Israel is a Middle Eastern country located in the Levant region, with a population of around 8.6 million people. The main ethnic group is Jewish, making up around 75% of the population. Other ethnic groups include Arabs, Druze and Circassians. The majority of Israelis are Jewish, with other religions such as Islam, Christianity and Druze making up much of the remaining population. Additionally, there is also a small Baha’i minority living in Israel as well. The literacy rate in Israel is close to 98%, and the average life expectancy is 82 years. Check hyperrestaurant to learn more about Israel in 2009.
Social conditions
Israel has well-developed social and health care. Visit AbbreviationFinder to see the definitions of ISR and acronym for Israel. Health conditions, average life expectancy and medical density are among the highest in the world, and infant mortality is one of the lowest. The health and social insurance schemes are well developed and include, in addition to the sickness funds, child, widow’s and old-age pensions, maternity allowance and occupational injury insurance as well as several types of child benefit for children up to 18 years. In 2009, the healthcare sector accounted for 7.6 percent of GDP.
These figures conceal considerable socio-economic differences between different population groups. The highest standard has Ashkenas followed by Oriental Jews, among whom Falasha (Jews from Ethiopia) form a particularly vulnerable group. Lower standards have Arabs on Israeli soil, although variations within the group are large. Conditions for Arabs in occupied areas are difficult. The average unemployment rate in 2009 was 7.6 percent. However, the differences between different ethnic groups are significant. Among the Arabs, especially those in occupied territory, it is much higher. Check to see Israel population.
The Returns Act (1950) and the Citizenship Act (1952) give every Jew the right to immigrate and every Jewish immigrant the right to immediate Israeli citizenship, a right that no other groups belong to. The large immigration of low-educated and poor Oriental Jews, especially during the 1950s, created an opposite relationship to the Ashkenazi – the pioneers and the community bearers. The groups have since approached each other financially and socially. not unusual. The gap widened again in the 1990s, as a result of a strong immigration of highly educated European Jews, especially from the former Soviet Union.
State bank robbers
IDF plundered September 20 exchange houses and banks on the occupied West Bank for several million. US $. Palestine was already in deep economic crisis due to the US and EU economic blockade against the democratically elected government and Israel’s blockades and war against the country. The bank robberies aimed to further amplify this crisis. (Haaretz : IDF raids W. Bank bureaux de change, confiscates millions. 20/9 2006)
Israel escalated the attacks on Gaza in early November, killing over 42 civilian Palestinians. The attacks were diverting maneuvers to the deep political crisis Israel itself was facing. In October, the country’s president, Moshe Katzav, was officially charged with a number of rape cases against former employees. At the same time, Prime Minister Olmert invited the party Yisrael Beiteinu to join the government and made the party’s chairman, Avigdor Lieberman, the Deputy Prime Minister and “Minister of Strategic Threats” (against Israel). The party was a fascist party openly advocating for transfer – ie. extermination of all Palestinians from Palestine. In early November, Lieberman demanded that not only Palestinians in Palestine, but also Palestinians in Israel be exterminated.
Plans for nuclear attack against Iran
Israel has been in possession of nuclear weapons since the late 1960s, built of weapons plutonium supplied by the United States. Like North Korea, the country does not sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty and has always opposed inspection visits by the International Atomic Energy Commission (IAEA). It has historically neither officially admitted nor denied possession of nuclear weapons – until Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in the autumn of 2006 in an interview admitted the existence. Experts believe the country has about 100 nuclear weapons. The primary reason why the US and Israel are so quiet with the Israeli nuclear weapons doors is partly that they are a violation of the non-proliferation agreement and partly that US law prohibits assistance to countries that violate the non-proliferation agreement.
An article on January 7, 2007 in the British newspaper Sunday Times revealed that Israel had prepared detailed plans for a nuclear attack on Iran with the aim of putting this country’s uranium reprocessing plant out of business. Israeli military sources revealed that Israeli pilots practiced a scenario in which the Natanz reprocessing plant is first attacked by conventional bunker-buster bombs that open a deep shaft down to the underground facility. Then other aircraft will send as many tactical nuclear weapons down this shaft as possible for the purpose of destroying the facility.
If Israel carries out its nuclear attack, it will be the first time since the US attack on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 that nuclear weapons are used for attacks. It will change military conventions and open up the general use of nuclear weapons in conflicts.
Israel rejected the detailed plans outlined in the Sunday Times as rumors.
In May 2007, an official report on the mistakes made during Israel’s war against Lebanon was published the year before. The report’s sharp criticism of Prime Minister Olmert prompted both opposition and members of Olmert’s own Kadima party to demand his departure. However, the greatly weakened prime minister still clung to power.
In June, President Katsav resigned from the post after admitting to raping several women. He also admitted other sexual offenses.
In a last-ditch effort to secure a positive aftermath, George Bush convened in November the Middle Eastern conflict for a conference in Annapolis, USA, to launch a new peace process. Israel also attended the conference and promised to participate in the process. A month later, new, unlawful settlements in the West Bank were initiated. Bush visited Israel in January 2008 for the first – and last – time of his reign.