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Do the Jewish People Know That Our People Never Actually Left the Land of Israel?
An aerial view of the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
Yossi Klein Halevi, senior fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, describes how anti-Zionists in academia have systematically challenged the moral basis of the Jewish/Zionist story. He exhorts us, the Jews of the world, to mount a credible defense of our story.
But do we Jews know our own story?
Edward Robinson, a prominent American archeologist of the 1800s, did not think so. Robinson was the first to identify the archeological ruins of Bar’am, a site in northern Galilee near the Lebanese border, as synagogues. The primary structure, built in the third century CE, was still in use in the 13th century.
While Robinson knew the truth 170 years ago, the common understanding, in both the Jewish and non-Jewish worlds, even today, is that the Jews, driven from their home by the Roman capture of Jerusalem in 70 CE, were scattered to all points of the globe, only to truly return to their ancestral home after 2,000 years of wandering.
In that case, who wrote the Jerusalem Talmud? In fact, the writers (including several sages mentioned in the Passover Haggadah) were living in the Holy Land after the destruction of the Temple.
And what about the four additional Jewish revolts that took place after the destruction of the Temple, the last one against Emperor Heraclius in the seventh century CE? How can you have Jewish revolts without Jews?
Moreover, an autonomous Jewish Patriarchate existed until the year 425 CE, more than a century after Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire. Rabbi Lee I. Levine, an American-Israeli archeologist and historian, notes that the Jewish Patriarch enjoyed extensive prestige and recognition, equivalent to that of a king.
The ruins of 100 synagogues built after 70 CE are witnesses to continuing Jewish life in the Holy Land. While a majority are in Galilee, they exist throughout the land. Several were imposing structures with elaborate mosaic floors. Huqoq, a recently excavated synagogue site with magnificent mosaics, dates to the fifth century CE. The mosaics survived because a 14th century synagogue was built over the ruins of the earlier one.
In later centuries, the Jewish population increased and decreased as a function of immigration, natural disasters, pogroms, and disease. While many Jews drifted from one exile to another, others stayed on, joined from time to time by returning exiles. In fact, the Jewish people never left the Middle East, and this brings up another part of the Jewish story often ignored — the story of the Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews.
Seventy-seven years ago, North Africa and the Middle East, outside the British Mandate of Palestine, contained almost a million Jews. With the establishment of Israel, however, they were subject to violent persecution and expulsion. Most ended up in Israel, where today they and their descendants make up more than one-half of the 7.7 million Jews in the country.
Then there is the history of the Jews of Iran, who experienced forced conversion and violent pogroms throughout the 19th century and into the 20th. The 1903 Kishinev Pogrom in Russia received worldwide attention. Who knows about the 1910 pogrom in Shiraz, Iran (then Persia), during which 12 Jews were killed, 50 injured, and the entire community of 6,000 robbed and made homeless?
One more aspect of the Jewish story gets little attention — unlike other nationalisms, modern Zionism was, and still is, a rescue mission. Every Zionist leader from Herzl onwards was aware that millions of European Jews were in imminent physical danger. The fact that modern Zionism arose in the 1880s, with the onset of violent pogroms in Russia, is not a coincidence.
The Jewish story is one of an oppressed people that never stopped inhabiting its ancestral homeland.
Jews in Israel are not colonizers. They are indigenous to the Land of Israel, and to the Middle East. Israel is not a European colonial entity. It is a diverse society and less than 50% of Israeli Jews are European in origin.
Finally, the development of modern Zionism was not an “option.” It was a necessity, a survivalist imperative, progressively compulsory due to increasingly incendiary antisemitism. In some ways, things haven’t really changed since then.
Jacob Sivak, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, is a retired professor, University of Waterloo.
The post Do the Jewish People Know That Our People Never Actually Left the Land of Israel? first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hamas Says No Interim Hostage Deal Possible Without Work Toward Permanent Ceasefire
Explosions send smoke into the air in Gaza, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, July 17, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
The spokesperson for Hamas’s armed wing said on Friday that while the Palestinian terrorist group favors reaching an interim truce in the Gaza war, if such an agreement is not reached in current negotiations it could revert to insisting on a full package deal to end the conflict.
Hamas has previously offered to release all the hostages held in Gaza and conclude a permanent ceasefire agreement, and Israel has refused, Abu Ubaida added in a televised speech.
Arab mediators Qatar and Egypt, backed by the United States, have hosted more than 10 days of talks on a US-backed proposal for a 60-day truce in the war.
Israeli officials were not immediately available for comment on the eve of the Jewish Sabbath.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement on a call he had with Pope Leo on Friday that Israel‘s efforts to secure a hostage release deal and 60-day ceasefire “have so far not been reciprocated by Hamas.”
As part of the potential deal, 10 hostages held in Gaza would be returned along with the bodies of 18 others, spread out over 60 days. In exchange, Israel would release a number of detained Palestinians.
“If the enemy remains obstinate and evades this round as it has done every time before, we cannot guarantee a return to partial deals or the proposal of the 10 captives,” said Abu Ubaida.
Disputes remain over maps of Israeli army withdrawals, aid delivery mechanisms into Gaza, and guarantees that any eventual truce would lead to ending the war, said two Hamas officials who spoke to Reuters on Friday.
The officials said the talks have not reached a breakthrough on the issues under discussion.
Hamas says any agreement must lead to ending the war, while Netanyahu says the war will only end once Hamas is disarmed and its leaders expelled from Gaza.
Almost 1,650 Israelis and foreign nationals have been killed as a result of the conflict, including 1,200 killed in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on southern Israel, according to Israeli tallies. Over 250 hostages were kidnapped during Hamas’s Oct. 7 onslaught.
Israel responded with an ongoing military campaign aimed at freeing the hostages and dismantling Hamas’s military and governing capabilities in neighboring Gaza.
The post Hamas Says No Interim Hostage Deal Possible Without Work Toward Permanent Ceasefire first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iran Marks 31st Anniversary of AMIA Bombing by Slamming Argentina’s ‘Baseless’ Accusations, Blaming Israel
People hold images of the victims of the 1994 bombing attack on the Argentine Israeli Mutual Association (AMIA) community center, marking the 30th anniversary of the attack, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, July 18, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Irina Dambrauskas
Iran on Friday marked the 31st anniversary of the 1994 bombing of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) Jewish community center in Buenos Aires by slamming Argentina for what it called “baseless” accusations over Tehran’s alleged role in the terrorist attack and accusing Israel of politicizing the atrocity to influence the investigation and judicial process.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry issued a statement on the anniversary of Argentina’s deadliest terrorist attack, which killed 85 people and wounded more than 300.
“While completely rejecting the accusations against Iranian citizens, the Islamic Republic of Iran condemns attempts by certain Argentine factions to pressure the judiciary into issuing baseless charges and politically motivated rulings,” the statement read.
“Reaffirming that the charges against its citizens are unfounded, the Islamic Republic of Iran insists on restoring their reputation and calls for an end to this staged legal proceeding,” it continued.
Last month, a federal judge in Argentina ordered the trial in absentia of 10 Iranian and Lebanese nationals suspected of orchestrating the attack in Buenos Aires.
The ten suspects set to stand trial include former Iranian and Lebanese ministers and diplomats, all of whom are subject to international arrest warrants issued by Argentina for their alleged roles in the terrorist attack.
In its statement on Friday, Iran also accused Israel of influencing the investigation to advance a political campaign against the Islamist regime in Tehran, claiming the case has been used to serve Israeli interests and hinder efforts to uncover the truth.
“From the outset, elements and entities linked to the Zionist regime [Israel] exploited this suspicious explosion, pushing the investigation down a false and misleading path, among whose consequences was to disrupt the long‑standing relations between the people of Iran and Argentina,” the Iranian Foreign Ministry said.
“Clear, undeniable evidence now shows the Zionist regime and its affiliates exerting influence on the Argentine judiciary to frame Iranian nationals,” the statement continued.
In April, lead prosecutor Sebastián Basso — who took over the case after the 2015 murder of his predecessor, Alberto Nisman — requested that federal Judge Daniel Rafecas issue national and international arrest warrants for Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei over his alleged involvement in the attack.
Since 2006, Argentine authorities have sought the arrest of eight Iranians — including former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who died in 2017 — yet more than three decades after the deadly bombing, all suspects remain still at large.
In a post on X, the Delegation of Argentine Israelite Associations (DAIA), the country’s Jewish umbrella organization, released a statement commemorating the 31st anniversary of the bombing.
“It was a brutal attack on Argentina, its democracy, and its rule of law,” the group said. “At DAIA, we continue to demand truth and justice — because impunity is painful, and memory is a commitment to both the present and the future.”
31 años del atentado a la AMIA – DAIA. 31 años sin justicia.
El 18 de julio de 1994, un atentado terrorista dejó 85 personas muertas y más de 300 heridas. Fue un ataque brutal contra la Argentina, su democracia y su Estado de derecho.
Desde la DAIA, seguimos exigiendo verdad y… pic.twitter.com/kV2ReGNTIk
— DAIA (@DAIAArgentina) July 18, 2025
Despite Argentina’s longstanding belief that Lebanon’s Shiite Hezbollah terrorist group carried out the devastating attack at Iran’s request, the 1994 bombing has never been claimed or officially solved.
Meanwhile, Tehran has consistently denied any involvement and refused to arrest or extradite any suspects.
To this day, the decades-long investigation into the terrorist attack has been plagued by allegations of witness tampering, evidence manipulation, cover-ups, and annulled trials.
In 2006, former prosecutor Nisman formally charged Iran for orchestrating the attack and Hezbollah for carrying it out.
Nine years later, he accused former Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner — currently under house arrest on corruption charges — of attempting to cover up the crime and block efforts to extradite the suspects behind the AMIA atrocity in return for Iranian oil.
Nisman was killed later that year, and to this day, both his case and murder remain unresolved and under ongoing investigation.
The alleged cover-up was reportedly formalized through the memorandum of understanding signed in 2013 between Kirchner’s government and Iranian authorities, with the stated goal of cooperating to investigate the AMIA bombing.
The post Iran Marks 31st Anniversary of AMIA Bombing by Slamming Argentina’s ‘Baseless’ Accusations, Blaming Israel first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Jordan Reveals Muslim Brotherhood Operating Vast Illegal Funding Network Tied to Gaza Donations, Political Campaigns
Murad Adailah, the head of Jordan’s Muslim Brotherhood, attends an interview with Reuters in Amman, Jordan, Sept. 7, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Jehad Shelbak
The Muslim Brotherhood, one of the Arab world’s oldest and most influential Islamist movements, has been implicated in a wide-ranging network of illegal financial activities in Jordan and abroad, according to a new investigative report.
Investigations conducted by Jordanian authorities — along with evidence gathered from seized materials — revealed that the Muslim Brotherhood raised tens of millions of Jordanian dinars through various illegal activities, the Jordan news agency (Petra) reported this week.
With operations intensifying over the past eight years, the report showed that the group’s complex financial network was funded through various sources, including illegal donations, profits from investments in Jordan and abroad, and monthly fees paid by members inside and outside the country.
The report also indicated that the Muslim Brotherhood has taken advantage of the war in Gaza to raise donations illegally.
Out of all donations meant for Gaza, the group provided no information on where the funds came from, how much was collected, or how they were distributed, and failed to work with any international or relief organizations to manage the transfers properly.
Rather, the investigations revealed that the Islamist network used illicit financial mechanisms to transfer funds abroad.
According to Jordanian authorities, the group gathered more than JD 30 million (around $42 million) over recent years.
With funds transferred to several Arab, regional, and foreign countries, part of the money was allegedly used to finance domestic political campaigns in 2024, as well as illegal activities and cells.
In April, Jordan outlawed the Muslim Brotherhood, the country’s most vocal opposition group, and confiscated its assets after members of the Islamist movement were found to be linked to a sabotage plot.
The movement’s political arm in Jordan, the Islamic Action Front, became the largest political grouping in parliament after elections last September, although most seats are still held by supporters of the government.
Opponents of the group, which is banned in most Arab countries, label it a terrorist organization. However, the movement claims it renounced violence decades ago and now promotes its Islamist agenda through peaceful means.
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