1.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
2.
Districts of Israel
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There are six main administrative districts of Israel, known in Hebrew as mehozot and Arabic as mintaqah and fifteen sub-districts known as nafot. Each sub-district is further divided into Cities, municipalities, and Regional councils it contains, the Judea and Samaria Area, however, is not included in the number of districts and sub-districts as Israel has not applied its civilian jurisdiction in that part of the West Bank. Population,1,358,600 District capital, Nazareth Safed – population,113,700 Kinneret – population,110,500 Yizreel – population,482,300 Akko – population,605,700 Golan – population,46,400. Population,966,700 District capital, Haifa Haifa – population,560,600 Hadera – population,406,000 Central District. Population,2,024,500 District capital, Ramla Sharon – population,446,500 Petah Tikva – population,685,000 Ramla – population,326,400 Rehovot – population,566,600 Tel Aviv District. Population,1,350,000 District capital, Tel Aviv Southern District, currently only the Coordination and Liaison Administration operates there. Jewish Population,407,118, Palestinian population, roughly 1.8 million, largest city, Modiin Illit The name Judea and Samaria for this geographical area is based on terminology from the Hebrew and other sources relating to ancient Israel and Judah/Judea. The territory has been under Israeli control since the 1967 Six-Day War but not annexed by Israel, in Jewish religious terms, it is part of the Land of Israel, which leads to politically contentious issues. However, it is not considered part of the State of Israel by the UN, urban Israel, Details and pictures about many cities in Israel
3.
Judea and Samaria Area
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Judea and Samaria Area is the Israeli government term for the territory generally referred to as the West Bank, but excluding East Jerusalem. The Judea and Samaria Area covers a portion of the territory designated by the ancient names Judea, Samaria corresponds to part of the ancient Kingdom of Israel, also known as the Northern Kingdom. Judea corresponds to part of the ancient Kingdom of Judah, also known as the Southern Kingdom, as a direct consequence, a central part of the former Northern Kingdom of Israel was renamed Samaria. During the Hellenistic and Roman periods the name of the former Southern Kingdom of Judah was hellenized to Judea, in modern times, Samaria was the name of one of the administrative districts of Mandatory Palestine. However, the phrase was used until 1977 when Menachem Begin. The phrase is used today by various figures who support Israeli annexation of the area. The name Judea, when used in Judea and Samaria, refers to all of the south of Jerusalem, including Gush Etzion. The region of Samaria, on the hand, refers to the area north of Jerusalem. East Jerusalem has been incorporated into the Jerusalem District and is under Israeli civilian rule, the terms West Bank, or, alternatively, the Territories, are also current in Israeli usage. The Judea and Samaria Area is administered by the Israel Defense Forces Central Command, administrative decisions are subject to the Commands chief. The incumbent chief of Central Command is Aluf Nitzan Alon, the future status of the region is a key factor in the ongoing Israeli–Palestinian conflict. The Supreme Court of Israel has considered the section of the West Bank which excludes East Jerusalem to be Israeli-occupied territories, extending Israeli law to the settlements would mean a de facto annexation of the settlements to Israel. Article 43 of the Fourth Hague Convention of 1907 is the basis of the Levy committees opinion, the area is further divided into 8 military administrative regions, Menashe, HaBika, Shomron, Efrayim, Binyamin, Maccabim, Etzion and Yehuda. Jewish Agency for Israel Judea and Samaria at DMOZ
4.
Regional council (Israel)
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As of 2003, there were 53 regional councils, usually responsible for governing a number of settlements spread across rural areas. Regional councils include representation of anywhere between 3 and 54 communities, usually spread over a large area within geographical vicinity of each other. Each community within a regional council usually does not exceed 2000 in population and is managed by a local committee and this committee sends representatives to the administering regional council proportionate to their size of membership and according to an index which is fixed before each election. Those settlements without an administrative council do not send any representatives to the regional council, representatives from those settlements which are represented directly are either chosen directly or through an election. The predominant form of communities represented on regional councils are kibbutzim and moshavim, the following sortable table lists all 53 regional councils by name, and the district or area according to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics. The list includes the regional councils in the Golan Heights and the West Bank, areas considered occupied territories under international law, city council Local council List of Israeli cities Local Government in Israel
5.
Mateh Binyamin Regional Council
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Mateh Binyamin Regional Council is a regional council covering 42 Israeli settlements and outposts in the southern Samarian hills of the West Bank. The seat of the council is Psagot, the council is named for the ancient Israelite tribe of Benjamin, whose territory roughly corresponds to that of the council. The region in which the Binyamin settlements are located is referred to as the Binyamin Region, the international community considers Israeli settlements to be illegal, and this applies to all communities under the administration of Mateh Binyamin. In November 2007, Avi Roeh was elected head of the council, the previous head, Pinchas Wallerstein, stepped down after being in the position for 28 years. Tel Tzion is a neighbourhood of Kokhav Yaakov, though it is set to ultimately become a separate locality
6.
West Bank
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The West Bank shares boundaries to the west, north, and south with Israel, and to the east, across the Jordan River, with Jordan. The West Bank also contains a significant section of the western Dead Sea shore, the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, has a land area of 5,640 km2 plus a water area of 220 km2, consisting of the northwest quarter of the Dead Sea. As of July 2015 it has an population of 2,785,366 Palestinians, and approximately 371,000 Israeli settlers. The international community considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, illegal under international law and this annexation was recognized only by Britain, Iraq and Pakistan. The term was chosen to differentiate the west bank of the River Jordan from the east bank of this river, the neo-Latin name Cisjordan or Cis-Jordan is the usual name for the territory in the Romance languages and Hungarian. The name West Bank, however, has become the standard usage for this entity in English. The analogous Transjordan has historically used to designate the region now roughly comprising the state of Jordan. From 1517 through 1917, the now known as the West Bank was under Ottoman rule as part of the provinces of Syria. At the 1920 San Remo conference, the victorious Allied powers allocated the area to the British Mandate of Palestine, the San Remo Resolution adopted on 25 April 1920 incorporated the Balfour Declaration of 1917. It and Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations were the basic documents upon which the British Mandate for Palestine was constructed. Faced with the determination of Emir Abdullah to unify Arab lands under the Hashemite banner, the West Bank area, was conquered by Jordan during the 1948 war with the new state of Israel. In 1947, it was designated as part of a proposed Arab state by the United Nations partition plan for Palestine. 1949 Armistice Agreements defined the boundary between Israel and Jordan. In 1950, Transjordan annexed the area west of the Jordan River, naming it West Bank or Cisjordan, Jordan ruled over the West Bank from 1948 until 1967. Jordans annexation was never recognized by the international community, with the exception of the United Kingdom. King Abdullah of Jordan had been crowned King of Jerusalem by the Coptic Bishop on 15 November 1948. and granted Palestinian Arabs in the West Bank, in June 1967, the West Bank and East Jerusalem were captured by Israel as a result of the Six-Day War. With the exception of East Jerusalem and the former Israeli-Jordanian no mans land, the Israeli settlements were, on the other hand, administered subsequently as Judea and Samaria Area directly by Israel. Since the 1993 Oslo Accords, the Palestinian Authority officially controls a geographically non-contiguous territory comprising approx, 11% of the West Bank which remains subject to Israeli incursions
7.
Hebrew language
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Hebrew is a language native to Israel, spoken by over 9 million people worldwide, of whom over 5 million are in Israel. Historically, it is regarded as the language of the Israelites and their ancestors, the earliest examples of written Paleo-Hebrew date from the 10th century BCE. Hebrew belongs to the West Semitic branch of the Afroasiatic language family, Hebrew is the only living Canaanite language left, and the only truly successful example of a revived dead language. Hebrew had ceased to be a spoken language somewhere between 200 and 400 CE, declining since the aftermath of the Bar Kokhba revolt. Aramaic and to a lesser extent Greek were already in use as international languages, especially among elites and it survived into the medieval period as the language of Jewish liturgy, rabbinic literature, intra-Jewish commerce, and poetry. Then, in the 19th century, it was revived as a spoken and literary language, and, according to Ethnologue, had become, as of 1998, the language of 5 million people worldwide. After Israel, the United States has the second largest Hebrew-speaking population, with 220,000 fluent speakers, Modern Hebrew is one of the two official languages of the State of Israel, while premodern Hebrew is used for prayer or study in Jewish communities around the world today. Ancient Hebrew is also the tongue of the Samaritans, while modern Hebrew or Arabic is their vernacular. For this reason, Hebrew has been referred to by Jews as Leshon Hakodesh, the modern word Hebrew is derived from the word Ivri, one of several names for the Israelite people. It is traditionally understood to be a based on the name of Abrahams ancestor, Eber. This name is based upon the root ʕ-b-r meaning to cross over. Interpretations of the term ʕibrim link it to this verb, cross over, in the Bible, the Hebrew language is called Yәhudit because Judah was the surviving kingdom at the time of the quotation. In Isaiah 19,18 it is called the Language of Canaan, Hebrew belongs to the Canaanite group of languages. In turn, the Canaanite languages are a branch of the Northwest Semitic family of languages, according to Avraham ben-Yosef, Hebrew flourished as a spoken language in the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah during about 1200 to 586 BCE. Scholars debate the degree to which Hebrew was a vernacular in ancient times following the Babylonian exile. In July 2008 Israeli archaeologist Yossi Garfinkel discovered a ceramic shard at Khirbet Qeiyafa which he claimed may be the earliest Hebrew writing yet discovered, dating around 3000 years ago. The Gezer calendar also dates back to the 10th century BCE at the beginning of the Monarchic Period, classified as Archaic Biblical Hebrew, the calendar presents a list of seasons and related agricultural activities. The Gezer calendar is written in an old Semitic script, akin to the Phoenician one that through the Greeks, the Gezer calendar is written without any vowels, and it does not use consonants to imply vowels even in the places where later Hebrew spelling requires it
8.
Israeli settlement
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Such settlements within Palestinian territories currently exist in Area C of the West Bank and in East Jerusalem, and within Syrian territory in the Golan Heights. Israel dismantled 18 settlements in the Sinai Peninsula in 1982, while in 2005 all 21 settlements in the Gaza Strip were dismantled, but only four in the West Bank. In the West Bank, however, Israel continues to expand its remaining settlements as well as settling new areas, the International Court of Justice also says these purportedly annexed settlements are illegal in a 2004 advisory opinion. Similar criticism was advanced by the EU and the US, Israel disputes the position of the international community and the legal arguments that were used to declare the settlements illegal. Most of the spending goes to the security of the Israeli citizens living there, on 30 June 2014, according to the Yesha Council,382,031 Israeli citizens lived in the 121 officially recognised Israeli settlements in the West Bank, almost exclusively Jewish citizens of Israel. In January 2015 the Israeli Interior Ministry gave figures of 389,250 Israeli citizens living in the West Bank, settlements range in character from farming communities and frontier villages to urban suburbs and neighborhoods. The four largest settlements, Modiin Illit, Maale Adumim, Beitar Illit, Ariel has 18,000 residents, while the rest have around 37,000 to 55,500 each. The 1967 Six-Day War left Israel in control of the entire West Bank of the Jordan River, the entire Sinai Peninsula up to the Suez Canal, and the Gaza strip. Most of the Golan Heights, since 1981, administered under the Golan Heights Law, as early as 1967, Israeli settlement policy was started by the Labor government of Levi Eshkol. The basis for Israeli settlement in the West Bank became the Allon Plan and it implied Israeli annexation of major parts of the Israeli-occupied territories, especially East Jerusalem, Gush Etzion and the Jordan Valley. The settlement policy of the government of Yitzhak Rabin, was derived from the Allon Plan. The first settlement was Kfar Etzion, in the southern West Bank, many settlements began as Nahal settlements. They were established as military outposts and later expanded and populated with civilian inhabitants, Ariel Sharon declared in the same year that there was a plan to settle 2 million Jews in the West Bank by 2000. Since 1967, government-funded settlement projects in the West Bank are implemented by the Settlement Division of the World Zionist Organization, though formally a non-governmental organization, it is funded by the Israeli government and leases lands from the Civil Administration to settle in the West Bank. It is authorized to create settlements in the West Bank on lands licensed to it by the Civil Administration, traditionally, the Settlement Division has been under the responsibility of the Agriculture Ministry. Since the Olso Accords, it was housed within the Prime Ministers Office. In 2007, it was moved back to the Agriculture Ministry, in 2009, the Netanyahu Government decided to subject all settlement activities to additional approval of the Prime Minister and the Defense Minister. In 2011, Netanyahu sought to move the Settlement Division again under the control of PMO
9.
Nablus
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Nablus is a city in the northern West Bank, approximately 49 kilometers north of Jerusalem, with a population of 126,132. The city was named by the Roman Emperor Vespasian in 72 CE as Flavia Neapolis, since then, Nablus has been ruled by many empires over the course of its almost 2, 000-year-long history. In 636, Neapolis, along with most of Palestine, came under the rule of the Islamic Arab Caliphate of Umar ibn al-Khattab, its name Arabicized to Nablus. In 1099, the Crusaders took control of the city for less than a century, leaving its mixed Muslim, after Saladins Ayyubid forces took control of the interior of Palestine in 1187, Islamic rule was reestablished, and continued under the Mamluk and Ottoman empires to follow. Following its incorporation into the Ottoman Empire in 1517, Nablus was designated capital of the Jabal Nablus district, when Ottoman rule was firmly reestablished in 1841, Nablus prospered as a center of trade. After the city was captured by British forces during World War I, during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, the city was captured and occupied by Transjordan, which subsequently annexed it unilaterally, until its occupation by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War. Today, the population is predominantly Muslim, with small Christian and Samaritan minorities, since 1995, the city has been governed by the Palestinian National Authority. In the Old City, there are a number of sites of archaeological significance, culturally, the city is known for its kanafeh, a popular sweet throughout the Middle East, and its soap industry. Flavia Neapolis was named in 72 CE by the Roman emperor Vespasian and applied to an older Samaritan village, variously called Mabartha or Mamorpha. Located between Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim, the new city lay 2 kilometers west of the Biblical city of Shechem which was destroyed by the Romans that same year during the First Jewish-Roman War, holy places at the site of the citys founding include Josephs Tomb and Jacobs Well. Due to the citys strategic position and the abundance of water from nearby springs, Neapolis prospered, accumulating extensive territory. Insofar as the topography of the site would allow, the city was built on a Roman grid plan and settled with veterans who fought in the victorious legions. In the 2nd century CE, Emperor Hadrian built a theater in Neapolis that could seat up to 7,000 people. Coins found in Nablus dating to this period depict Roman military emblems and gods and goddesses of the Greek pantheon such as Zeus, Artemis, Serapis, Neapolis was entirely pagan at this time. Justin Martyr who was born in the city c.100 CE, came into contact with Platonism, the city flourished until the civil war between Septimius Severus and Pescennius Niger in 198–9 CE. Having sided with Niger, who was defeated, the city was stripped of its legal privileges by Severus. In 244 CE, Philip the Arab transformed Flavius Neapolis into a Roman colony named Julia Neapolis and it retained this status until the rule of Trebonianus Gallus in 251 CE. The Encyclopaedia Judaica speculates that Christianity was dominant in the 2nd or 3rd century and it is known for certain that a bishop from Nablus participated in the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE
10.
B'Tselem
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Its executive director is Hagai El-Ad. BTselem also maintains a presence in Washington, D. C. known as BTselem USA, BTselem has come under intense fire for what its critics describe as misrepresenting and distorting facts. BTselem was founded in 1989, during the First Intifada, by Israeli academics, BTselems funding comes from private individuals, governments, and European and North American foundations focusing on human rights. In December 1989, BTselem shared the Carter-Menil Human Rights Prize with the Palestinian group, BTselem has been harshly criticized by Israeli nationalists. In 2011, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman charged the group with abetting terrorism, BTselem was founded on February 3,1989. Key founders were Daphna Golan-Agnon, David Zucker, Haim Oron, Zehava Gal-On, Avigdor Feldman, and Edy Kaufman, BTselem regularly provides Knesset members with information on alleged human rights violations in the West Bank, and alleged injustices caused by Israeli authorities. Several Knesset members, from various factions, assist BTselem in placing human rights matters on the public agenda, BTselem has hundreds of supporters and volunteers who work to improve the human rights situation in the West Bank. These activities include, in part, setting up information stands, distributing printed material, addressing problems and requests to decision-makers, over one hundred reports have been published so far. The organization serves as a source of information for journalists, researchers, BTselems activities receive extensive media coverage. BTselem also campaigns against the penalty and the human rights record of the Palestinian Authority. On February 17,2005, the organization called on Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to commute the sentences of Palestinians condemned to death, Abbas had shortly before ratified the death sentences of a number of Palestinians accused of collaborating with Israel or of other criminal charges. In 2016, BTselem announced that it was cutting ties with the IDF over the alleged whitewashing of complaints raised by the NGO.2009 Foul Play. Neglect of Wastewater Treatment in the West Bank found that water from two million people in the West Bank and Jerusalem area was being allowed to drain untreated into the Jordan Valley. Whilst emphasising the illegality of the settlements the report calls for improvements in their sewage treatment and it points out that this illegality makes cooperation between the Israeli and Palestinian authorities impossible. Freedom of Movement to and from the Gaza Strip on the Eve of the Disengagement Plan investigates the four and it points out that Israel has the right to defend its civilians and that attacks on Israeli civilians were defined under international law as war crimes. Israels Bombing of the Gaza Power Plant and its Effects reported on the June 28,2006 Israeli missile attack which destroyed the Gaza Strips only electricity power plant. It recognises that the high level decision to launch the attack was linked to the capture of Corporal Gilad Shalit but concludes that the attack and it list questions that need to be answered as, Were civilian objects the target of attacks. Did the military respect the principle of proportionality, did the military use prohibited weapons including white-phosphorus shells and indiscriminate weapons
11.
Book of Joshua
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The Book of Joshua is the sixth book in the Hebrew Bible and the first book of the Deuteronomistic history, the story of Israel from the conquest of Canaan to the Babylonian exile. Almost all scholars agree that the book of Joshua holds little value for early Israel. Although Rabbinic tradition holds that the book was written by Joshua, transfer of leadership to Joshua A. Joshuas instructions to the people II, entrance into and conquest of Canaan A. Entry into Canaan 1. Reconnaissance of Jericho 2, establishing a foothold at Gilgal 4. Failure and success at Ai 3, renewal of the covenant at Mount Ebal 4. Other campaigns in central Canaan 5, summary list of defeated kings III. Division of the land among the tribes A, cities of refuge and levitical cities D. Summary of conquest E. De-commissioning of the eastern tribes IV, conclusion A. Joshuas farewell address B. Methodist writer Joseph Benson suggests that Gods revelation to Joshua comes either immediately after, God commissions Joshua to take possession of the land and warns him to keep faith with the Covenant. The Israelites cross the Jordan River through the intervention of God. The conquest begins in Canaan with Jericho, followed by Ai, after which Joshua builds an altar to Yahweh at Mount Ebal, the covenant ceremony has elements of a divine land-grant ceremony, similar to ceremonies known from Mesopotamia. The narrative then switches to the south, the Gibeonites trick the Israelites into entering into an alliance with them by saying they are not Canaanites, this prevents the Israelites from exterminating them, but they are enslaved instead. An alliance of Amorite kingdoms headed by the Canaanite king of Jerusalem is defeated with Yahwehs miraculous help of stopping the sun and the moon, the enemy kings were eventually hanged on trees. With the south conquered the narrative moves to the northern campaign, a powerful multi-national coalition headed by the king of Hazor, the most important northern city, is defeated with Yahwehs help and Hazor captured and destroyed. Chapter 11, 16–23 summarises the extent of the conquest, Joshua has taken the land, almost entirely through military victories. Joshua 11,18 asserts that the conquest took a long time - the Amplified Bible, anglican churchman Charles Ellicott thinks the war seems to have lasted seven years. The land then had rest from war, the list of the 31 kings is quasi-tabular, the king of Jerusalem, one, the king of Hebron, one, the king of Jarmuth, one, the king of Lachish, one
12.
Yitzhak Rabin
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Yitzhak Rabin was an Israeli politician, statesman and general. He was the fifth Prime Minister of Israel, serving two terms in office, 1974–77 and 1992 until his assassination in 1995, Rabin was born in Jerusalem to Ukrainian-Jewish immigrants and was raised in a Labor Zionist household. He learned agriculture in school and excelled as a student and he led a 27-year career as a soldier. As a teenager he joined the Palmach, the force of the Yishuv. He eventually rose through its ranks to become its chief of operations during Israels War of Independence and he joined the newly formed Israel Defense Forces in late 1948 and continued to rise as a promising officer. He helped shape the training doctrine of the IDF in the early 1950s and he was appointed Chief of the General Staff in 1964 and oversaw Israels victory in the 1967 Six-Day War. Rabin served as Israels ambassador to the United States from 1968 to 1973 and he was appointed Prime Minister of Israel in 1974, after the resignation of Golda Meir. In his first term, Rabin signed the Sinai Interim Agreement and he resigned in 1977 in the wake of a financial scandal. Rabin was Israels minister of defense for much of the 1980s, in 1992, Rabin was re-elected as prime minister on a platform embracing the Israeli–Palestinian peace process. He signed several agreements with the Palestinian leadership as part of the Oslo Accords. In 1994, Rabin won the Nobel Peace Prize together with long-time political rival Shimon Peres, Rabin also signed a peace treaty with Jordan in 1994. In November 1995, he was assassinated by an extremist named Yigal Amir, Rabin was the first native-born prime minister of Israel, the only prime minister to be assassinated and the second to die in office after Levi Eshkol. Rabin has become a symbol of the Israeli–Palestinian peace process, Nehemiah Rubitzov was born in the shtetl Sydorovychi near Ivankiv in the southern Pale of Settlement. His father Menachem died when he was a boy, and Nehemiah worked to support his family from an early age, at the age of 18, he emigrated to the United States, where he joined the Poale Zion party and changed his surname to Rabin. In 1917, Nehemiah went to Mandatory Palestine with a group of volunteers from the Jewish Legion, yitzhaks mother, Rosa Cohen, was born in 1890 in Mogilev in Belarus. Her father, a rabbi, opposed the Zionist movement and sent Rosa to a Christian high school for girls in Gomel, early on, Rosa took an interest in political and social causes. In 1919, she traveled to the region on the steamship Ruslan, after working on a kibbutz on the shores of the Sea of Galilee, she moved to Jerusalem. Rabins parents met in Jerusalem during the 1920 Nebi Musa riots and they moved to Tel Avivs Chlenov Street near Jaffa in 1923
13.
Shimon Peres
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Shimon Peres was an Israeli politician who served both as ninth President of Israel, and Prime Minister of Israel, as well as Interim Prime Minister. He was a member of twelve cabinets in a career spanning 70 years. At the time of his retirement in 2014, he was the worlds oldest head of state and he was considered the last link to Israels founding generation. From a young age, he was renowned for his oratorical brilliance and he began his political career in the late 1940s, holding several diplomatic and military positions during and directly after the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. His first high-level government position was as Deputy Director-General of Defense in 1952 which he attained at the age of 28, in 1956, he took part in the historic negotiations on the Protocol of Sèvres described by British Prime Minister Anthony Eden as the highest form of statesmanship. In 1963, he held negotiations with U. S. President John F. Kennedy, which resulted in the sale of Hawk anti-aircraft missiles to Israel, the first sale of U. S. military equipment to Israel. On October 26,1994, Jordan and Israel signed the Israel–Jordan peace treaty, Peres won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize together with Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat for the peace talks that he participated in as Israeli Foreign Minister, producing the Oslo Accords. During his career, he represented five political parties in the Knesset, Mapai, Rafi, the Alignment, Labor and Kadima, and led Alignment and Labor. In July 2016, he founded the Israel innovation center in the Arab neighbourhood of Ajami, Jaffa, Peres was polyglot, speaking Polish, French, English, Russian, Yiddish and Hebrew, although he never lost his Polish accent when speaking in Hebrew. In his private life, he was a poet and songwriter, writing stanzas during cabinet meetings, as a result of his deep literary interests, he could quote from Hebrew prophets, French literature, and Chinese philosophy with equal ease. After suffering a stroke, Peres died on September 28,2016 near Tel Aviv, Shimon Peres was born Szymon Perski, on August 2,1923, in Wiszniew, Poland, to Yitzhak and Sara Perski. The family spoke Hebrew, Yiddish and Russian at home, and he then learned to speak English and French. His father was a timber merchant, later branching out into other commodities. Peres had a brother, Gershon, and was a relative of American film star Lauren Bacall. Peres told Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson that he had been born as a result of a blessing his parents had received from a chassidic rebbe, Peres grandfather, Rabbi Zvi Meltzer, a grandson of Rabbi Chaim Volozhin, had a great impact on his life. In an interview, Peres said, As a child, I grew up in my grandfathers home, … My grandfather taught me Talmud. It was not as easy as it sounds and my home was not an observant one. My parents were not Orthodox but I was Haredi, at one point, I heard my parents listening to the radio on the Sabbath and I smashed it
14.
Labour Party (Israel)
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The Israeli Labor Party, commonly known as HaAvoda, is a social democratic and Zionist political party in Israel. The Israeli Labor Party was established in 1968 by a merger of Mapai, Ahdut HaAvoda, until 1977, all Israeli Prime Ministers were affiliated with the Labor movement. The current party leader since 2013 is Isaac Herzog, the Labor Party is associated with supporting the Israeli–Palestinian peace process, pragmatic foreign affairs policies and social democratic economic policies. The party is a member of the Socialist International and Progressive Alliance, after the Six-Day War broke out, Rafi and Gahal joined the coalition. On 23 January 1968 Mapai, Ahdut HaAvoda and Rafi merged into one body, on 28 January 1969, the party allied itself with Mapam, the alliance becoming known as the Alignment. As the largest faction within the Alignment, Labor came to dominate it, Mapam left during the eighth Knesset, but rejoined shortly afterwards. In the 1977 elections, Labor for the first time ended up in opposition, in the 1984 elections, Labor joined a national unity government with Likud, with the post of Prime Minister rotating between the two parties. Mapam broke away again during the eleventh Knesset, angry at Shimon Peress decision to form a unity government with Likud. Although the Independent Liberals merged into the Alignment in the 1980s, on 7 October 1991 the Alignment ceased to exist, with all factions formally merged into the Labor Party. W. Led by Yitzhak Rabin, Labor won the 1992 elections and formed the government together with Meretz, in domestic policy, the Labor-led government introduced various measures to improve levels of social protection. Better provisions were introduced for single parents and people with disabilities, the 1994 Law to Reduce Poverty and Income Inequality increased income maintenance grants to needy families, particularly benefitting those sections of society most vulnerable to poverty. In 1995, a health insurance policy was implemented, making access to health care a right for all Israelis. Various measures were introduced to bring greater progressivity into the system of collection of national insurance contributions. A maternity grant for adopting mothers was introduced, together with insurance for housewives, a minimum unemployment allowance. The subsequent role of Labor became to a large extent tied to the Oslo Accords, the Oslo Accords led to a vote of confidence, which the Government won with a margin of 61–50. Several MKs from the Government parties declined to support the Government, but on the other hand, due to the lack of a constitution in Israel, the Government was able to implement the accords with a thin margin. Rabins decision to advance peace talks with the Palestinians to the point of signing the Oslo Accords led to his assassination by Yigal Amir in 1995, Peres decided to call early elections in 1996 to give him a mandate for advancing the peace process. However, his ploy failed, although Labor won the most seats in the Knesset election, Netanyahu and Likud were thus able to form the government
15.
Likud
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Likud, officially the Likud–National Liberal Movement, is a major center-right to right-wing political party in Israel. A secular party, it was founded in 1973 by Menachem Begin in an alliance with several right-wing, Likuds landslide victory in the 1977 elections was a major turning point in the countrys political history, marking the first time the left had lost power. In addition, it was the first time in Israel that a party won the plurality of the votes. However, after ruling the country for most of the 1980s, nevertheless, Likuds candidate Benjamin Netanyahu did win the vote for Prime Minister in 1996 and was given the task of forming a government after the 1996 elections. Netanyahus government fell apart after a vote of no confidence, which led to elections being called in 1999, in 2001, Likuds Ariel Sharon, who replaced Netanyahu following the 1999 election, defeated Barak in an election called by the Prime Minister following his resignation. After the party recorded a win in the 2003 elections. This resulted in Likud slumping to fourth place in the 2006 elections, Netanyahu has been Prime Minister since and Likud has been the leading vote-getter in each election. A member of the party is called a Likudnik. Herut had been the nations largest right-wing party since growing out of the Irgun in 1948 and it had already been in coalition with the Liberals since 1965 as Gahal, with Herut as the senior partner. Herut remained the senior partner in the new grouping, which was given the name Likud, meaning Consolidation and it worked as a coalition under Heruts leadership until 1988, when the member parties merged into a single party under the Likud name. From its establishment in 1973, Likud enjoyed great support from blue-collar Sephardim who felt discriminated against by the ruling Alignment, Likud made a strong showing in its first elections in 1973, reducing the Alignments lead to 12 seats. The party went on to win the 1977 elections, finishing 11 seats ahead of the Alignment, Begin was able to form a government with the support of the religious parties, consigning the left-wing to opposition for the first time since independence. A former leader of the hard-line paramilitary Irgun, Begin helped initiate the process with Egypt, which resulted in the 1978 Camp David Accords. Likud was reelected with a reduced mandate in 1981. Likud has long been an alliance between politicians committed to different and sometimes opposing policy preferences and ideologies. Begin resigned in October 1983 and was succeeded as Likud leader, although Shamir lost the 1984 election, the Alignment was unable to form a government on its own. Likud and the Alignment thus formed a unity government, with Peres as Prime Minister. After two years, Peres and Shamir switched posts and this government remained in power through 1990, when the Alignment pulled out and Shamir stitched together a right-wing coalition that held on until its defeat in 1992 by Labor
16.
Bnei Akiva
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Bnei Akiva is the largest religious Zionist youth movement in the world, with over 125,000 members in 42 countries. It was established in 1929 in Mandatory Palestine, Bnei Akiva was established as the youth wing of the Mizrachi movement. The axiom of Bnei Akiva is Torah v’Avodah, a phrase coined by Rav Shmuel Chaim Landau, Bnei Akiva first came into existence in the late 1920s, following World War I. Concurrent with the establishment of the movement in pre-independence Israel, organizations of religious youth operated in the Diaspora, some of them adopted the name Bnei Akiva and others had appellations such as Hashomer Hadati. Twenty-five years later, the Israeli and Diaspora groups merged and the Mazkirut Olamit of Bnei Akiva was formed, Bnei Akivas twin ideals of Torah and Avodah loosely translate to religious commitment/study and work on the land of Israel. The movement has an anthem called Yad Ahim, Bnei Akiva feels that Jewish youth in the Diaspora should be educated to realize that the State of Israel needs them, and that they, in turn, need it. In the early years of pioneering, Avodah was understood as meaning agricultural work, in more recent years, there has driven a shift in ideology towards a broader definition of working for the development of the country. Similarly, the original socialist aims of Bnei Akiva are also taking more of a back-seat, up to the 1980s many Bnei Akiva members joined religious Kibbutzim in Garinim. They were either based on army service together Nahal or they were groups that came on Aliya to Israel together. Since the 1990s, a view of how to contribute to Israeli life has become accepted. Bnei Akiva members now typically settle in development towns, settlements etc, the term Bnei Akiva and its ideology relates directly to the story of Rabbi Akiva. At the age of 40 years, after growing up tending flock, he changed his ways and he reasoned that just as something as soft as water can penetrate a solid rock and cause it to erode, so too can the Torah penetrate into himself. Chanichim strive to emulate Rabbi Akiva and his qualities, namely his love of God, devotion to the Torah, respect for labor, love of Israel, and his fight for its independence. Some members would like Bnei Akivas slogan to be Am Yisrael bEretz Yisrael al pi Torat Yisrael - The Nation of Israel living in the Land of Israel according to the Torah of Israel and this is the slogan of the original Mizrachi movement. In Israel, Bnei Akiva is affiliated with the Religious Kibbutz Movement and it is run by a National Secretariat. Outside Israel, local branches of Bnei Akiva are under the Bnei Akiva Olami organization, in every country, Bnei Akiva operates a network of Shabbat groups, summer camps, leadership seminars, Shabatonim, and other activities. The two perspectives of Torah and Avoda are united together by the ribbon which says Bnei Akiva on it - symbolizing that the two aspects can only and must work hand in hand. The letters on the two tablets are the Hebrew letters Taf and Ayin standing for Torah veAvoda By work, Bnei Akiva means working in Israel, helping and developing Israel, so Israel can be an example for all the other countries
17.
Israeli West Bank barrier
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The Israeli West Bank barrier or wall is a separation barrier in the West Bank or along the Green Line. Barrier opponents claim it seeks to annex Palestinian land under the guise of security, in Hebrew, descriptions include, separation fence, separation wall and security fence. In Arabic, it is called wall of apartheid جدار الفصل العنصري, in English, the BBCs style guide uses the terms barrier as does The Economist, PBS and the New York Times. The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs uses the phrase security fence in English, the International Court of Justice has used the term wall explaining the other expressions sometimes employed are no more accurate if understood in the physical sense. It is also referred to as the Apartheid Wall or Apartheid Fence in a derogatory manner, Seam zone refers to the land between the 1949 Armistice Agreement Line and the fence. The barrier contains an on-average 60-metre wide exclusion area, the width of some sections is larger due to topographic conditions. The width of some sections is 3 metres where the barrier is constructed as a wall up to 8 metres high. These sections are narrower, require less land, and provide protection against snipers. Wall construction is common in urban settings, e. g. Qalqilyah and Jerusalem. The barrier nearly encircles some Palestinian towns, about 20% follows the line. Some 27,520 to 31,000 Palestinians will be captured on the Israeli side, another 124,000, on the other hand, will effectively be controlled and isolated. Some 230,000 Palestinians in Jerusalem will be placed on the West Bank side, most of the barrier was built at the northern and western edges of the West Bank, mostly beyond the Green Line and created 9 enclaves, which enclosed 15,783 ha. An additional barrier, circa 10 km long, run south of Ramallah, by contrast, the International Court of Justice states that in such cases it is only legal to build the barrier inside Israel. The barrier route has been challenged in court and changed several times, argument presented to the court has reiterated that the cease-fire line of 1949 was negotiated without prejudice to future territorial settlements or boundary lines. In 1992, the idea of creating a barrier separating the Israeli. In 1994, a first barrier was constructed along the Green Line between Bat Hefer and Tulkarm, in 1995, the Shahal commission was established to discuss how to implement a separation barrier. In 2000, Prime Minister Ehud Barak approved financing of a 74 km fence between the Wadi Ara region and Latrun, on 23 June 2002, the Ariel Sharon Government definitely approved the plan in principle and work at the barrier begun. By 2003,180 km had been completed and in 2004, by 2006,362 km of the barrier had been completed,88 km was under construction and 253 km had not yet been started
18.
Green Line (Israel)
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It served as the de facto borders of the State of Israel from 1949 until the Six-Day War in 1967. The name comes from the ink used to draw the line on the map while the armistice talks were going on. After the Six-Day War, the territories captured by Israel beyond the Green Line came to be designated as East Jerusalem, the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Golan Heights and these territories are often referred to as Israeli-occupied territories. The Green Line was intended as a line rather than a permanent border. The 1949 Armistice Agreements were clear that they were not creating permanent borders, similar provisions are contained in the Armistice Agreements with Jordan and Syria. The Green Line refers to the lines, rather than permanent borders. All movement across the lines was banned and monitored by the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization. Most commonly, the term was applied to the boundary between Jordan-controlled Jerusalem and the West Bank and Israel, the Palestinian and Arab leaders had repeatedly rejected any permanent partition of Mandatory Palestine. Although Israel has always argued that the Green Line has no legal significance. The territories beyond the Green Line were administered by the Israeli military or later also by the Palestinian Authority, citizenship by residence, for example, was determined with reference to the Green Line, as well as a persons refugee status. The extension of the municipality boundary of Jerusalem in 1980 was an exception to this position and this claim has not been recognised by any country or by the United Nations Security Council. A notional Green Line continues to divide Jerusalem at the boundary of East Jerusalem, the Golan Heights are another exception, having been informally incorporated by Israel with the 1981 Golan Heights Law. The UN Security Council declared this to be null and without any legal effect. Israeli settlements in these areas are subject to the laws of Israel rather than those of the Palestinian Authority. The sections of the Green Line that delineate the boundaries between Israel, the West Bank and Gaza run through heavily populated regions, consequently, the Green Line underwent various slight adjustments, and special arrangements were made for limited movement in certain areas. Jerusalem was divided in half, into East and West Jerusalem, the village of Bartaa, partially due to errors on the map, was left with one third of its area on the Israeli side and two thirds outside of it. Kibbutz Ramat Rachel was left almost entirely outside the Israeli side of the Green Line, the green line was redrawn in blue ink on the southern map to give the impression that a movement in the green line had been made. During the war in 1947-48, Jews residing east of the Line, all but a few of the Gush Etzion defenders were massacred
19.
Karst topography
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Karst topography is a landscape formed from the dissolution of soluble rocks such as limestone, dolomite, and gypsum. It is characterized by underground drainage systems with sinkholes and caves and it has also been documented for more weathering-resistant rocks, such as quartzite, given the right conditions. Subterranean drainage may limit surface water, with few to no rivers or lakes, the English word karst was borrowed from German Karst in the late 19th century. The German word came into use before the 19th century, according to the prevalent interpretation, the term is derived from the German name for the Karst region, a limestone plateau above the city of Trieste in the northern Adriatic. Scholars disagree, however, on whether the German word was borrowed from Slovene, the Slovene common noun kras was first attested in the 18th century, and the adjective form kraški in the 16th century. The Slovene words arose through metathesis from the reconstructed form *korsъ, ultimately, the word is of Mediterranean origin, believed to derive from some Romanized Illyrian base. It has been suggested that the word may derive from the Proto-Indo-European root karra- rock, the name may also be connected to the oronym Karsádios oros cited by Ptolemy, and perhaps also to Latin Carusardius. The development of karst occurs whenever acidic water starts to break down the surface of bedrock near its cracks, as the bedrock continues to degrade, its cracks tend to get bigger. As time goes on, these fractures will become wider, if this underground drainage system does form, it will speed up the development of karst formations there because more water will be able to flow through the region, giving it more erosive power. The carbonic acid that causes karstic features is formed as rain passes through the atmosphere picking up carbon dioxide, once the rain reaches the ground, it may pass through soil that can provide much more CO2 to form a weak carbonic acid solution, which dissolves calcium carbonate. The oxidation of sulfides leading to the formation of acid can also be one of the corrosion factors in karst formation. As oxygen -rich surface waters seep into deep anoxic karst systems, they bring oxygen, sulfuric acid then reacts with calcium carbonate, causing increased erosion within the limestone formation. This chain of reactions is, This reaction chain forms gypsum, the karstification of a landscape may result in a variety of large- or small-scale features both on the surface and beneath. On exposed surfaces, small features may include solution flutes, runnels, limestone pavement, medium-sized surface features may include sinkholes or cenotes, vertical shafts, foibe, disappearing streams, and reappearing springs. Large-scale features may include limestone pavements, poljes, and karst valleys, mature karst landscapes, where more bedrock has been removed than remains, may result in karst towers, or haystack/eggbox landscapes. Beneath the surface, complex underground systems and extensive caves. Some of the most dramatic of these formations can be seen in Thailands Phangnga Bay, calcium carbonate dissolved into water may precipitate out where the water discharges some of its dissolved carbon dioxide. Rivers which emerge from springs may produce tufa terraces, consisting of layers of calcite deposited over extended periods of time, in caves, a variety of features collectively called speleothems are formed by deposition of calcium carbonate and other dissolved minerals
20.
Stalactite
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A stalactite is a type of formation that hangs from the ceiling of caves, hot springs, or manmade structures such as bridges and mines. Any material which is soluble, can be deposited as a colloid, or is in suspension, or is capable of being melted, Stalactites may be composed of amberat, lava, minerals, mud, peat, pitch, sand, and sinter. A stalactite is not necessarily a speleothem, though speleothems are the most common form of stalactite because of the abundance of limestone caves, the corresponding formation on the floor of the cave is known as a stalagmite. The most common stalactites are speleothems, which occur in limestone caves and they form through deposition of calcium carbonate and other minerals, which is precipitated from mineralized water solutions. Limestone is the form of calcium carbonate rock which is dissolved by water that contains carbon dioxide. When the solution comes into contact with air the chemical reaction that created it is reversed, the reversed reaction is, Ca 2 → CaCO3 + H 2O + CO2 An average growth rate is 0.13 mm a year. The quickest growing stalactites are formed by a constant supply of slow dripping water rich in calcium carbonate and carbon dioxide. The drip rate must be enough to allow the CO2 to degas from the solution into the cave atmosphere. Too fast a drip rate and the solution, still carrying most of the CaCO3, falls to the floor where degassing occurs. All limestone stalactites begin with a single drop of water. When the drop falls, it deposits the thinnest ring of calcite, each subsequent drop that forms and falls deposits another calcite ring. Eventually, these form a very narrow, hollow tube commonly known as a soda straw stalactite. Soda straws can grow long, but are very fragile. If they become plugged by debris, water flowing over the outside, depositing more calcite. The same water drops that fall from the tip of a stalactite deposit more calcite on the floor below, unlike stalactites, stalagmites never start out as hollow soda straws. Given enough time, these formations can meet and fuse to create pillars of calcium carbonate known as a column, another type of stalactite is formed in lava tubes while lava is still active inside. The mechanism of formation is similar to that of limestone stalactites, a key difference with lava stalactites is that once the lava has ceased flowing, so too will the stalactites cease to grow. This means that if the stalactite were to be broken it would never grow back, the generic term lavacicle has been applied to lava stalactites and stalagmites indiscriminately and evolved from the word icicle
21.
Sinkhole
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A sinkhole, also known as a cenote, sink, sink-hole, shakehole, swallet, swallow hole, or doline, is a depression or hole in the ground caused by some form of collapse of the surface layer. Most are caused by karst processes—for example, the dissolution of carbonate rocks or suffosion processes. Sinkholes vary in size from 1 to 600 m both in diameter and depth, and vary in form from soil-lined bowls to bedrock-edged chasms, sinkholes may form gradually or suddenly, and are found worldwide. Sinkholes may capture surface drainage from running or standing water, but may form in high. Sinkholes that capture drainage can hold it in limestone caves. These caves may drain into tributaries of larger rivers, the formation of sinkholes involves natural processes of erosion or gradual removal of slightly soluble bedrock by percolating water, the collapse of a cave roof, or a lowering of the water table. Sinkholes often form through the process of suffosion, for example, groundwater may dissolve the carbonate cement holding the sandstone particles together and then carry away the lax particles, gradually forming a void. Occasionally a sinkhole may exhibit a visible opening into a cave below, sinkholes also occur in sandstone and quartzite terrains. As the rock dissolves, spaces and caverns develop underground and these sinkholes can be dramatic, because the surface land usually stays intact until there is not enough support. Then, a collapse of the land surface can occur. Sinkholes also form from human activity, such as the collapse of abandoned mines and salt cavern storage in salt domes in places like Louisiana, Mississippi, more commonly, sinkholes occur in urban areas due to water main breaks or sewer collapses when old pipes give way. They can also occur from the overpumping and extraction of groundwater, sinkholes can also form when natural water-drainage patterns are changed and new water-diversion systems are developed. Sinkholes tend to occur in karst landscapes, karst landscapes can have up to thousands of sinkholes within a small area, giving the landscape a pock-marked appearance. These sinkholes drain all the water, so there are only subterranean rivers in these areas, examples of karst landscapes with a plethora of massive sinkholes include Khammouan Mountains and Mamo Plateau. The largest known sinkholes formed in sandstone are Sima Humboldt and Sima Martel in Venezuela, some sinkholes form in thick layers of homogenous limestone. On the contact of limestone and insoluble rock below it, powerful underground rivers may form, in such conditions, the largest known sinkholes of the world have formed, like the 662-metre deep Xiaozhai Tiankeng, giant sótanos in Querétaro and San Luis Potosí states in Mexico and others. The state of Florida in the United States is known for having frequent sinkhole collapses, the Murge area in southern Italy also has numerous sinkholes. Sinkholes can be formed in retention ponds from large amounts of rain, an analysis of a case of sinkhole formation under a retention pond due to a large amount of rain can be seen in a sinkhole collapse study
22.
Bnei Menashe
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The Bnei Menashe are made up of Mizo, Kuki and Chin peoples, who all speak Tibeto-Burman languages, and whose ancestors migrated into northeast India from Burma mostly in the 17th and 18th centuries. They are called Chin in Burma, in the late 20th century, Israeli Rabbi Eliyahu Avichail of the group Amishav named them Bnei Menashe, based on their account of descent from Menasseh. Most of the peoples in these two northeast states, who more than 3.7 million, do not identify with these claims. Some have supported other movements to separate from India, prior to conversion in the 19th century to Christianity by Welsh Baptist missionaries, the Chin, Kuki, and Mizo peoples were animists, among their practices was ritual headhunting. Since the late 20th century, some of these peoples have begun following Messianic Judaism, the Bnei Menashe are a small group who started studying and practicing Judaism since the 1970s in a desire to return to what they believe is the religion of their ancestors. The total population of Manipur and Mizoram is more than 3.7 million, the Bnei Menashe number below 9,000, several hundred have emigrated to Israel. In 2003–2004 DNA testing showed that several hundred men of this group had no evidence of Middle Eastern ancestry, in the early 21st century, Israel halted immigration by Bnei Menashe, it resumed after a change in government. The chief rabbi of Israel ruled in 2005 that the Bnei Menashe was recognized as part of a lost tribe, in the time of the first temple, Israel was divided into two kingdoms. The southern one, known as the Kingdom of Judah, was made up mostly of the tribes of Judah, Benjamin, most Jews today are descended from the southern kingdom. The northern Kingdom of Israel was made up of the ten tribes. The Assyrians invaded the kingdom, exiled the ten tribes living there. As of the 21st century, the Bnei Menashe have come to believe that the legendary Kuki-Mizo ancestor Manmasi was the Hebrew Menasseh and this group of Chin-Kuki-Mizo people began a Messianic movement during the 1950s. They had no connections with other Jewish groups in the diaspora or in Israel, on May 31,1972, some Messianic communities founded the Manipur Jewish Organization, the first Jewish organization in northeast India. After these people established contacts with other Jewish religious groups in Israel and other countries, Rabbi Eliyahu Avichail is the founder of Amishav, an organization dedicated to finding the Lost Tribes and facilitating aliyah. He investigated this groups claims to Jewish descent in the 1980s and he named the group as Bnei Menashe. In the late 20th century, many of the Bnei Menashe started studying normative Judaism, hundreds emigrated to Israel, some completing the required formal conversions there to be accepted as Jews. Critics thought the governments policy of settling the Bnei Menashe immigrants in the unstable Judea, Samaria, others criticised these people as economic migrants, and not true Jews. In 2005, the Chief Rabbinate of Israel accepted them as Jews due to the devotion displayed by their practice through the decades, but still required formal ritual conversion to be accepted as Jews
23.
Manipur
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Manipur is a state in northeastern India, with the city of Imphal as its capital. It is bounded by Nagaland to the north, Mizoram to the south, the state covers an area of 22,327 square kilometres and has a population of almost 3 million, including the Meitei, Kuki, Naga, and Pangal peoples, who speak Sino-Tibetan languages. Manipur has been at the crossroads of Asian economic and cultural exchange for more than 2,500 years and it has long connected the Indian subcontinent to Southeast Asia, enabling migration of people, cultures and religions. During the British Rule, the Kingdom of Manipur was one of the princely states, between 1917 and 1939, the people of Manipur pressed for their rights against the British Rule. By the late 1930s, the state of Manipur negotiated with the British administration its preference to be part of India. These negotiations were cut short with the outbreak of World War II, on 21 September 1949, Maharaja Budhachandra signed a Treaty of Accession merging the kingdom into India. This merger is disputed by groups in Manipur as having been completed without consensus, the dispute and differing visions for the future has resulted in a 50-year insurgency in the state for independence from India, as well as in violence between ethnic groups in the state. Over 2010–2013, the militant insurgency was responsible for the violent death of about 1 civilian per 100,000 people, the world average annual death rate from intentional violence has been 7.9 per 100,000 people. The Meitei ethnic group, represents 53% of the population of Manipur state, the main language of the state is Meitei. By comparison, indigenous tribal peoples constitute 20% of the population, they are distinguished by dialects. Manipurs ethnic groups practice a variety of religions, according to 2011 census, Hinduism is the major religion in the state closely followed by Christianity. Other religions include Islam, Sanamahism, Buddhism etc, Manipur has primarily an agrarian economy, with significant hydroelectric power generation potential. It is connected to areas by daily flights through Imphal airport. Manipur is home to sports, the origin of Manipuri dance. Manipur is mentioned in texts as Kangleipak or Meeteileipak which covered only the three valleys districts, Bishnupur, Thoubal and Imphal. Sanamahi Laikan wrote that officials during the reign of Meidingu Pamheiba in the eighteenth century adopted Manipurs new name, according to Sakok Lamlen, the area had different names in its history. During the Hayachak period, it was known as Mayai Koiren poirei namthak saronpung or Tilli Koktong Ahanba, during the Langbachak era, it became Tilli Koktong Leikoiren, and finally Muwapali in the Konnachak epoch. Neighbouring cultures each had differing names for Manipur and its people, the Shan or Pong called the area Cassay, the Burmese Kathe, and the Assamese Meklee
24.
Mizoram
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Mizoram is one of the states of Northeast India, with Aizawl as its capital city. The name is derived from Mi, Zo and Ram, in the northeast, it is the southern most landlocked state sharing borders with three of the Seven, now with the addition of Sikkim, Eight sister states, namely Tripura, Assam, Manipur. The state also shares a 722 kilometre border with the countries of Bangladesh. Like several other states of India, Mizoram was previously part of Assam until 1972. It became the 23rd state of India, a step above Union Territory, on 20 February 1987, Mizorams population was 1,091,014, according to a 2011 census. It is the 2nd least populous state in the country, Mizoram covers an area of approximately 21,087 square kilometres. About 91% of the state is forested and this is the highest concentration of tribal people among all states of India, and they are currently protected under Indian constitution as a Scheduled Tribe. Mizoram is one of three states of India with a Christian majority and its people belong to various denominations, mostly Presbyterian in its north and Baptists in south. Mizoram is a highly literate agrarian economy, but suffers from slash-and-burn jhum or shifting cultivation, in recent years, the jhum farming practices are steadily being replaced with a significant horticulture and bamboo products industry. The states gross domestic product for 2012 was estimated at ₹6,991 crore. About 20% of Mizorams population lives below poverty line, with 35% rural poverty, the state has about 871 kilometres of national highways, with NH-54 and NH-150 connecting it to Assam and Manipur respectively. It is also a transit point for trade with Myanmar. The term Mizoram is derived from three Mizo words-Mi, zo and ram, Mi in Mizo means People and Ram means land. There is dispute on the term zo, According to one view, zo means highland and Mizoram means land of the hill people. Lalthangliana says zo may also mean cold region and therefore, Mizo signifies people of the cold region, the origin of the Mizos, like those of many other tribes in the northeastern India, is shrouded in mystery. The people living in the Mizo Hills were generally referred to as the cucis or kukis by their ethnic groups which was also a term adopted by the British writers. The claim that The Kukis are the earliest known residents of the Mizo hills area, the majority of the tribes classified as Mizo today most likely migrated to their present territories from the neighbouring countries in several waves, starting around 1500 CE. Before the British Raj, the various Mizo clans lived in autonomous villages, the tribal chiefs enjoyed an eminent position in the gerontocratic Mizo society
25.
Ein Yabrud
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Ein Yabrud is a Palestinian town in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate in the central West Bank. It is located approximately 7 km northeast of the city of Ramallah, according to a census conducted in 1931 by the British Mandate authorities, Ein Yabrud had a population of 788 inhabitants, in 178 houses. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics the town had a population of 3,000 in 2007 and it is the home village of Hamas military commander Maher Udda. Jordan confiscated lands of Ein Yabrud and nearby Silwad for the construction of a camp before the Six Day War. The Jordanian buildings formed the basis of the Israeli settlement of Ofra founded in 1975. Plans for further expansion of Ofra in this land in 2011 resulted in legal challenges, land belonging to the residents of the village has been used to construct hundreds of structures in the neighbouring Israeli settlement of Ofra
26.
Silwad
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Silwad is a Palestinian town located 12 kilometers north-east of Ramallah, about 5 km away from the Nablus-Jerusalem highway. Silwads altitude is 860 meters above sea level, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the town had a population of 6,123 inhabitants in 2007. Historians have argued the etymology of Silwads name, others claim that Silwad comes from the words sal and wad, meaning a running valley. Silwad experiences cold and humid winters with several days of snow almost every year with an annual precipitation of about 750 millimeters. The summers are dry and mild and this climate is suitable for growing cherries, nectarines, kiwifruit, peaches, grapes and olives. Silwad was inhabited in the Mamluk and early Ottoman era, in the spring of 1697, Henry Maundrell noted two Arab villages, first Geeb and then Selwid, both on the west side of the road on the way south from Nablus to Jerusalem. Edward Robinson identified these two villages as Jibiya and Silwad, an Ottoman village list of about 1870 counted 205 houses and a population of 817 in Silwad, though the population count included men only. It was described as being in the Hebron district, just east of Sara, in 1882, the Palestine Exploration Funds Survey of Western Palestine described it as being situated on a hill, and having ancient tombs and a fine spring. In 1945 the population was 1,910, all Muslims, while the land area was 14,186 dunams, according to an official land. Of this,12,909 were plantations and irrigable land,2,496 for cereals, in the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Silwad came under Jordanian rule. Jordan confiscated lands of Silwad and nearby Ein Yabrud for the construction of a camp before the Six-Day War. After the Six-Day War in 1967, Silwad was under Israeli occupation, as per the Oslo Accords, the built-up area of Silwad is under Palestinian Authority rule. The economy of Silwad is based on farming as well as handicrafts, the Jordanian buildings formed the initial basis of the Israeli settlement of Ofra founded in 1975. Plans for further expansion of Ofra in this land in 2011 resulted in legal challenges, Silwad villagers have petitioned the High Court to be allowed to farm their traditional lands to which they had been denied access for a decade. They requested the right to access to some 3,100 dunams, land that has been blocked from cultivation in this way includes property of villagers from Taibe, Ein Yabrud and Deir Jarir. The incident occurred after they had obtained permission to enter it and he let one settler woman and her two children pass unharmed. He told one person of his deed, word leaked out and he was arrested in October 2004, put on trial. Thaer had seen one of his uncles, killed when he was a child, during the First Intifada, and another shot dead by Israeli forces during the Al-Aqsa Intifada
27.
Deir Jarir
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Deir Jarir is a Palestinian agricultural town in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate in the central West Bank, located eleven kilometers northeast of Ramallah. It is situated on a hilltop overlooking the Jordan Valley at an elevation of 900 metres, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Deir Jarir had a population of approximately 3,986 inhabitants in mid-year 2006. It spreads along a land area of 33,357 dunams, of which 17. 2% is under the civil jurisdiction of the Palestinian National Authority. Most of the land administered by the PNA is the citys area and most of Deir Jarirs cultivated lands are grown with grape vines and fig. Open-spaces make-up 76% of the towns area, the village name means The monastery, or house of Jerir, named after the celebrated Arab poet Jarir. In 1517, Deir Jarir was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire with the rest of Palestine and it had a population of 23 households, all Muslim. Taxes were paid on wheat, barley, olives, vineyards, fruit trees, occasional revenues, the French explorer Victor Guérin visited the village in the 1860s, and he found it having about 200 inhabitants. In the 1922 census of Palestine, conducted by the British Mandate authorities, in the 1931 census the population of Deir Jarir was a total of 847, still entirely Muslim, in 172 inhabited houses. In 1945 the population of Deir Jarir was 1,080, all Arabs,3,091 dunams were plantations and irrigable land,6,499 used for cereals, while 40 dunams were built-up land. In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, after the Six-Day War in 1967, Deir Jarir has been under Israeli occupation. In September 2005, hundreds of armed residents from Deir Jarir attacked the town of Taybeh. The feud was caused by a Christian man from Taybeh allegedly having intimate relations with a Muslim woman from Deir Jarir, the attack left 13 houses burnt, and three men were arrested. Despite the incident, the towns continue to have healthy relations, residents say the people of Taybeh
28.
Rammun
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Rammun is a Palestinian town in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate in the central West Bank, located twelve kilometers east of Ramallah and three kilometers south of Taybeh. Other nearby towns include Deir Dibwan to the southwest, Beitin to the east, sherds from Iron Age I, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Crusader/Ayyubid and Mamluk eras have been found. Mosaics and ancient cisterns have been found, van der Velde assumed that Rammun was the place mentioned in the Bible as Rimmon, Sela Rimmon. The Rock of Rimmon was where the Benjamites fled, and where they maintained themselves for four months after the battle at Gibeah. It also is suggested to be the town of Rimmon mentioned in the Map of Madaba, located fifteen miles north of Jerusalem, between Bethel and Jericho. There are Byzantine, Crusader, Ayyubid, Mamluk and Ottoman remains in the town including a mosaic in the towns mosque, the burial cave dates back to Byzantine times and contained pottery lamps, sandals and cross-shaped medallions. Sherds from the early Ottoman era have also found. In 1596, Rammun appeared in Ottoman tax registers as being in the Nahiya of Quds of the Liwa of Quds and it had a population of 39 Muslim households and paid taxes on wheat, barley, olives, and vines or fruit trees. The French explorer Victor Guérin first visited the village in the 1863 and he further noted that in the limestone mountain around it were drilled numerous caves, many of which were still used by shepherds and their flocks. Ancient cisterns dug into the rock were also found, the houses were partly built with antique materials, including some large blocks cut ashlars. An Ottoman village list of about 1870 showed that Rammun had 249 houses, the village was described as being north of Mikhmas, on a rocky hill. In the 1882, the Palestine Exploration Funds Survey of Western Palestine described Rammun as A village of moderate size, with cisterns and caves, on the north-east is a deep rockcut tank, and south of it a rock-cut tomb. The houses stand on a conical point of rock north of a rough valley. The site is peculiar, being at the end of a plateau of arable soil extending southwards from Taiyibeh, the view is extensive towards the south-east, but bounded by the Taiyibeh range on the north. There are numerous caves in the sides of the hill called Ashkaf Jiljal. In 1945, the population was 970, all Muslims, while the land area was 30,043 dunams, according to an official land. Of this,2,338 were allocated for plantations and irrigable land,7,181 for cereals, in the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Rammun came under Jordanian rule. After the Six-Day War in 1967, Rammun has been under Israeli occupation, by 2012, about 3000 villagers remain in Rammun, while there are about 7000 in the Palestinian diaspora, chiefly in the United States
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Deir Dibwan
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Deir Dibwan is a Palestinian town in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate in the central West Bank 7 kilometers east of Ramallah. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics the town had a population of approximately 5,252 inhabitants in mid-year 2006, there were 5,016 people from Deir Dibwan living abroad. Deir Dibwan was built close to the ruins of Et-Tell, the word Deir means monastery and the word dibwan came from the name of the divan, or Council. It has also been called Deir Dubwan, where Dubwan is a proper name, Et-Tell is a mound located just west of the village. Potsherds from the Middle Bronze Age, Iron Age II, Hellenistic/Roman, Byzantine, Crusader/Ayyubid, Deir Dibwan have been identified with the Crusader site named Dargebaam, or Dargiboan. Potsherds from the early Ottoman era have been found, in the late Ottoman period, in 1838, the American scholar Edward Robinson described Deir Dibwan as being tolerably wealthy, and reportedly the producer of great quantities of figs. The French explorer Victor Guérin visited the village in July 1863, the highest point of the plateau was occupied by the remains of an old construction, which people referred to as Ed-Deir. He also note several cisterns dug into the rock, which he assumed dated from antiquity, an Ottoman village list of about 1870 showed that Der Diwan had 161 houses and a population of 459, though the population count included only men. There are a few scattered olives round the place, in 1945 the population was 2,080, all Muslims, while the total land area was 73,332 dunams, according to an official land and population survey. Of this,5,052 were allocated for plantations and irrigable land,10,695 for cereals, in the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Deir Dibwan came under Jordanian rule. After the Six-Day War in 1967, Deir Dibwan has been under Military governor, from the Israeli government-commissioned Sasson Report it was concluded that more than 4 million NIS of public funds were illegally invested in the outpost. In addition the Israeli State admitted the outpost stands on private Palestinian land, the Deir Debwan Association is headquartered in New Jersey, United States. Membership is not limited to any specific clan or tribe and it has representatives from each clan or tribe, as well as refugee groups living in the town. The association serves to provide a link to the town, a source of identity to its members, to increase their members honor and this association provides a source of honor for those in the United States and for relatives in the town. Israelis December 24,2003, Nytimes Deir Dibwan Town Deir Dibwan Town Profile Deir Dibwan aerial photo
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Taybeh
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Taybeh is a Palestinian village in the West Bank,15 kilometers northeast of Jerusalem and 12 kilometers northeast of Ramallah in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate,850 meters above sea level. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Taybeh had a population of 1,452 in 2007 and it is the last all-Christian community in the West Bank. Taybeh has been identified as the site of Ophrah, mentioned in the Bible as a town of Benjamin, however the word Ophrah was close in sound to afrit meaning demon in Arabic. Under Saladin, the name was changed to Taybeh, The goodly, according to local tradition, Saladin met a delegation of Aphram inhabitants during his wars against Crusaders. Impressed by the hospitality of the locals, he named the village Taybeh, another version of the story is that he was charmed by their goodness and the beauty of their faces, ordering the village to be renamed Tayyibat al-Isem instead of what sounded like Afra. According to the Bible, Jesus, after Lazarus resurrection, retired with his disciples to this town, john says, Since that day on, they made the decision to kill him. Jesus did not walk in public among the Jews anymore and he went away to a region near the desert, to a city called Aphram, and it was there that he and his disciples dwelt. This happened during the first days of Nissan probably around the year 30, Jesus retired on a rocky hill which was situated 8 km from Taybeh towards the Jordan, in order to fortify his spirit, pray, fast, and expose himself to temptation. That is why this rocky hill is known as, from the Latin root Quarenta, according to the Evangelist, Taybeh-Aphram is the isolated place where Jesus found the diaphanous quietness to prepare himself and his disciples for the great sacrifice. In the 5th century, a church, known today as St. Georges Church, was built in the east of the town, in the 12th century, another church was built by the Crusaders, in attachment to the first one. The Crusaders fortified Taybeh by means of a castle named in English the Castle of St Elias, in February 1182, Joscelin III gave the castle to king Baldwin IV of Jerusalem along with some other properties in return for the lordship of Miilya. In 1185, the king Baldwin V of Jerusalem granted the castle to his grandfather William V, however, in 1187 Taybeh fell to Saladin in the wake of the Battle of Hattin. Imad ad-Din al-Isfahani described it as a Crusader fortress taken by Saladin, while Yaqut al-Hamawi described it, under the name of Afra, as a fortress in the Filastin Province, near Jerusalem. In 1596, a village named Tayyibat al-Isem appeared in Ottoman tax registers as being in the Nahiya of Quds of the Liwa of Quds and it had a population of 63 Muslim households and 23 Christian families. The village paid taxes on wheat, barley, vines or fruit trees, around 1810-1820 a large battle were fought in the village between rival factions of the Kais and the Yamani. Eventually the Yamani-faction, led by the sheik of Abu Ghosh, when Edward Robinson visited in 1838, he found it to contain 75 taxable inhabitants, indicating a population of about 3-400 people. French explorer Victor Guérin visited the village in 1863, and described Thayebeh as having an estimated 800 villagers,60 Catholics, and he further noted the remains a large building on the top of a hill. An Ottoman village list of about 1870 showed Taybeh to be a Christian town with 87 houses, in 1882, the Palestine Exploration Funds Survey of Western Palestine described Taiyibeh as a large Christian village in a conspicuous position, with well-built stone houses
31.
Amona, Mateh Binyamin
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Amona was an Israeli outpost in the central West Bank. Located on a hill overlooking Ofra within the boundaries of the Mateh Binyamin Regional Council. As of 2012, its population was around 200, as of October 2013, the outpost lodged 42 families. In May 2014 an Israeli police investigation revealed the entire outpost lay on private Palestinian land, in December 2014, the Israeli High Court ordered the state to completely evacuate and demolish the settlement within two years. The international community considers all Israeli settlements in the West Bank illegal under international law and its name is derived from the Book of Joshua 18,24, which mentions Kfar HaAmmoni or Kfar HaAmmonah. Amona was founded in 1995 on private Palestinian land by settlers from Ofra who thought it was getting too urbanized for their taste. It was one of the first outposts, Amona was constructed on property the Palestinians of Silwad used to cultivate and grow crops on, land that was stolen from them by Ofra teenagers. Yesh Din states that Amona is built on the land of three Palestinian villages, Silwad, Ein Yabrud and Taybeh. Back at the start of the 1980s, nine dunams he owns, planted with fig trees and grapevines, stopped laughing by force of various military orders preventing access to them. Thirty-two dunams stopped laughing after the outpost of Amona was established at the end of the 1990s on private lands belonging to inhabitants of the villages of Silwad, Dir Jarir and Taibeh. Amona has become highly symbolic, revealing the role in the settlement enterprise of the settlement movement, the Israeli State, in 1997, the first demolition order was issued, followed by another one in 2003. In 2006, settlers were evacuated, but only nine permanent buildings were razed, in 2008, the state said that construction on the site was illegal and announced that the entire outpost would be razed. In 2011, the announcement was repeated, but as of January 2015 the outpost was still there, in 2004, the Amana settlement organization completed the construction of nine permanent homes at Amona, all built illegally on privately owned land and appropriately registered to Palestinians. In October 2004, the Israeli Civil Administration ordered the demolition of the structures, in November 2005, Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz ordered the demolition by the end of January 2006. On 1 February 2006, settlers and protesters were evacuated, attended with unprecedented clashes,10,000 Israel Police, Israel Border Police, and Israel Defense Forces troops appeared in Amona to carry out the demolition and to secure the troops involved in the operation. They faced an estimated 4,000 Israeli protesters, one thousand actively protesting inside and around the houses, over 300 people were injured, including about 80 security personnel. Among the injured were three Knesset members, after several hours, the houses were demolished. Young girls that were evacuated accused police officers of sexual assault, Internal Security Minister Gideon Ezra was criticised for preventing police commanders from testifying at the hearings
32.
Cherries
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A cherry is the fruit of many plants of the genus Prunus, and is a fleshy drupe. The cherry fruits of commerce usually are obtained from a number of species such as cultivars of the sweet cherry. The name cherry also refers to the tree, and is sometimes applied to almonds and visually similar flowering trees in the genus Prunus, as in ornamental cherry, cherry blossom. Wild cherry may refer to any of the species growing outside of cultivation. The subgenus is native to the regions of the Northern Hemisphere. Other cherry fruits are members of subgenus Padus, most eating cherries are derived from either Prunus avium, the sweet cherry, or from Prunus cerasus, the sour cherry. The indigenous range of the sweet cherry extends through most of Europe, western Asia, and parts of northern Africa, and the fruit has been consumed throughout its range since prehistoric times. A cultivated cherry is recorded as having brought to Rome by Lucius Licinius Lucullus from northeastern Anatolia, also known as the Pontus region. Cherries were introduced into England at Teynham, near Sittingbourne in Kent, by order of Henry VIII, cherries arrived in North America early in the settlement of Brooklyn, New York when the region was under Dutch sovereignty. Trades people leased or purchased land to plant orchards and produce gardens, behind the house sold by Anthony Jansen from Salee to Barent Dirksen. Both species originate in Europe and western Asia, they do not cross-pollinate, some other species, although having edible fruit, are not grown extensively for consumption, except in northern regions where the two main species will not grow. Irrigation, spraying, labor, and their propensity to damage from rain, nonetheless, demand is high for the fruit. In commercial production, cherries are harvested by using a mechanized shaker, hand picking is also widely used to harvest the fruit to avoid damage to both fruit and trees. Common rootstocks include Mazzard, Mahaleb, Colt, and Gisela Series, sour cherries require no pollenizer, while few sweet varieties are self-fertile. Like most temperate-latitude trees, cherry seeds require exposure to cold to germinate, the pits are planted in the autumn and seedlings emerge in the spring. A cherry tree will take three to four years in the field to produce its first crop of fruit, and seven years to attain full maturity, because of the cold-weather requirement, none of the Prunus genus can grow in tropical climates. Cherries have a growing season and can grow in most temperate latitudes. Cherries blossom in April and the season for the cherry harvest is in the summer
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Nectarines
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The peach is a deciduous tree native to the region of Northwest China between the Tarim Basin and the north slopes of the Kunlun Shan mountains, where it was first domesticated and cultivated. It bears an edible fruit called a peach or a nectarine. The specific epithet refers to its widespread cultivation in Persia. It belongs to the genus Prunus which includes the cherry, apricot, almond and plum, the peach is classified with the almond in the subgenus Amygdalus, distinguished from the other subgenera by the corrugated seed shell. Peach and nectarines are the species, even though they are regarded commercially as different fruits. The Peoples Republic of China is the worlds largest producer of peaches, Prunus persica grows to 4–10 m tall and 6 in. in diameter. The leaves are lanceolate, 7–16 cm long, 2–3 cm broad, the flowers are produced in early spring before the leaves, they are solitary or paired,2. 5–3 cm diameter, pink, with five petals. The fruit has yellow or whitish flesh, an aroma. The flesh is very delicate and easily bruised in some cultivars, the single, large seed is red-brown, oval shaped, approximately 1. 3–2 cm long, and is surrounded by a wood-like husk. Peaches, along with cherries, plums and apricots, are stone fruits, there are various heirloom varieties, including the Indian peach, which arrives in the latter part of the summer. Cultivated peaches are divided into clingstones and freestones, depending on whether the flesh sticks to the stone or not, Peaches with white flesh typically are very sweet with little acidity, while yellow-fleshed peaches typically have an acidic tang coupled with sweetness, though this also varies greatly. Both colors often have red on their skin. The scientific name persica, along with the word peach itself, the Ancient Romans referred to the peach as malum persicum Persian apple, later becoming French pêche, hence the English peach. The scientific name, Prunus persica, literally means Persian plum, fossil endocarps with characteristics indistinguishable from those of modern peaches have been recovered from late Pliocene deposits in Kunming, dating to 2.6 million years ago. In the absence of evidence that the plants were in other ways identical to the modern peach, until recently, it was believed that the cultivation started circa 2000 BC. Nevertheless, the recent evidence indicates that domestication occurred as early as 6000 BC in Zhejiang Province of China, the oldest archaeological peach stones are from the Kuahuqiao site. Archaeologists point at the Yangzi River valley as the place where the selection for favorable peach varieties likely took place. Peaches were mentioned in Chinese writings as far back as the 10th century BC and were a fruit of kings
34.
Kiwifruit
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Kiwifruit or Chinese gooseberry is the name given to the edible berries of several species of woody vines in the genus Actinidia. The most common group of kiwifruit is oval, about the size of a large hens egg. It has a fibrous, dull greenish-brown skin and bright green or golden flesh with rows of tiny, black, the fruit has a soft texture and a sweet but unique flavor. It is a crop in several countries, such as Italy, New Zealand, Chile, Greece. Early varieties were described in a 1904 nurserymans catalogue as having. edible fruits the size of walnuts, as per Indian language Hindi Kiwifruit is termed as Lalit. In 1962, New Zealand growers began calling it kiwifruit when exporting, the word kiwifruit and shortened kiwi has been used since around 1966 when the fruit was first imported from New Zealand to the United States. Kiwifruit has since become a name for all commercially grown fruit from the genus Actinidia. In New Zealand, the word kiwi is seldom used to refer to the fruit. Kiwifruit is native to north-central and eastern China, cultivation of the fuzzy kiwifruit spread from China in the early 20th century to New Zealand, where the first commercial plantings occurred. Although kiwifruit is a fruit of China, until recently, China was not a major producing country of kiwifruit. The fruit became popular with American servicemen stationed in New Zealand during World War II and later exported to California using the names Chinese gooseberry and melonette. In 1962, New Zealand growers began calling it kiwifruit to give it more market appeal, in Italy, kiwifruit cultivation began in 1970, growing to rank second in production behind China in 2014. The genus Actinidia contains around 60 species, though most kiwifruit are easily recognized as kiwifruit their fruit is quite variable. The skin of the fruit varies in size, shape, hairiness, the flesh varies in color, juiciness, texture, and taste. Some fruits are unpalatable while others taste considerably better than the majority of the commercial varieties, the most common kiwifruit is the fuzzy kiwifruit, from the species A. deliciosa. Other species that are eaten include golden kiwifruit, Chinese egg gooseberry, baby kiwifruit, Arctic kiwifruit, red kiwifruit, silver vine. Almost all kiwifruit sold belong to a few cultivars of fuzzy kiwi, Hayward, Blake and they have a fuzzy, dull-brown skin, and bright-green flesh. The familiar cultivar Hayward was developed by Hayward Wright in Avondale and it was initially grown in domestic gardens, but commercial planting began in the 1940s
35.
Grapes
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A grape is a fruit, botanically a berry, of the deciduous woody vines of the flowering plant genus Vitis. Grapes can be fresh as table grapes or they can be used for making wine, jam, juice, jelly, grape seed extract, raisins, vinegar. Grapes are a type of fruit, generally occurring in clusters. The cultivation of the grape began 6, 000–8,000 years ago in the Near East. Yeast, one of the earliest domesticated microorganisms, occurs naturally on the skins of grapes, the earliest archeological evidence for a dominant position of wine-making in human culture dates from 8,000 years ago in Georgia. The oldest known winery was found in Armenia, dating to around 4000 BC, by the 9th century AD the city of Shiraz was known to produce some of the finest wines in the Middle East. Thus it has proposed that Syrah red wine is named after Shiraz. Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics record the cultivation of grapes, and history attests to the ancient Greeks, Phoenicians. The growing of grapes would later spread to regions in Europe, as well as North Africa. Vitis vinifera cultivars were imported for that purpose, Grapes are a type of fruit that grow in clusters of 15 to 300, and can be crimson, black, dark blue, yellow, green, orange, and pink. White grapes are actually green in color, and are derived from the purple grape. Mutations in two genes of white grapes turn off production of anthocyanins, which are responsible for the color of purple grapes. Anthocyanins and other pigment chemicals of the family of polyphenols in purple grapes are responsible for the varying shades of purple in red wines. Grapes are typically an ellipsoid shape resembling a prolate spheroid, most grapes come from cultivars of Vitis vinifera, the European grapevine native to the Mediterranean and Central Asia. Vitis riparia, a vine of North America, is sometimes used for winemaking. It is native to the entire Eastern U. S. Vitis rotundifolia, the muscadines, used for jams and wine, are native to the Southeastern United States from Delaware to the Gulf of Mexico. Vitis amurensis is the most important Asian species, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization,75,866 square kilometers of the world are dedicated to grapes. Approximately 71% of world production is used for wine, 27% as fresh fruit
36.
Olives
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Olea europeana sylvestris is a subspecies that corresponds to a smaller tree bearing noticeably smaller fruits. The olives fruit, also called the olive, is of agricultural importance in the Mediterranean region as the source of olive oil. The tree and its fruit give their name to the plant family, which includes species such as lilacs, jasmine, Forsythia. The word derives from Latin ŏlīva a borrowing from the Greek ἐλαία, the oldest attested forms of the Greek words are the Mycenaean
37.
Manufacturing
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Manufacturing is the value added to production of merchandise for use or sale using labour and machines, tools, chemical and biological processing, or formulation. Manufacturing engineering or manufacturing process are the steps through which raw materials are transformed into a final product, the manufacturing process begins with the product design, and materials specification from which the product is made. These materials are modified through manufacturing processes to become the required part. Manufacturing takes turns under all types of economic systems, in a free market economy, manufacturing is usually directed toward the mass production of products for sale to consumers at a profit. In a collectivist economy, manufacturing is more directed by the state to supply a centrally planned economy. In mixed market economies, manufacturing occurs under some degree of government regulation, modern manufacturing includes all intermediate processes required the production and integration of a products components. Some industries, such as semiconductor and steel manufacturers use the term fabrication instead, the manufacturing sector is closely connected with engineering and industrial design. Examples of major manufacturers in North America include General Motors Corporation, General Electric, Procter & Gamble, General Dynamics, Boeing, Pfizer, examples in Europe include Volkswagen Group, Siemens, and Michelin. Examples in Asia include Sony, Huawei, Lenovo, Toyota, Samsung, in its earliest form, manufacturing was usually carried out by a single skilled artisan with assistants. In much of the world, the guild system protected the privileges. Before the Industrial Revolution, most manufacturing occurred in rural areas, entrepreneurs organized a number of manufacturing households into a single enterprise through the putting-out system. Toll manufacturing is an arrangement whereby a first firm with specialized equipment processes raw materials or semi-finished goods for a second firm, manufacturing provides important material support for national infrastructure and for national defense. On the other hand, most manufacturing may involve significant social and environmental costs, the clean-up costs of hazardous waste, for example, may outweigh the benefits of a product that creates it. Hazardous materials may expose workers to health risks and these costs are now well known and there is effort to address them by improving efficiency, reducing waste, using industrial symbiosis, and eliminating harmful chemicals. The negative costs of manufacturing can also be addressed legally, developed countries regulate manufacturing activity with labor laws and environmental laws. Across the globe, manufacturers can be subject to regulations and pollution taxes to offset the costs of manufacturing activities. Labor unions and craft guilds have played a role in the negotiation of worker rights. Environment laws and labor protections that are available in developed nations may not be available in the third world, tort law and product liability impose additional costs on manufacturing
38.
Supreme Court of Israel
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The Supreme Court is the highest court in Israel. It has ultimate jurisdiction over all other courts and, in some cases. The Supreme Court consists of 15 justices who are appointed by the Judicial Selection Committee, once appointed, justices serve until retirement at the age of 70, unless they resign, or are removed from office. The current President of the Supreme Court is Miriam Naor, the Supreme Court is situated in Jerusalems Givat Ram governmental campus. Its jurisdiction applies to all of Israel and the Israeli-occupied territories, according to the principle of binding precedent, a ruling of the Supreme Court is binding upon every other court, except itself. Appointing Supreme Court Justices requires a majority of 7 of the 9 committee members, the three organs of state—the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government—as well as the bar association are represented in the Judges Nominations Committee. Thus, the shaping of the body, through the manner of judicial appointment, is carried out by all the authorities together. An eminent jurist can also be appointed to the Supreme Court, the number of Supreme Court justices is determined by a resolution of the Knesset. Currently, there are 15 Supreme Court Justices, at the head of the Supreme Court and at the head of the judicial system as a whole stands the President of the Supreme Court, and at his or her side, the Deputy President. A judges term ends when he or she reaches 70 years of age, resigns, dies, is appointed to another position that disqualifies him or her, as of December 2016 the Supreme Court Justices are, Liat Benmelech and Guy Shani serve as the Court Registrars. Below is a list of presidents of the Supreme Court, As an appellate court and it also considers appeals on judicial and quasi-judicial decisions of various kinds, such as matters relating to the legality of Knesset elections and disciplinary rulings of the Bar Association. The High Court of Justice grants relief through orders such as injunction, mandamus and Habeas Corpus, the Supreme Court can also sit at a “further hearing” on its own judgment. The Supreme Court, both as a court and the High Court of Justice, is normally constituted of a panel of three Justices. The Supreme Court sits as a panel of five justices or more in a ‘further hearing’ on a matter in which the Supreme Court sat with a panel of three justices. The Supreme Court may sit as a panel of an uneven number of justices than three in matters that involve fundamental legal questions and constitutional issues of particular importance. The length of service, for purpose, is calculated from the date of the appointment of the Judge to the Supreme Court. A special power, unique to the Supreme Court, is the power to order a retrial on a matter in which the defendant has been convicted by a final judgment. In practice, a ruling to hold a retrial is very rarely made, the Court announces its judgments through individually signed opinions setting out the result and underlying reasoning
39.
Yesh Din
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Yesh Din, Volunteers for Human Rights is an Israeli organization working in Israel and in the West Bank. The organization was founded in 2005 by a group of women who worked with the organization Machsom Watch. The purpose of Yesh Din, as reflected in its publications, is to work for structural, the organizations name in Hebrew – there is law – reflects the belief that equitable application of local and international law is an important component in upholding human rights. The organization conducts three main projects, the first project applies to law enforcement regarding Israeli citizens suspected of harming Palestinians. Michael Sfard, and lawyers from his office follow the investigations, examine the files in cases which didnt lead to indictment. According to its records, up until September 2015, the organization followed more than 1,000 investigation files, according to Yesh Din, 85% of investigation files in these cases are closed due to police failure and only 7.5 lead to indictments. A second project deals with the accountability of Israeli security forces personnel suspected of committing offences against Palestinians in the West Bank, the organization works legally and publicly to improve the conduct of law authorities in the West Bank. The organization petitioned to HCJ demanding to reveal protocols from the military courts, following the petition, state attorney announced that the organization will be given a general review permit for the military courts files. The organization claims that IDF did not formulate clear instructions and procedures on how soldiers should act in such incidents, another main field with which the organization deals is the battle against the illegal construction conducted on privately owned Palestinian land and the expansion of settlements on public land. The organization wishes to enforce systemic changes in Israeli authorities who oversee planning, the organization filed several petitions to HCJ which led, among other things, to the evacuation of Ulpana hill in Beit El and to the decision to evacuate the Amona outpost. The organizations Executive Director is Atty, yehudit Karp, industrialist Yair Rotlevy, historian Zeev Sternhell, journalist Akiva Eldar, and sculptor and Israel Prize laureate Dani Karavan. Yesh Din is a non-profit organization, in order to maintain its independence, the organization does not accept direct or indirect donations from Israeli or Palestinian government bodies. On 2007, the organization received donations in the sum of 1,895,078 NIS, in 2008 it was 3,125,875 NIS and in 2009 it was 4,361,947 NIS. Following the criticism and public protest against the organization, IDF and Israel Police decided to cancel their participation in the conference held by the organization on May 2015
40.
Israeli-occupied territories
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The Israeli-occupied territories are the territories occupied by Israel during the Six-Day War of 1967. Originally, those included the Syrian Golan Heights, the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula and Egyptian-occupied Gaza Strip. Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict, termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for the right of every state in the area to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries. From 1967 to 1982, the four areas were governed under the Israeli Military Governorate, the IMG was dissolved in 1982, after the Egypt–Israel Peace Treaty. Between 1998 and 2012, the term Palestinian territories, Occupied was used to refer to territories controlled by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, the International Court of Justice, the UN General Assembly and the United Nations Security Council regards Israel as the Occupying Power. UN Special Rapporteur Richard Falk called Israels occupation an affront to international law, the Israeli High Court of Justice has ruled that Israel holds the West Bank under belligerent occupation. Israeli governments have preferred the term disputed territories in the case of the West Bank, officially Israel maintains that the West Bank is disputed territory. Israel asserts that since the disengagement of Israel from Gaza in 2005, the significance of the designation of these territories as occupied territory is that certain legal obligations fall on the occupying power under international law. Under international law there are laws of war governing military occupation, including the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907. In 2015, over 800,000 Israelis resided over the 1949 Armistice Lines, Israel captured the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt in the 1967 Six-Day War. It established settlements along the Gulf of Aqaba and in the northeast portion and it had plans to expand the settlement of Yamit into a city with a population of 200,000, though the actual population of Yamit did not exceed 3,000. The Sinai Peninsula was returned to Egypt in stages beginning in 1979 as part of the Israel–Egypt Peace Treaty, as required by the treaty, Israel evacuated Israeli military installations and civilian settlements prior to the establishment of normal and friendly relations between it and Egypt. Israel dismantled eighteen settlements, two air bases, a naval base, and other installations by 1982, including the only oil resources under Israeli control. The evacuation of the population, which took place in 1982, was done forcefully in some instances. The settlements were demolished, as it was feared that settlers might try to return to their homes after the evacuation, since 1982, the Sinai Peninsula has not been regarded as occupied territory. Israels stated purpose for the Security Belt was to create a space separating its northern border towns from terrorists residing in Lebanon, during the stay in the security belt, the IDF held many positions and supported the SLA. The SLA took over daily life in the security zone, initially as the force of the Free Lebanon State. Notably, the South Lebanon Army controlled the prison in Khiam, in addition, United Nations forces and the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon were deployed to the security belt
41.
Fourth Geneva Convention
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It was adopted in August 1949, and defines humanitarian protections for civilians in a war zone. There are currently 196 countries party to the 1949 Geneva Conventions, including this, a number of articles specify how Protecting Powers, ICRC and other humanitarian organizations may aid Protected persons. Protected person is the most important definition in this section because many of the articles in the rest of GCIV only apply to Protected persons, a protected person/s shall not have anything done to them of such a character as to cause physical suffering or extermination. The physical suffering or extermination of protected persons in their hands and this prohibition applies not only to murder, torture, corporal punishments, mutilation and medical or scientific experiments not necessitated by the medical treatment. The prohibition on scientific experiments was added, in part, in response to experiments by German and Japanese doctors during World War II, no protected person may be punished for an offense he or she has not personally committed. Collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited. Pillage is prohibited. Reprisals against protected persons, under the 1949 Geneva Conventions, collective punishment is a war crime. By collective punishment, the drafters of the Geneva Conventions had in mind the reprisal killings of World War I, in the First World War, the Germans executed Belgian villagers in mass retribution for resistance activity during the Rape of Belgium. In World War II, both the Germans and the Japanese carried out a form of punishment to suppress resistance. Entire villages or towns or districts were responsible for any resistance activity that occurred at those places. The conventions, to counter this, reiterated the principle of individual responsibility and they are opposed to all principles based on humanity and justice. Additional Protocol II of 1977 explicitly forbids collective punishment, but as fewer states have ratified this protocol than GCIV, GCIV Article 33 is the one more commonly quoted. Articles 47-78 impose substantial obligations on occupying powers, nevertheless, the Occupying Power may undertake total or partial evacuation of a given area if the security of the population or imperative military reasons so demand. Such evacuations may not involve the displacement of protected persons outside the bounds of the territory except when for material reasons it is impossible to avoid such displacement. Persons thus evacuated shall be transferred back to their homes as soon as hostilities in the area in question have ceased, the Protecting Power shall be informed of any transfers and evacuations as soon as they have taken place. The Occupying Power shall not detain protected persons in a particularly exposed to the dangers of war unless the security of the population or imperative military reasons so demand. The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies, the Occupying Power shall, with the cooperation of the national and local authorities, facilitate the proper working of all institutions devoted to the care and education of children. The Occupying Power shall take all steps to facilitate the identification of children. It may not, in any case, change their personal status, a special section of the Bureau set up in accordance with Article 136 shall be responsible for taking all necessary steps to identify children whose identity is in doubt
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International Court of Justice
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The International Court of Justice is the primary judicial branch of the United Nations. Established in 1945 by the UN Charter, the Court began work in 1946 as the successor to the Permanent Court of International Justice, the Statute of the International Court of Justice, similar to that of its predecessor, is the main constitutional document constituting and regulating the Court. The Courts workload covers a range of judicial activity. Chapter XIV of the United Nations Charter authorizes the UN Security Council to enforce Court rulings, however, such enforcement is subject to the veto power of the five permanent members of the Council, which the United States used in the Nicaragua case. The election process is set out in Articles 4–19 of the ICJ statute, elections are staggered, with five judges elected every three years to ensure continuity within the court. Should a judge die in office, the practice has generally been to elect a judge in an election to complete the term. No two judges may be nationals of the same country, according to Article 9, the membership of the Court is supposed to represent the main forms of civilization and of the principal legal systems of the world. Essentially, that has meant common law, civil law and socialist law, the exception was China, which did not have a judge on the Court from 1967 to 1985 because it did not put forward a candidate. Judicial independence is dealt with specifically in Articles 16–18, judges of the ICJ are not able to hold any other post or act as counsel. A judge can be dismissed only by a vote of the other members of the Court. Despite these provisions, the independence of ICJ judges has been questioned, judges may deliver joint judgments or give their own separate opinions. Judges may also deliver separate dissenting opinions, Article 31 of the statute sets out a procedure whereby ad hoc judges sit on contentious cases before the Court. The system allows any party to a case if it otherwise does not have one of that partys nationals sitting on the Court to select one additional person to sit as a judge on that case only. It is thus possible that as many as seventeen judges may sit on one case, the system may seem strange when compared with domestic court processes, but its purpose is to encourage states to submit cases. Although this system does not sit well with the nature of the body. Ad hoc judges usually vote in favor of the state that appointed them, generally, the Court sits as full bench, but in the last fifteen years, it has on occasion sat as a chamber. Articles 26–29 of the statute allow the Court to form smaller chambers, usually 3 or 5 judges, Two types of chambers are contemplated by Article 26, firstly, chambers for special categories of cases, and second, the formation of ad hoc chambers to hear particular disputes. In 1993, a chamber was established, under Article 26 of the ICJ statute
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International Committee of the Red Cross
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The International Committee of the Red Cross is a humanitarian institution based in Geneva, Switzerland and a three-time Nobel Prize Laureate. State parties to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols of 1977 and 2005 have given the ICRC a mandate to protect victims of international and internal armed conflicts, such victims include war wounded, prisoners, refugees, civilians, and other non-combatants. The ICRC is part of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement along with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies and 190 National Societies. It is the oldest and most honoured organization within the Movement and one of the most widely recognized organizations in the world, having won three Nobel Peace Prizes in 1917,1944, and 1963. When he arrived in the town of Solferino on the evening of 24 June, he witnessed the Battle of Solferino. In a single day, about 40,000 soldiers on both sides died or were wounded on the field. Henry Dunant was shocked by the aftermath of the battle, the suffering of the wounded soldiers. He completely abandoned the original intent of his trip and for days he devoted himself to helping with the treatment. He succeeded in organizing an overwhelming level of assistance by motivating the local population to aid without discrimination. Back in his home in Geneva, he decided to write a book entitled A Memory of Solferino which he published with his own money in 1862 and he sent copies of the book to leading political and military figures throughout Europe. In addition, he called for the development of international treaties to guarantee the neutrality and protection of wounded on the battlefield as well as medics. On 9 February 1863 in Geneva, Henry Dunant founded the Committee of the Five as a commission of the Geneva Society for Public Welfare. Their aim was to examine the feasibility of Dunants ideas and to organize a conference about their possible implementation. Eight days later, the five men decided to rename the committee to the International Committee for Relief to the Wounded, in October 1863, the international conference organized by the committee was held in Geneva to develop possible measures to improve medical services on the battle field. The states and kingdoms represented by delegates were Baden, Bavaria, France, Britain, Hanover, Hesse, Italy, the Netherlands, Austria, Prussia, Russia, Saxony, Sweden. Only one year later, the Swiss government invited the governments of all European countries, as well as the United States, Brazil, sixteen countries sent a total of twenty-six delegates to Geneva. On 22 August 1864, the conference adopted the first Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded in Armies in the Field. Representatives of 12 states and kingdoms signed the convention, Baden, Belgium, Denmark, France, Hesse, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Prussia, Switzerland, Spain, and Württemberg
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B'tselem
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Its executive director is Hagai El-Ad. BTselem also maintains a presence in Washington, D. C. known as BTselem USA, BTselem has come under intense fire for what its critics describe as misrepresenting and distorting facts. BTselem was founded in 1989, during the First Intifada, by Israeli academics, BTselems funding comes from private individuals, governments, and European and North American foundations focusing on human rights. In December 1989, BTselem shared the Carter-Menil Human Rights Prize with the Palestinian group, BTselem has been harshly criticized by Israeli nationalists. In 2011, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman charged the group with abetting terrorism, BTselem was founded on February 3,1989. Key founders were Daphna Golan-Agnon, David Zucker, Haim Oron, Zehava Gal-On, Avigdor Feldman, and Edy Kaufman, BTselem regularly provides Knesset members with information on alleged human rights violations in the West Bank, and alleged injustices caused by Israeli authorities. Several Knesset members, from various factions, assist BTselem in placing human rights matters on the public agenda, BTselem has hundreds of supporters and volunteers who work to improve the human rights situation in the West Bank. These activities include, in part, setting up information stands, distributing printed material, addressing problems and requests to decision-makers, over one hundred reports have been published so far. The organization serves as a source of information for journalists, researchers, BTselems activities receive extensive media coverage. BTselem also campaigns against the penalty and the human rights record of the Palestinian Authority. On February 17,2005, the organization called on Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to commute the sentences of Palestinians condemned to death, Abbas had shortly before ratified the death sentences of a number of Palestinians accused of collaborating with Israel or of other criminal charges. In 2016, BTselem announced that it was cutting ties with the IDF over the alleged whitewashing of complaints raised by the NGO.2009 Foul Play. Neglect of Wastewater Treatment in the West Bank found that water from two million people in the West Bank and Jerusalem area was being allowed to drain untreated into the Jordan Valley. Whilst emphasising the illegality of the settlements the report calls for improvements in their sewage treatment and it points out that this illegality makes cooperation between the Israeli and Palestinian authorities impossible. Freedom of Movement to and from the Gaza Strip on the Eve of the Disengagement Plan investigates the four and it points out that Israel has the right to defend its civilians and that attacks on Israeli civilians were defined under international law as war crimes. Israels Bombing of the Gaza Power Plant and its Effects reported on the June 28,2006 Israeli missile attack which destroyed the Gaza Strips only electricity power plant. It recognises that the high level decision to launch the attack was linked to the capture of Corporal Gilad Shalit but concludes that the attack and it list questions that need to be answered as, Were civilian objects the target of attacks. Did the military respect the principle of proportionality, did the military use prohibited weapons including white-phosphorus shells and indiscriminate weapons
