3 ms·

> It's true that there've always been some Jews living continuously in Palestine, but for centuries they were essentially a bottleneck community, and over time

> It's true that there've always been some Jews living continuously in Palestine, but for centuries they were essentially a bottleneck community, and over time (especially after the Alhambra Decree in 1492, but starting well before then) their numbers began to be supplanted by migrants largely from Spain and from other parts of the Ottoman Empire, as well as from other countries in Europe. Sounds like it was community of Theseus then? My own family have left Spain after Alhambra Decree, and some members have chosen to move to Palestine then. AFAIK, they become part of the local Jewish community, they didn't supplant anyone. Anyway, I fail to see how the fact that Jews have migrated between different communities, including to and from Palestine, invalidates my point.

aguaviva 2y ago
In terms of massacres and "freeing the land" for anyone -- it of course has no relevance. Nothing ever explains or contextualizes a massacre, in my view. The point was simply a demographic observation -- that the Old Yishuv were composed largely of descendants of waves of post 13th-century migrants from Jewish communities in other regions (such as your own family from what you say). Meaning in turn their lineage is from communities that had been dispersed from the region for easily 1000+ years. So "native" is not quite the right term for them. Meanwhile the truly "native" contingent among them (meaning descendant from continually resident communities) was comparatively small. "Supplanted" was poor word choice -- it wasn't meant in the sense of 'replacing' or pushing out. I meant simply, numerically superseded by. Should have said simply that. It's very cool that you can trace your history back that far, BTW. I'll try to get to your longer post still, if I can.

3 ms·

> It's true that there've always been some Jews living continuously in Palestine, but for centuries they were essentially a bottleneck community, and over time

by golergka 2y ago

aguaviva 2y ago
In terms of massacres and "freeing the land" for anyone -- it of course has no relevance. Nothing ever explains or contextualizes a massacre, in my view. The point was simply a demographic observation -- that the Old Yishuv were composed largely of descendants of waves of post 13th-century migrants from Jewish communities in other regions (such as your own family from what you say). Meaning in turn their lineage is from communities that had been dispersed from the region for easily 1000+ years. So "native" is not quite the right term for them. Meanwhile the truly "native" contingent among them (meaning descendant from continually resident communities) was comparatively small. "Supplanted" was poor word choice -- it wasn't meant in the sense of 'replacing' or pushing out. I meant simply, numerically superseded by. Should have said simply that. It's very cool that you can trace your history back that far, BTW. I'll try to get to your longer post still, if I can.