were no longer allowed to come and go as they felt like it. Zionist policy is a policy that says Jews should be able to establish a Jewish nation in Israel. That was not the policy of Nazi Germany. The policy of Nazi Germany said that Jews are inferior human beings, that it is Germanys job to clean them off of the Earth, and that special railroad lines and death camps should be built to do the job. And thats exactly what Germany did, from 1938 until 1945, capturing and killing millions of Jews (and others) in Germany, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, France, and Holland. After Germany lost the Second World War in 1945, most of the Jews who were still alive in those countries left, and went to other places. A lot of them went to Israel. Israel became a country in 1948, and since that time, there have been migrations to Israel of Jews from many countries, including large numbers from Russia, from Ethiopia, from Yemen, and from the US and Canada. In 1937, Zeev Jabotinsky proposed a mass exodus of Polish Jews to Mandatory Palestine, but before he could pitch the idea to the Polish Jewish communities (3.3 million people ... of whom 3 million would be mass-murdered), the British opposed the entry of any Polish Jews into Mandatory Palestine fearing Arab reprisals. If you wish to specifically discuss Immigration to Mandatory Palestine during the height of the Holocaust (1939-1945) you should note that the British White Paper of 1939 further minimized the legal Jewish immigration to a trickle. This widely prevented Jews from settling in Mandatory Palestine until after 1948 when the State of Israel was declared and opened its borders.
Why do Jews believe that Israel is their homeland?
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Why do Jews believe that Israel is their homeland?
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Jews believe that Israel is their homeland because it has been so for over 3000 years. Israel has never not had a Jewish presence in that time. This is no different than the English considering Britain to be their homeland, Italians considering Italy to be their homeland, Indians considering India to be their homeland, etc.Answer:The Jewish relationship to Israel is is based upon the Torah, which states that God gave Israel to the Israelites (Genesis 28:13 and many other verses). Here is a very brief outline of the Jewish presence in Israel:The Patriarchs and their family were in Israel (Canaan) for 220 years. The era from Joshua until the First Destruction (including the Judges and Kings) was 850 years. The Second Temple era was, according to traditional chronology, another 420 years (not 586), which included the Hasmonean dynasty. Thats a total of 1490 years.After the Second Destruction, there were thousands of Jews who remained in Israel (Judea; Palestine) throughout the Talmudic era and beyond (see for example the Talmud, Sanhedrin 17b). They were the majority of Palestines population well into the fourth century, with records attesting to at least 43 Jewish communities, most of them in the Galilee and Jordan valley. After that, there were still Yeshivas in Israel with at least some thousands of community-members.In the fifth century, the Jerusalem Talmud was completed in the yeshiva of Tiberias, by the disciples of Rabbi Johanan; and the Christians of Palestine declared Judaism to be a tolerated minority.In the sixth century CE, Mar Zutra and his descendants served as head of the community and the Rabbinical academy in Tiberias.In the seventh century, the Palestinian Jews joined the Persians in a battle to take Jerusalem from the local Byzantines, and enjoyed a brief autonomy, which the Byzantines under Heraclius officially recognized in 628. At the time of the Moslem conquest of Palestine in 638, the Jewish population has been put at no less than 300,000; and a period of flourishing began. Caliph Umar encouraged Jews to resettle Jerusalem.In the eighth century, there were 30 synagogues in Tiberias. A Jew named Abu Issa brought his forces in battle against the Caliph.In the ninth century, the Jews of Palestine instituted their own Gaon (leading sage) in Tiberias and later in Jerusalem.In the tenth century, we have the greatest of the Massoretes, Aharon ben Asher and Ben Naphtali, flourishing in Tiberias.Contemporary with Rashi (11th century), we have a Rabbi Abiathar and others, who lived in Israel (see for example Rashi commentary, Talmud Berakhot 62a), and large Jewish communities in Rafah and Ramle, Hebron, Acre, Caesaria, Jaffa, Ashkelon and Gaza.In the 12th-13th centuries, the Palestinian Jews were harshly persecuted under the Christian Crusaders, yet many Jews continued to live in all the above-mentioned towns as well as Haifa, with Judah Halevi journeying to Palestine in 1141, Maimonides in 1165, and Nachmanides in 1286. In 1187, Saladdin invited more Jews to settle Palestine. In 1204, a group of Maghreb Jews arrived; and in 1211, 300 Rabbis arrived from France and England. In 1260, Rabbi Yechiel of Paris established a Talmud academy in Acre.Since that time, the continual presence of Jewish communities in Palestine (Israel) is well-known and needs no reiteration.
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