Benny Morris recently published an interview here with Shimon Peres.  The interview is in a relatively new magazine called Tablet - we have linked to it on the right. Worth a read!

Benny Morris’ interview of Shimon Peres is a wide-ranging interview that covers a variety of historical and current topics.

Here is one excerpt, the latter part of which was picked up by a “shocked” British press:

How do you explain the rise in the delegitimization of Israel in the world in recent years? Do you agree that this is happening?

Let me give you a contrary picture: Israel is the most popular country in the world. [Peres’s media aide giggles. “Benny, you won’t leave here depressed,” she says.] For 2,000 years there was friction between the Vatican and the Jews. There are, what is it, 1.3 billion Christians? Now we have excellent relations with the Vatican. This is no small thing. And we have good relations with India, also hit by Muslim terrorists. And that’s together 3 billion. And [we now have] excellent relations with China.

Right. But why the delegitimization, especially in the West?

Firstly, there is a problem in the Scandinavian countries. They always want to appear like yefei nefesh [the Hebraism roughly translates as “bleeding hearts,” with an undertone of hypocrisy]. And I don’t expect them to understand us. Sweden doesn’t understand why we are at war. For 150 years they have not had a war. There were even Hitler and Stalin, but they kept out of the picture. As did Switzerland. So, they don’t understand why we are “for war,” as if we really like wars. It’s like Marie Antoinette didn’t understand why the people didn’t bake cakes. The same logic.

But it goes a bit beyond [Sweden and Switzerland]?

Our next big problem is England. There are several million Muslim voters. And for many members of parliament, that’s the difference between getting elected and not getting elected. And in England there has always been something deeply pro-Arab, of course, not among all Englishmen, and anti-Israeli, in the establishment. They abstained in the [pro-Zionist] 1947 U.N. Partition Resolution, despite [issuing the pro-Zionist] Balfour Declaration [in 1917]. They maintained an arms embargo against us [in the 1950s]; they had a defense treaty with Jordan; they always worked against us.

But England changed after the 1940s and 1950s. They supported us in 1967, there was Harold Brown and Mrs. Thatcher [who were pro-Israeli].

There is also support for Israel today [on the British right].

But in Labor there was always a deep pro-Israeli current.

But [the late 1940s prime minister and Labor leader Clement] Attlee was [anti-Israel].

Anyway, this [pro-Israeli current] vanished because they think the Palestinians are the underdog. In their eyes the Arabs are the underdog. Even though this is irrational. Take the Gaza Strip. We unilaterally evacuated the Gaza Strip [in 2005]. We evacuated 8,000 settlers and it was very difficult, after mobilizing 47,000 policemen [and soldiers]. It cost us $2.5 billion in compensation. We left the Gaza Strip completely. Why did they fire rockets at us, for years they fired rockets at us. Why?

Maybe because they don’t like us?

Peres: You fire rockets at everyone you don’t like? For eight years they fired and we refrained from retaliating. When they fired at us, the British didn’t say a word.

Maybe it is anti-Semitism?

Yes, there is also anti-Semitism. There is in England a saying that an anti-Semite is someone who hates the Jews more than is necessary. But with Germany relations are pretty good, as with Italy and France.

But there is erosion of public pro-Israel sentiment—at the universities, in the press. I’m not talking about the governments.

I’ll tell you why. On television there is an asymmetry that can’t be corrected. What the terrorists do is never broadcast. Only the response is broadcast. And then critics charge: “This is disproportionate.” You don’t see the terrorist act. When a lawful nation fights a lawless nation there is a problem in the media. When an open regime fights a secret regime there is a problem.

Contemporary Jews are an aggregate of ethno-religious communities whose world-wide members identify with each other through shared religious, historical and cultural traditions. It is only recently that the genetic structure of the Jewish people has been addressed and elucidated using gene-array technology.

Nature in 1998(1) published an article entitled “Origins of Old Testament Priests” in which the authors examined the hypothesis that the Y chromosomes of present-day Cohanim and Leviim should be distinguishable from those of other Jews and derive from a common ancestral type no more recently than the Temple period. The authors also showed that although the Levite chromosomes are diverse, Cohen chromosomes are homogenous. 306 male Jews from Israel, Canada and the UK were involved in the study.

The methodology of this study, which is explained in detail in the paper, includes an estimation of time since the chromosomes were derived from the ancestral chromosome. The estimate is 106 generations, which for a generation time of 25 (30) years gives an estimate of 2,650 (3,180) years, dating the coalescence of the Cohanim chromosomes to between the Exodus and the destruction of the first Temple (586 BCE).

“The genome-wide structure of the Jewish people” by Doron Behar et al (2) reports on a study which compares genotypes of individuals from 14 Diaspora Jewish communities with individuals from adjacent non-Jewish communities and with individuals from non-Jewish populations from the Middle East and North Africa. Most Jewish samples clustered with Druze and Cypriot samples but not from other Levantine or paired Diaspora host populations. Indian and Ethiopian Jews clustered with their local host populations and the Bene Israel also showed a clear paternal link to the Levant.

The best explanation for these findings is a common genetic origin consistent with the historical formulation of the Jewish people as descending from ancient Hebrew and Israelite residents of the Levant. There is significant genetic continuity among most Jewish communities and contemporary non-Jewish Levantine  populations despite their long-term residence in diverse regions remote from the Levant and isolation from one another. In addition, most Jewish samples could be partitioned into Ashkenazi-north African-Sephardi, Caucasus-Middle Eastern and Yemenite subclusters.

In the paper “Abraham’s Children in the Genome Era…” by Gil Atzmon et al (3), the authors describe a genome-wide analysis and comparison with local populations for representatives of 3 major groups of the Jewish Diaspora; Eastern European Ashkenazim, Italian, Greek and Turkish Sephardim, and Iranian, Iraqi and Syrian Mizrahim. Data were generated from 237 unrelated individuals (51% female) from the 7 Jewish populations which were merged with selected data sets from the Human Genome Diversity Panel.

In this study, the most distant and differentiated of the Jewish populations were Iranian Jews followed by Iraqi Jews. Two major groups were identifiable that could be characterised as middle-eastern (Iranian and Iraqi) and European/Syrian Jews. The Druze, Palestinian, and Bedouin were on branches distinctive from the other populations. The Italian, Syrian, Iranian, and Iraqi Jews demonstrated the high levels of IBD(identity by descent) that  would be expected for extremely inbred populations.

In this study, Jewish populations from the 3 major Jewish Diaspora groups, Ashkenazi, Sephardi and Mizrahi, formed a distinctive population cluster, albeit related to European and Middle Eastern non-Jewish populations. Within the study, each of the Jewish populations formed its own cluster as part of the larger Jewish cluster. Each group demonstrated Middle Eastern ancestry and variable admixture with European populations. There was evidence of a split between Middle Eastern Iraqi and Iranian Jews and European/Syrian Jews compatible with the historical divide which occurred more than 2,500 years ago.

These studies demonstrate that over the past 3000 years, both the flow of genes and the flow of religious and cultural ideas have contributed to Jewishness.

(1) Origins of Old Testament Priests. Thomas MG, Skorecki K,et al. Nature 394 138-140, 1998.

(2) The genome-wide structure of the Jewish people. Behar DM, Yunusbayev B et al. Nature Letters 1-6 June 9, 2010.

(3) Abraham’s Children in the Genome Era. Atzmon G, Hao L, et al. The American Journal of Human Genetics 86, 850-859, 2010.

On ANZAC day, it is worthwhile to look at some of the ties of friendship and support between Israel and Australia.  Last year, we focused on the Zion Mule Corps here and it is worth another look. 

The Charge of Beersheba is another important link between the 2 countries. The sunset charge by 800 Anzacs mounted on horses defeated 400 Turks, and captured Beersheba, which led to the liberation of Jerusalem and the fall of the Ottoman Empire.  It was the last mounted horse charge in the history of warfare  (see the image of the reenactment)

Richard Pratt established the “Park of the Australian Soldier”  in Beersheba to commemorate this historic moment.  As described in an article in the Australian Jewish News here,  “Jeanne Pratt joined around 400 people from the Australian and Israeli military, diplomatic and Jewish communities at a ceremony on October 31 (2009) that commemorated the Australian Light Horse charge at Be’er Sheva.  The ceremony took place at the Park of the Australian Soldier in Be’er Sheva in front of a monument to the Australian Light Horse regiment and also honoured the memory of businessman and philanthropist Richard Pratt, who died in April this year.  On October 31, 1917, the Australian Light Horse regiment charged the wells of Be’er Sheva, repelling Turkish forces and opening the route to the British arrival in Jerusalem and its victory in the World War I Middle Eastern campaign.”

Australian politician, Joe Hockey, has a special interest in Beersheba. His grandfather, Joseph Hocadonian, was deputy clerk of Beersheba after the war. And one of Joe Hockey’s predecessors in his seat of North Sydney was a commander of a division of the Light Horse at Beersheba.

Two books have been recently published on the subject.  Paul Daley, as mentioned here was the author of   Beersheba while Roland Perry, previous author of an excellent book on Sir John Monash,  wrote The Australian Light Horse 

A project contributed to by JNF Australia plans to develop an ANZAC trail in the area as described here.

Kelvin Crombie is an Australian historian who specialises in tours related to the ANZACS in Israel.

The pro-British NILI Spy Ring, under the leadership of Aaron Aarononsohn supplied valuable information to General Allenby which helped in the success of the Beersheba charge and other battles.

February 1948 was the month when Jewish civilians were targeted in 2 terrorist attacks - a bombing on February 1st at the Palestine Post, the leading Jewish newspaper, and forerunner of the Jerusalem Post;  and a second bombing on February 22nd in the central Ben Yehuda Street.

Alexander Zvielli relives this time through the eyes of Gershon Agron, the founder and first editor of the Palestine Post in this article.   A stirring Palestine Post editorial response was published on the following day, as reproduced here.

The Ben Yehuda Street bombing as described here claimed 54 lives and many more injured.  As described, “at about 6:30 in the morning, three men dressed as British soldiers and police drove to the corner of Ben Yehuda and Ben Hillel Streets. They passed through British and Jewish checkpoints with no problems, owing to their seeming British identity. One of these men was Azmi Djaoumi, a Palestinian Arab. The others were Eddie Brown and Peter Madison, British deserters. They were driving an armored car and two truck bombs loaded with explosives, prepared by SS-trained Fawzi el Kuttub, the master saboteur of the Arab Palestinians in Jerusalem. The bombings had been ordered by Abdel Khader El Husseini, who intended to terrorize the Jews into leaving Jerusalem.  Brown and Madison had previously carried out the Palestine Post bombing.  For the Ben Yehuda bombing, they were supposed to get a thousand pounds sterling from the Grand Mufti.”   

I recently finished a book about the Sorek Valley and surrounding area - and the important role it played in the Israel War of Independence.  Its location made it a stategically important link to maintain supplies between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.  

Now more than 60 years on, there is much to see in this area which was the stomping ground of Samson - for instance here is a biblical look at Israel

One of the successes of the area is Kibbutz Tzora which contains many successful industries, high quality wine production, and a B and B.

One of nearby Moshav Eshtaol’s residents is Uzi-Eli Chezi, known as the Etrog Medicine Man.

I was interested to read that Princess Alice, the mother of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, is buried on the Mount of Olives.   The Frommers guide has a fascinating paragraph about Princess Alice, as part of their tour of East Jerusalem. 

The guide states that “in 1943, during the Nazi occupation of Greece, Princess Alice learned that the widow and children of close friend Haim Cohen were desperately trying to escape deportation to the death camps in Poland. At the risk of her life and with the help of two servants, Princess Alice hid her Jewish friends on the grounds of the royal palace in Athens for 13 months until Greece was liberated. Princess Alice died at Buckingham Palace in 1969, and in 1988, in accordance with her dying wish, was reinterred on the Mount of Olives.

In 1994, Prince Philip and his sister, Princess Sophie, traveled to Jerusalem to receive Yad VaShem’s Medal of Honor of Righteous Among the Nations, awarded to their late mother. A tree in memory of Princess Alice has been planted at Yad VaShem.  More about her is contained on the Yad Vashem site here which includes Prince Philip’s poignant talk at the ceremony honouring her.

This eight day festival celebrating the dedication of the altar, through the dedication of the Hasmonean Temple is almost finished. Judah Maccabee, after defeating the Syrian Lysias, entered Jerusalem and purified the Temple. The altar that had been defiled was demolished, and a new one was built. Judah then made new holy vessels,  candelabrum, incense altar, and curtains, and set the 25^th of Kislev as the date for the rededication of the Temple.

The Hasmoneans led the rebellion against the Hellenist Seleucid kingdom, established an autonomous Jewish state, annexed the most important regions of Eretz Israel, and absorbed a number of neighbouring Semitic peoples into the Jewish people. This successful rebellion of the Hasmoneans assured the continued existence of the Jewish religion and contributed to the decisive influence of monotheism in Western culture and history. (1)

The Hasmoneans were a priestly family who lived in Modi’in on the border of Judea and Samaria. Mattathias b Johanan led the revolt and was succeeded by his son Judah in 164 BCE. After the dedication of the Temple, Judah continued to strive for the autonomy of Judea and in 161 BCE established an alliance with Rome. Jonathan and Simeon continued to extend the borders of Judea after Judah’s death in battle. Jonathan was appointed High Priest in 152 BCE, and Simeon in 140 BCE. A decree passed by the Great Assembly in Jerusalem made the office hereditary. During his son Johns reign, the rift between the Hasmoneans and the Pharisees began. There was open conflict during the reign of his nephew Yannai who strove to establish absolute authority as king and high priest. Pompey’s annexation brought the independence of the Hasmonean state to an end. The Romans abolished the monarchy but allowed the priesthood to remain, whilst detaching large areas from Judea. With the defeat of Antigonus in 37 BCE, the Romans brought the Hasmonean rule to a close.

The sages decided that Hallel should be recited on each of the eight days of Chanukah  since at that time, Israel had experienced miracles, salvation and deliverance for the sake of the Torah. Unfortunately the Jews became vulnerable following the integration of the two roles, of king and high priest. A lesson from history would be to keep a separation between the religious powers and the secular powers of the modern state.

(1) Encyclopedia Judaica.

Since the Gaza war, the persecution of the remaining Jews living in Yemen has markedly increased, together with further signs of instability in the country.

Many of the Jews have managed to escape, the majority to Israel but also some to the U.S.  The Wall Street Journal has a good description of the rescue mission.

Earlier in the year, Jews left quietly for Israel.  The recent Haaretz article noted that President Ali Abdullah Saleh had been publicly supportive of the remaining Jews, as has been the main Islamist opposition party, Islah.

“The Yemeni Jews are citizens. They should have their own life as Yemenis,” said Mohammed al-Sadi, the party’s assistant secretary-general. “I prefer for them to stay in Yemen, not move to another country, because they are part of this society.”  Unfortunately, the Presidents support has not quelled the popular sentiment against the Jews still living in Yemen.

The flight of the Jews under threat brings to mind Operation Magic Carpet in 1949 when 45,000 Yemenite Jews were airlifted to Israel.  Following the 1947 UN Partition Plan, Muslim rioters had engaged in clashes in Aden that killed 82 people and destroyed a number of Jewish homes. Early in 1948, the accusation of the murder of two Muslim Yemeni girls led to looting of Jewish property. Aden’s Jewish community was economically paralyzed, as most of the Jewish stores and businesses were destroyed.  This article by Sarah Symkowicz from the Jewish Virtual Library provides a fascinating reminder of both the rich history and cultural life of the Yemenite Jews, and also how they coped with Islamic restrictions in Yemen.

.. and from Israel a reminder of the superb Yemenite-Israeli talent of Ofra Haza here, here, and here (the last beautiful song in a concert for Yitzhak Rabin)

The 14th year of Memorium for Yitzhak Rabin will be commemorated in the upcoming days when his multifaceted legacy will be honoured.  For the Sydney evening, see the State Zionist Council website - the evening will also include the premiere screening of the film “Unsettled”.

The Rabin Centre in Israel provides a rich tapestry of his life, with the educational goals of the Centre strongly emphasising democratic values.

Rabin’s inspiring lecture on receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 is shown here.  It begins:

“At an age when most youngsters are struggling to unravel the secrets of mathematics and the mysteries of the Bible; at an age when first love blooms; at the tender age of sixteen, I was handed a rifle so that I could defend myself - and also, unfortunately, so that I could kill in an hour of danger.

That was not my dream. I wanted to be a water engineer. I studied in an agricultural school and I thought that being a water engineer was an important profession in the parched Middle East. I still think so today.”

For those interested in Australian Jewish History and World War I, it is worth noting that tonight and tomorrow Wednesday night and Thursday 15th October (27th Tishrei) is the Jewish date or Yahrzeit of Jewish and Australian hero of World War I Sir John Monash who died on the morning of 8 October 1931 — 78 years ago.

A crowd of 300,000 people lined the streets as his coffin made its way to Brighton Cemetery, with 60,000 in attendance at the grave site. Why was he so loved, and knighted by King George V?

Because his strategic genius plus his respect and love for the lives of his soldiers enabled him to bring World War I to an end through his victories against the German army on the Western Front. The most significant of these, the Battle of Amiens on 8 August 1918, ought to be taught about and memorialised as the first major victory for the ‘five Australian divisions’ under his command.

Although Monash himself was behind the memorial day of Anzac Day where he himself fought, Paul Keating was right when he said it was time we celebrated our victories on the Western front and not just our massive defeat at Gallipoli. Let’s celebrate August 8 and Tishrei 27.

According to Roland Perry’s book ‘Monash: The Outsider who won a war’, Monash was so popular amongst ex-diggers that Prime Minister Billy Hughes deliberately snubbed Monash after the war so he would not be a political threat to him. It’s time a major box-office movie was made about the man and his genius.

On the Monash Unversity website, it states that “Sir John Monash was a famous Australian who made a contribution to almost every level of Australian life. The University is named after him, not because of his fame but because of the many and important ways in which he contributed to the community. The motto of Monash University, Ancora Imparo (’I am still learning’), captures the essence of the achievements of Sir John the man and the spirit of our university.”