Why are Israelis so Happy?
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12 responses to “Why are Israelis so Happy?”
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The title of a book I “Englished” for its Israeli author is “What We Need to Steal from Israel” (https://www.amazon.com/What-Need-Steal-Israel-seen/dp/B0DN81B7HN“: see the copyright page). What we must “steal” (he insisted on that verb) is Israel’s volunteer culture. This 37-chapter book complements the article you linked to.
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You couldn’t convince him to substitute ‘borrow’?
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No, Bill. It’s not ungrammatical, so I relented. He’s a great, generous client, gave me a great review. It’s his book, and it answers your post’s titular question, at least in part.
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The Israelis are happy because they love each other.
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Tony,
“The customer is always right.” And you understand the limits of the editor.
But when you changed my ‘black’ to ‘Black’ in LIFE’S PATH, you went beyond grammar into the precincts of wokery. -
Joe,
The truth is better captured by the generic claim, “Jews love life, Muslims death.”
David Benatar an outlier.
The Jewish love of life is shown by the rate of procreation in Israel, one very dangerous place to live. Jews love life, this life, not eternal life. There is a definite tension between Judaism and Xinaity in this regard. But the problem is complex.
See here: https://maverickphilosopher.typepad.com/maverick_philosopher/2024/11/was-st-paul-an-anti-natalist-updated-2024-version.html -
I say go beyond the tension and love this life AND eternal life.
That would be the next step.
We are all in this together, Jews and Christians both, and if you are Christian, you are in some very basic ways more or less Jewish too. I say we should amalgamate. I don’t think that would be impossible. It might even be easy at the right time, and in the face of mortal danger. -
Hi Joe
“The Israelis are happy because they love each other.” This is not too precise. I’d say that Bill’s “Jews love life, Muslims death” is much closer to truth as far as short descriptions can go. I’d add that most Israelis share values which enable them to be happier than their neighbours – respect for reasoning, respect for achievements in science, business, arts, engineering. The values are supported by constructive attitudes at work, military and study and another value — the willingness to work hard. Personal talents and merits matter in the Israeli society.
It is not a coincidence that Benatar and Walter Benjamin are not Israelis. -
Dmitri,
We agree about Jews as a group. Of course, there are Jews who are not Israelis, and Israelis who are not Jews; but — correct me if I am wrong — most Israelis are Jews, at least ethnically.
I believe you are a Russian Jew around 40 years old who has lived in Russia and in Israel.
Antisemitism is not the same as anti-Zionism, a point often made. I am using ‘antisemitism’ to mean Jew-hatred. It seems to me that ‘anti-Zionism’ could be taken in two ways. First, it could refer to belief that Jews ought not have a state anywhere. Second, it could refer to the belief that Jews ought not have a state where it currently is. The term is standardly used in the second sense.
Agree?
A large part of Jew hatred can be traced back to ENVY. The inferior tend to hate the superior. Now Muslims as a group are inferior to Jews as a group in respect of contributions to high civilization. So it is no surprise that Muslims hate Jews with a genocidal hatred.
Agree?
The State of Israel, and Jews elsewhere have no greater friend on the world stage at present than DJT.
Agree?
Finally, have you read Svetlana Alexievich, Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets? I’ll bet you have, in Russian. I started reading it yesterday. Wow! I will read every word of it. -
Hi Bill
I agree with you about antisemitism. It is much more tricky with regards to anti-Zionism. Both senses of the term that you described exist. But there are more. In recent years many antisemites prefer to refer to themselves as anti-Zionists as it sounds more respectable. Many of them, such as Iranian theocratic mullahs, claim that the state of Israel is a non-entity and should not be recognized as such not just where it is now (there are too many variations to count — 1947 borders, 67 “green line” etc) but nowhere at all.
Certain Islamists claim without any basis that the Jews of Israel are “not the same” as the Jews that lived there since King David times and that they should “go to where they came from – Poland, Ukraine etc”. They “forget” to acknowledge that more than 600,000 Sephardic Jews were expelled from Arab and Middle Eastern countries after UN voted the modern state of Israel into existence in 1948. Many Arab countries declared war on Israel right after it was established, expelled their Jewry and have not stopped their attempts to fight since then with the exception of Egypt and Jordan who signed peace treaties with Israel in 1979 and 1994 respectively.
Envy is a motive for Jew hatred. But there is much more. In the Middle East a religious upbringing in the Islamist tradition and Arab nationalist education system contain loads of institutional Jewish hatred that children, who grow into adults, accept as divine or self-evident truths. Nazi level of hateful content that deprives Jews of humanity and provides motivation and justification for violence against them “dirty infidels”.
DJT is a great supporter of Israel, the best there is now — 100% agreed.
Modern population of Israel is about 75% Jewish, about 20% are Arabs and 5% others.
Have not read Alexievich yet, but I should especially if you enjoy it.
I’m older than your estimate but when I began frequenting your wonderful blog I was about that age… -
Bill, I didn’t insist on that change over your objection to it, did I? I’m of a divided mind over not capitalizing names of ethnic groups, but as the always-right customer, you could have resolved it immediately. If you did insist, but I ignored your wishes, then I deserve all the opprobrium you could hurl my way, including slouching toward Wokery. I’m sorry you felt you had to air this matter here after I explained a settled matter between me and a client. I stipulate in advance that you may have many comebacks to my defense, but I will have to let them stand unanswered. Tony
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No you didn’t, Tony. I discovered it after the book was published. No big deal, but I had said explicitly in my A Note to the Readrr that one reason I was self-publishing was to avoid ‘woke’ editors. Note also that referring to blacks as blacks is not ungrammatical . . . see your comment @7:25.
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