Israel civ

[gsmoove23]

Communities that are selected for these genetic studies are of course ones with strong Jewish traditions. These communities are usually rather insular and do not mix much. However, these studies do not take into account Jews who left these communities and integrated with the surrounding societies. While I've always found these studies pretty amazing they do not prove what you claim.

Your claims that Palestine was empty before the Jews came is one of the worst lies surrounding the conflict in Israel and has no basis in fact. I've seen the Mark Twain reference, heavily paraphrased by your author. It describes his travels through a specific area of Palestine which was empty, not the whole of Palestine.

'The district of Jerusalem was under the direct authority of the Ottoman capital of Istanbul because of the international significance of the cities of Jerusalem and Bethlehem as religious centers for Muslims, Christians and Jews. According to Ottoman records, in 1878 there were 462,465 subject inhabitants of the Jerusalem, Nablus and Acre districts: 403,795 Muslims (including Druze), 43,659 Christians and 15,011 Jews. In addition, there were perhaps 10,000 Jews with foreign citizenship (recent immigrants to the country), and several thousand Muslim Arab nomads (bedouin) who were not counted as Ottoman subjects. The great majority of the Arabs (Muslims and Christians) lived in several hundred rural villages. Jaffa and Nablus were the largest and economically most important Arab towns.'

from http://merip.org/palestine-israel_pr...sr-primer.html

[sabrewolf]

it's always a pleasure reading well researched and well documented (with hyperlinks and valid quotes) posts, thanks gsmoove

if only both "sides" would use the same high standard, discussions wouldn't be so incredibly frustrating to read, because only true arguments would be used and not emotional ones...

[Silpy]

The conflict in the Mid-East can be traced to 2 nations -Britain and France. Another place which still shows the scars of colonalism. (But does'nt the whole world still show scars from it?)

[sabrewolf]

as a high US-army communications instructor told me:
there's practicly NO country that hasn't been fúcked up by either the british, french, spanish or americans.
the italians, belgians, dutch and german have also sinned, but just in around one country and maybe some smaller islands...

[Silpy]

Switerland has screwed the world around, too.
Not physicly, but by allowing genasidal dictators and resimes around the world to stuff the ill-gotten gains there...

[Panag]

Originally posted by Silpy
The conflict in the Mid-East can be traced to 2 nations -Britain and France. Another place which still shows the scars of colonalism. (But does'nt the whole world still show scars from it?)

hi ,

if its only tha easy , ......and what about turkey , the US and other nations , ...

have a nice day

[sabrewolf]

Originally posted by Silpy
Switerland has screwed the world around, too.
Not physicly, but by allowing genasidal dictators and resimes around the world to stuff the ill-gotten gains there...

btw: you don't need to counterattack me with switzerland. i grew up and live here, but i'm foreign (half english, half slavic)

yep, of course... specially in WW2 switzerland did a lot of things they shouldn't. officially to not provoke the germans and italians (after all, ~80% of our borders are adjacent to the axis-countries D, A, I) but of course the money was also a motivation.

no country is perfect... all have commited bigger and lesser crimes in history.
what's important is that we should learn from those mistakes and make sure they don't happen again and again and again... but they do

[Silpy]

Hey!

I'm just showing that every country in the 'devoloped' world has screwed around with the world.

And I said that the problems in the Mid-East were created by Britain + France. The US and Russia really helped them on the way they are today. Turkey is not really guilty.

Would'nt the world be a better place if it was all one nation?

[Gangerolf]

no way

[Agathon]

IHMO

There are ample reasons why Hebrews/Israelis/Jews would not be a good candidate for inclusion in Civ 3; though, of course, if people want to use an Israeli mod that is up to them. Here's some reasons.

1. If you look at the list of civilisations included in the game you will see that innovative religious influence does not really count for much to the game designers. There are only three civs that could conceivably be included under this aegis: the Arabs, the Indians, and the Chinese (and the last is extremely debatable). What seems to count for the game designers is a civilisation that expanded to a significant degree and obtained at some point or another an "empire". This need not mean a formal "empire" perhaps just a large expansion or a period of dominance. The only civs that perhaps don't quite fit the bill are Japan and Korea. But Japan held sway over much of the Pacific rim in the 20th century and the Korean civilisation did achieve a centralisation of power through military means. No one could say the same of the Hebrews/Israelis. In this respect the Byzantines have a much better claim.

2. If we were to include a Hebrew civilisation on the grounds that the Kingdom of Solomon and David was an "empire" of this sort, we would be making a very dubious historical claim. The Old Testament is not a history book in the way that a contemporary historian would understand a "history book" any more than the Iliad is an historical record of the Mycenaean age. Rather it is a confusing farrago of historical occurrence, interpretation and wishful thinking (like most other books of its time), complete with a "golden age" which probably never existed. The Biblical archaeology movement, which attempts to find material evidence for Biblical claims, has been beset with problems in this respect. Where is the evidence (not contaminated by religious fanaticism) that Kings such as Solomon and David actually existed in the manner it is claimed that they did? I don't believe it - the Hebrews of that time were like many other races in being basically cannon fodder and whipping boys for their larger neighbours. No Hebrew civilisation was ever a major player in its area of the world at any time - even now.

3. Whilst some civilisations (e.g. Carthage) have been included because they were involved in historically significant wars or because they were the only civ in their area (Iroquois), the majority are there because of their cultural influence. One could say that there is massive cultural influence from Jewish religious practice - this is true up to a point, but it is not enough (see 1.). And it is true, though people hate to admit it, that Greek philosophy has had just as much influence over the religious practices of the west as ancient Judaism. Furthermore, every single one of the other civs (excepting Carthage, which is there so people can play at being Hannibal) has made great contributions to or at least had its own version of most of the following: art, architecture, literature, science, philosophy and music. I can show you Celtic, French, Chinese, Japanese, Greek and Roman art; can you show me any uniquely Jewish art? Apart from the Bible, what other pieces of Jewish literature have had what could loosely be called "universal appeal"? Is there anything like the Tales of Monkey, the Platonic dialogues, the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Odyssey, Shakespeare, Goethe, Proust, Tolstoy, etc. etc. In short the Hebrews had ONE thing, and that doesn't seem to be enough.

4. Another good reason, and in my opinion the best one, for not including the Hebrews is that there would no doubt be those anti semitic players who would delighted in razing Jewish cities and playing out their own private holocaust. If I were a game designer, that is one pleasure I would not want to contribute to.

So how could the game designers acknowledge the influence of Jewish people on history without making them a civilisation? My own answer is that I would like to see a modification to the game where civilisations that produce a great amount of culture have a percentage chance of producing a "great individual" (not a leader) whose achievements add a couple of points a turn to the culture score of that civ. Or perhaps they could accrue to the civ that discovers particular advances first. Each civ could have a gallery of the "greats" it has produced. I mean the usual suspects: Plato, Aristotle, Copernicus, Ptolemy, Confucius, Leonardo, etc. And here's where our Jewish friends come in because ol' Al Einstein is going to be on everyone's list and there will be others. This for me more adequately represents the Jewish contribution to history - not conquest or empire or culture in the larger sense, but by being a minority that has very occasionally thrown up magnificent individuals.

[SIV]

Agathon:
First, just to clear things up: Hebrew/Jew/Israeli = both nation and religion.

Now, We Hebrew had our days of glory:
There was a David (almost for sure) and the events after his time (kings of Judea and kings of Israel) that are described in the our holly books (which you christians call The Old Testament) are known to happen.

Our second (yet short and militaristic) golden age came after the successful revolt against Antichus and his greek elephants. There was an independet, expanding Jewish state.

1700 years of creation and invention in Europe and the middle east. (the Roman exile). There were the r.m.b.m (Rabbi Moshe Ben Maymon) , r.sh.y. (Rabbi Shlomo yitzhaki) . Albert and many others...
I should also mention the Rotshild banking family.

Our third golden age is...now in Israel.
We are not a minoraty in Israel now. Nor were we in the other "golden ages".

We have all what is needed to enter the game: Cities (and many of them) ; GL (many 0 David, Yehuda the Makkabi, Yehushua (the Hebrew names) and others) ; a golden age (choose one of the three) ; UU (maybe a modern Israeli weapon like the Merkava tank or something ancient).

Greek wasn't independed for 1500 years and isn't a wrold power today - so what, it's in the game just for it's glorious days 2300 years ago...

Sorry for the English, guys.

[sabrewolf]

SIV: you're right about david. it is generally accepted that there was a king david and a lot of others written about in the the jewish and christian holy books. it can be proven by comparing the writings of different civilizations of those times.
of course the stories round the kings are for non-believers and sceptic people made up and vastly exadurated. as usual, the truth lies somewhere between

there's a nice article here: YHWH and the 70 Thieves

however i disagree with you calling present israel a golden age. israel is a country like many others, has far less inhabitants than most eastern european, south american, african, etc. nations which aren't either included in the game. present day israel happens to have a powerful army and an even more powerful friend.
but a 50 year existance of a country in which it was fighting wars nearly permanently and committing a lot of doubtable "actions" of which many break international treaties does NOT make it a golden age.

noone calles the third reich one of germany's golden ages, even though they were a military and economicaly superpower... (note: i'm not comparing nazi germany with isael, although some things do remind me of 1933-1945)

i believe a golden age should be when the country/civilization lives in prosperity, happiness, peace and has the respect of friends and enemies...

[SIV]

I meant it is a golden age compared to our history, not the wrold's.

the thier reich wasn't an economical superpower...
they just had some economical relief from the hardships of the 20's (less unemployment).

We are economicly prosperous (well until just about 2 yeras ago...) and technologically advanced.

Now about UN treaties: if we had followed all of them there was no Israel today... probebly it would be a part of some Arab country and all Jews here were dead...

The U.S doesn't follow any treaties so is Russia, China, Most arab countries and many others.
You should remember that we are the only real democracy (except four our friend Turkey) in the Middle East.

If the Zulu entered the game, so should we.

[Panag]

Originally posted by SIV

If the Zulu entered the game, so should we.

hi ,

indeed , the arabs are in , but we are not , ........

as for what we have done , well the world would be a different place today if there would not have been any Jews , think of all things we gave to civilization , ...........
we participated in many "golden ages" , and many civ's had theirs because of us , ........

have a nice day

[Agathon]

Originally posted by SIV
Agathon:
First, just to clear things up: Hebrew/Jew/Israeli = both nation and religion.

Now, We Hebrew had our days of glory:
There was a David (almost for sure) and the events after his time (kings of Judea and kings of Israel) that are described in the our holly books (which you christians call The Old Testament) are known to happen.

This is exactly what is in dispute. The Old Testament is not reliable if viewed as a history book. I don't think you would find any reputable historian who would be willing to hold that the Hebrews were a world power - to argue that they were is simply not backed up by any reasonable evidence.

Our second (yet short and militaristic) golden age came after the successful revolt against Antichus and his greek elephants. There was an independet, expanding Jewish state.

Yes but you still have no evidence that this constituted being a major power. The Hebrews were never ever a dominant military/cultural power in the manner of Rome or Byzantium. All of the civilisations in Civ 3 at one time or another were the dominant power in their area of the world (perhaps excepting the Carthaginians as I said above).

1700 years of creation and invention in Europe and the middle east. (the Roman exile). There were the r.m.b.m (Rabbi Moshe Ben Maymon) , r.sh.y. (Rabbi Shlomo yitzhaki) . Albert and many others...
I should also mention the Rotshild banking family.

No one disputes this. I would add Maimonides to your list. However, during this time there was not a Hebrew empire. I think that this contribution to world history would best be served in the game by the "Great Persons" feature I suggested above.

Our third golden age is...now in Israel.
We are not a minoraty in Israel now. Nor were we in the other "golden ages".

Israel is a very small country and cannot be said to have been the dominant military /cultural force in the world since its founding.

We have all what is needed to enter the game: Cities (and many of them) ; GL (many 0 David, Yehuda the Makkabi, Yehushua (the Hebrew names) and others) ; a golden age (choose one of the three) ; UU (maybe a modern Israeli weapon like the Merkava tank or something ancient).

David is about the only one that is world renowned and his details and dates are disputed as I said above. In any case the Maya, Incas, Huns, and especially the Byzantines have much stronger claims given the criteria that the game designers seem to be using.

Look - if the Hebrews get in then according to the same criteria the Scots, the Irish, the Hittites, the Assyrians, the Sumerians, the Etruscans, and many others should get the same treatment. Of all these I think the Scots and the Etruscans have equal claim with the Hebrews. The Scots in particular have great leaders (Will Wallace, Robert the Bruce), a golden age (The Scottish Enlightenment), great thinkers (Hume, Smith), and at least as much influence on history as
the Hebrews.

Remember that the Hebrew religious influence on the world has been mostly by proxy - through Christian and Islamic civilisations.

Greek wasn't independed for 1500 years and isn't a wrold power today - so what, it's in the game just for it's glorious days 2300 years ago...

Eh? Classical and Hellenistic Greece is the most culturally dominant civilisation in the history of the world. Look at the tech tree in Civ 3 and see how many of the advances were invented by Greeks or perfected by them. We are talking about the founders of Western Art, Architecture, Political Theory, Philosophy, Rhetoric, Literature and Science. A civilisation which included the largest share of great minds in history. A civilisation which bore two of the world's three greatest philosophers, a large share of its greatest literary figures, generals, politicians and scientists. A civilisation which is responsible for the vast majority of core mathematical discoveries. A civilisation which through Alexander the Great conquered most of the known world and left behind a culture which is the foundation of Western thought for the next 1600 years.

Next to the acheivements of the Greeks the rest of the civs in the game look pretty pathetic.