Christian Zionism

This reading discusses the events leading up to the British Mandate as well as the after effects of its implementation. The Balfour Declaration announced British support of Zionism, provided that no injustice was done to the native Arab population. The Declaration became solidified in international law when the League of Nations wrote it into the British Mandate for Palestine. While Zionist saw this as a long-awaited charter and renewed hope after the brutal years of WWI, Arabs viewed it as…

It is now more than fifty years since the State of Israel was established. It has passed the initial stages of nation-building and is today, in many respects, a Western, technological society. It was built on the experience of ideologically driven Jewish settlement which began in the nineteenth century. Israel has a background of the Holocaust, ongoing military struggle with neighboring countries, and the necessity of absorbing unprecedented numbers of new immigrants from very different culture.…

Could you believe that an innocent mans life was ruined just because of his religion? The Dreyfus Affair was blatant anti-semitism. An innocent French soldier was convicted for a dreadful crime, just because he was Jewish. It is clear he was only imprisoned as a result of anti-semitism for countless reasons. Firstly, Dreyfus was the only Jew in the French Army. Secondly, there was a lot of anti-semitic statements coming out at this time, displaying that there was influx of anti-semitism in…

Produced in 1939 by Edgar G. Ulmer, The Light Ahead highlights a transition away from past superstitious beliefs toward Jewish Enlightenment thinking. The film is set in a small village of Glupsk, which serves to portray Jewish shtetl life as a juxtaposition to big city life. In his film, Ulmer pushes for the furtherance of Jewish Enlightenment through underlining stark contrasts in opinion between religious leaders of the village and Mendele, a book peddler and Jewish Enlightenment thinker.…

Have you ever wondered how Palestine became occupied? How people suddenly started calling it Israel? I was shocked to see that because of the occupation in my country, Palestine, my grandparents had to flee the country, and how some people refer to it as Israel instead of the true name Palestine. Yasser Arafat was the founder of the Fatah. He spent most of his lifetime fighting Israel and that is why many Palestinians admire and respect him. Arafat died at the age of 75 from a mysterious blood…

“Apartheid is not Normal” “Normalize This” is a free form, spoken word poem from Remi Kanazi. Kanazi is a Palestinian-American born to Palestinian immigrants. Kanazi’s grandmother was pregnant with his mother when she left Palestine in 1947. Around this time there was a great exodus or “nukba” of indigenous Palestinians, just as the land was being annexed to create the new state of Israel. Kanazi’s father left Haifa after the occupation had already taken place. Born in New York City in 1981,…

Israel belongs to the Jews by religious and documented rights. From 1948 to this day, Jews and Palestinians have been fighting over the land of Israel. Both sides have been claiming that the land is theirs by numerous rights. One of the main reasons that the land should belong to Jews is the Balfour Declaration. Another is that Jewish people have strong religious ties to the land. Also the fact that this land is a safe haven for jews after being discriminated against. The Balfour Declaration…

The Middle East is a region rich in culture. Many ethnic groups reside there, including Arabs, Turks, Persians, Kurds, and Azeris. Several major religions have their origins in the Middle East, such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. With the mix of the diverse ethnic groups and religions, the Middle East is one of the most cultured places on earth. However, with the wide variety of ethnic groups and religions, the area is consistently subject to contrasting ideologies and interpretations of…

Zola continues in his letter by describing to the readers the story from the beginning, where Dreyfus was arrested and immediately was “clamoring his innocence…and that is how the investigation proceeded…shrouded in mystery and a wealth of the wildest expedients.” Zola’s letter lays out all the proof the government and army had to accuse Dreyfus and it is just not sufficient enough to imprison someone. Throughout the letter, proof of Dreyfus’ innocence is never brought, rather a compilation of…

The SS Exodus 1947 was a ship that carried Jewish emigrants from France to British Mandatory Palestine on July 11, 1947. Most of the emigrants were Holocaust survivors who had no legal immigration certificates for Palestine. Following wide media coverage, the British Royal Navy seized the ship and deported all its passengers back to Europe. In the same period, the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine visited Palestine to assess the conflict between the Jews and Arabs, trying to find a…