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Much of this is correct, but I'd like to clarify a few points (as neutrally as I can, and without sharing my opinions). There are not just 2, but 5 things called Israel. You already said three of them: Israel the character in the Bible (who was also named Jacob); Israel the people ("children of Israel"), and Israel the state. But there was also Israel the ancient kingdom, long before the modern state, and there is the land of Israel, which Jews and sometimes Christians called by that name even when there was no kingdom or state of Israel and the land was ruled by others. When the ancient Roman empire ruled that land (and drove many Jews into exile), they called it Palestina, and so Palestine came to be another name for the very same land.
In modern times, the role of the British was complicated, but they did not create the state of Israel, and there was no state of Palestine there that got removed. In WW1, the British conquered Palestine from the Ottoman (Turkish) empire, and for about 20 years they helped zionist Jews settle in the land of Israel, but the Arabs of Palestine objected and the British stopped. Then after WW2, when Jews most desperately needed a homeland, the British withdrew and left the problem of Jewish-Arab conflict in that land for the United Nations to try to resolve. Jews and Arabs there both saw the same place, call it Palestine or Israel, as their own homeland.
The UN suggested dividing the land to create both a Jewish state of Israel and an Arab state of Palestine. The Arabs of Palestine declined, because they thought the creation of a Jewish state on half of their land was unjust. The Jews there accepted the idea of a state on half of their land, and established the state of Israel, ratified by the United Nations. The Palestinian Arabs immediately began a civil war, which the new state of Israel won. Many Palestinian Arabs were driven or fled into exile, and the territory that the UN had allotted for a Palestinian state was divided, by war, among Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. In 1967 there was another war, in which Israel took the areas of Palestine that had been under Egyptian and Jordanian rule (Gaza and the West Bank). Over the years, many Israelis have settled in those occupied territories, but they are still mostly Palestinian.
People still argue, and periodically break into open violence, over some basic questions: Who has legitimate rights to the land? Are Israeli settlements in the territories it took in 1967 legitimate? Do non-citizen Palestinians in those territories have a right to resist and bring an end to Israel's undemocratic rule over them? Are Palestinians inside Israel full citizens with equal rights? Do Palestinian refugees have a right to return to where they used to live? Do Jews from around the world have a right to return to Israel as their national homeland? What is the best way for both peoples to live together in their common land? Would Hamas, the Islamic party that runs the Palestinian authority in Gaza and advocates armed resistance, participate in any peaceful resolution? If an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel would be best, who is to blame for it not being created yet? Should Israelis and Palestinians all be citizens of a single state instead? And so, for now, it continues...
Okay, Judaism is a religion. People who follow this religion are called Jews. The Jews are not just a religious group but also a people.
Jesus Christ was born a Jew. Then he gathered his own Group of followers founding a new religion. So Christianity is basically a spin-off of Judaism.
Israel is two things: The first Israel is the Name of a mythical figure in the Thora as well as in the First Testament of the Bible. this Guy Israel was the dad of 12 other Guys. These 12 Guys are the forefathers of the 12 tribes of the Jews. The Jews are sometimes referred to as the "children of Israel".
The second Israel is a state. This state is situated at the east coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Many Jews live there. But also Arabs. And some Christians. The state Israel was founded by the English after WW2 in order to give a home to the Jewish people. Because after the Shoah/Holocaust it was clear that they needed their own place. But to found that state, they had to remove another state from the map. And that was Palestine. Thus the prevailing conflict between Israeli and Palestine people.
Judaism, the religion, is about being a people living - or trying to live - in a loving, faithful relationship with G!d, guided by the written and oral Torah.
Jewishness can also mean belonging to the Jewish people, with or without the religion of Judaism, and sharing in that people's ethnic or national identity, history, concerns, and culture, as a single diverse people dispersed around the world.
When the name, "Israel" is used in prophesies, it's a symbolic name for all God's created people, also called the book of life. No one will be left behind when we get new bodies to live in the New Jerusalem.
Most of the reference of Israel in the prophesies are God's created people, also called the book of life.
Oops, "Much of this is correct..." I meant much of what rottensheepof_evil wrote.
It's best if you don't try interpret the prophesies. It's embarrasing to watch.
Wow. You really believe in that New Jerusalem stuff?
Wow, why can't you understand the prophesies of God?
then whats Judaism about?
nope. its about judaism
