Are the Jews…..well…..Jews?

Dr. Schlomo Sand, Dr. Eran Elhaik, and Arthur Koestler, all “Jews,” say no.

In November of 1947, the United Nations voted in favor of the partition of Palestine, and the creation of Israel, or a “Jewish” state alongside an Arab state. The UN would administer the city of Jerusalem. Arab leaders rejected that UN decision, and what Israel describes as its first Arab-Israel war, it’s War of Independence, broke out. On May 14th, 1948, Israel declared its independence. To detail the history of the State of Israel since its creation in 1947, in this article, is not its purpose. To do so would be the equivalent of writing a book.

The decision of the United Nation was not based on the perception of the Israeli, or Jewish, people as being the alleged actual physical descendants of the ancient Israelites, or Hebrews, that are mentioned in the Torah or any other religious book. The decision of the UN was not based on a “promise,” located in a scripture, to the Jewish people, by God, of an “eternal” land that would be owned only by them [Eretz Israel, i.e., the Land of Israel]. The decision, by the United Nations, for the creation of Israel was a political decision based, whether this would be agreed upon or not, on pragmatism and other considerations [such as British foreign policy, for one thing]. (Continue reading below)

There are eight billion human beings on earth. Except for the 15 million people on earth who identify as Jews, which represents a tiny 0.2% of the 8 billion human beings on earth, the rest of us—7,985,000,000, i.e., seven-billion, nine-hundred and eighty-five million people—are not bound to believe, or accept, alleged genetic, or religious, claims of Jewish people that center on the book known as the Bible, specifically the Torah, or “Old Testament,” with respect to claims of “Promised” lands or “Chosen” people.

On this earth, there are approximately 1 billion Hindus. They possess a variety of scriptures that they believe in:

The Vedas
The Upanishads
The Smriti
The Puranas
The Bhavagad Gita

And other books sacred to the Hindus. On this earth, there are approximately 470,000,000 (four-hundred and seventy-million) Buddhists. There are books of the Buddhists, a vast number of them. Some of the main books of Buddhism are:

The Tripitaka
Buddhāvataṃsaka Sūtra
The Dhammapada
The Lotus Sutra of Mahayana Buddhism
The Diamond Sutra of Mahayana Buddhism

And other books sacred to the Buddhists. There are approximately 2,400,000,000 (2.4 billion) Christians in the world. Their principle scripture is called The Bible, though it contains two parts:

The Old Testament
The New Testament

Christians place special emphasis, of course, on the New Testament, which, in some areas, abrogates parts of the Old Testament. And, Christians point to Old Testament prophecies that, they claim, predict the coming of the individual known as Jesus Christ, the “Son of God,” who has primacy over every other religious belief. That’s not my belief. But that’s what Christians believe.

There are approximately 2 billion Muslims in the world. The two sources of religious and spiritual thought for Muslims are,

The Holy Qur’an (Islam’s only scripture)
Hadith (compilations of the sayings and doings of Islam’s founder, Muhammad Ibn Abdullah, whom Muslims refer to as Prophet Muhammad)

According to the sociologist, Phil Zuckerman, there are approximately from 500 million to 700 million people, on this planet, who have an absence of belief in a deity, and who, as such, would be classified as atheists.

On this planet, what can be called a social contract has developed. Parts of that social contract include unwritten understandings, among the nations, with respect to behavior, and other parts of that social contract are contained within humanitarian law, the breaking of which can actually result in the imprisonment of those breaking humanitarian law, or even the execution of those breaking humanitarian law.

One thing that greatly surprised observers of Russia’s SMO (Special Military Operation) in Ukraine, is the very tiny number of civilian deaths that have occurred in Ukraine since Russia’s SMO began. Russia began its SMO on Thursday, February 24th, 2022. From that date to October 8th, 2023, the number of civilian deaths in Ukraine totals a tiny 9,806 people.

Military specialists have been very surprised at such low figures of civilian deaths during Russia’s SMO, or what is being called the war between Russia and Ukraine. How, and why has Russia been able to keep civilian deaths in Ukraine at such a low number over the past 21 months?

I have been daily reading articles and viewing interviews of political, military, international relations, ambassadorial and other experts that have been covering the conflict in Ukraine. And what they all have stated is the following: The government of Russia, under the leadership of President Vladimir Putin, is deeply concerned about how the world, which is closely watching the conflict in Ukraine, views Russia and its conduct of the war.

These experts have stated that Russia is particularly afraid to earn the ire of the countries of the fast-emerging South. Countries that have been mentioned specifically, by experts, that Russia fears to upset are China, India, Brazil, Iran, and African countries.

I found it very interesting that, when a delegation of African countries, which are perceived to be weak and virtually inconsequential, visited Russia and expressed their concern that the propagation of Russia’s SMO be conducted with minimal civilian casualties, their words did not fall on deaf ears. The Russian government duly noted the concerns of those African countries, and President Putin met with their representatives personally.

This is why civilian deaths in Ukraine have been so extremely low. Quite amazing, but it shows the power of the international social contract, a contract which Russia very clearly, as statistics show, honors greatly.

Let’s contrast this with civilian deaths that have occurred since October 8th, 2023, when Israel launched its attack on “Hamas,” an attack that was clearly not directed solely on Hamas fighters, but, rather, was, and still is, purposely launched against civilians in an effort to genocide them'; to exterminate them. Reuters reports that the Gaza Health Ministry has reported that, from October 8th to today, November 6, 2023, 16,015 Palestinian civilians have been killed.

It took Russia 21 months to accumulate a civilian death toll, in Ukraine, of 9,806 people. But, in contrast, it took the State of Israel only one month to kill 16,015 Palestinian civilians. At the beginning of Russia’s SMO, military experts were almost shocked that Russia did not “get the job” done, and either put an end to Ukraine, or bring Ukraine to the negotiating table quickly, using Russia’s awesome military force.

Well, there were factors, one of which was the huge factor of avoiding civilian deaths so that Russia could keep its reputation as a nation that respected human rights and willingly adhered to the international social contracts, and the contracts involving human rights. Russia has presented itself, especially in contrast to the State of Israel, as a pristine example of a nation that, during war, bends over backwards to respect the human rights of the citizens of the country that it is at war with.

Now, remember: The question of Israel’s right to exist is not based on verses of the Torah, the Talmud, or any other Jewish scripture or book. The right of Israel to exist was decided upon by the collective nations of the earth.

Correspondingly, the right of the creation of a Palestinian State was not based on any verses that Palestinian Christians follow, in their Bible, or any verses that Palestinian Muslims follow, in their Qur’an. The right of Palestinians to have their own State was based on a decision agreed upon by the collective nations of the world, at least as represented by the United Nations Organization.

Well, that being said, let’s talk about social contracts. And then, after that, we’ll jump into the question of Jewish identity. Again, for emphasis: Whether “Jews are Jews” or “Jews are not Jews” does not matter with respect to the right of Israel to exist. I’ll explain why I decided to cover the issue of the identity of those, chiefly in Israel, who call themselves Jews and who believe that alleged Jewish descendancy from the Biblical Israelites happens, in their eyes, to justify their claim to the land called Israel, even though such justification is not, and should not be, recognized as a factor, in the modern world, for supporting the right of Israel to exist. Israel exists. The nations have agreed to that, and not because of Biblical claims. Leave the Bible out of it.

(The following first two paragraphs are not directly related to the subject of this article and have been borrowed from a Substack article I wrote entitled, The Threat of “Singularity” in the Transformation of Human beings to Machines. Yet, these first two paragraphs are appropriate to the discussion).

I’d first met Ralph Jenkins, who became my best friend, when I was five years old. When I was seven years old, one day I decided to go play with Ralph. When I got to the front gate, and grabbed the doorknob of the gate to open it and enter the tiny courtyard, Ralph had just burst through the front door, stood on the porch a few seconds, fully dressed in his Superman uniform, and hollered “Here I come to save the DAYYYYYY!!!”

He then leaped into the air, his chubby torso landing flat on the concrete walkway at the bottom of the steps that he could have simply walked down. Ralph was taken to Provident Hospital, where it was discovered that he had broken an arm. His face, to use his own expression, had also been “rearranged,” though it eventually healed up.

George Reeves, aka, Superman, Courtesy giphy.com

In the West, we pretty much “live and let live,” as the old saying goes, even to the extreme. These days, we call it “identifying.” You can declare that you identify as a giraffe. And, unless you’re sitting in an HR office, applying for a gig, I think that probably half the population of the West would not care how you identify yourself. Here’s someone who identifies as an infant.

And here’s a video of Phil. Tell me: What do you think? I think he does baby really well

When I say that Phil does baby “really well,” I caution the reader not to assume that Phil is putting on an act. Phil believes that he is an infant. Well, okay, so maybe Phil has convinced himself that he is an infant. But, it doesn’t matter. Phil is harmless (ahem). We in the West will give Phil all the respect that is due to any harmless human being, although we used to consign such people to insane asylums. But, we’ve progressed (I guess).

Ralph identified (so to speak) as Superman, a fictional character that never existed as a real human being. Ralph ended up slamming his torso into concrete, rearranging his face, and breaking his arm. The only harm done was to him. Well, and to his mom. She had to pay his hospital bill. And, of course, Ralph, unlike Phil, was a real child. Well, I guess Phil, a 40 year old grown man, is also a real child too…sort of.

Why should a grown man be allowed to “identify” as a baby? There is something that I’ve heard scholars talk about. It’s called, The Social Contract. I capitalize it simply because I like the idea of a social contract, in part because I lived during a period, pre-1960s, when Americans lived by a social contract. And it worked. Oh, no one talked about a “social contract.” No such term was used, by teachers, in school. We’d never heard of any laws that established, and enforced, a “social contract.” But, upon reflection, it’s easy for me to see that we possessed, and lived by a social contract.

The Social Contract includes an important idea that, when adhered to, sustains balance, cohesion, harmony, safety, peace and stability within the family, the community, and the nation. The Social Contract contains the unwritten rules, within family, community, or nation, that are understood to exist, even if never verbalized, and that all adhere to. Let’s take a trip back to a 1950s barber shop, on the south side of Chicago, to see an example of a social contract.

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“Whassup, Leroy,” greets Ed, one of the barbers, as Leroy walks in, sits down, and waits for his turn to get his hair cut. “Same old sh*t, warmed all over,” Leroy replies. “How was Thanksgiving,” Ed asks. “Aw, it was great. All the kin from Tennessee, and some from Alabama, came on up.” Ed replies, “That’s cool. It’s sho nuf great when family gets together.” Ed giggles through his next question, “Now you know I gotta ask!! Did Uncle Joe show up?”

Leroy smiles, while shaking his head and looking down to the floor, then replies through that smile and a sigh, “Yeah, the nigguh showed up, just like every year. But, what are you gonna do? He’s family.”

Ed asks, “No fireworks?” Leroy responds, “Not from Uncle Joe, that’s for DAMN sure!!! Especially this year!! You know about Uncle Joe’s…..problem, of course.” Ed replies, “Oh, yeah….Who don’t.” Everybody in the barber shop bursts out laughing. Yeah: Everybody knows Uncle Joe’s problem.

“Ed, this nigguh never learns! Okay, we’re all taking our seats at the dining room table, right? Plus there’s seats all over the crib. What does Uncle Joe do, though? He sits next to Sally Mae!!!” Sally Mae represents Uncle Joe’s problem. Sally Mae is Leroy’s 15-years old daughter, extremely beautiful facially, and is fast-developing, as a female, otherwise. Built, as the old “objectifying” expression went, like a brick sh*t house. Yeah…that’s Uncle Joe’s problem: underaged girls—with family not being a barrier, ‘cause Uncle Joe just can’t help himself.

The laughter dies down, and Ed says, “Well, after he sat down next to Sally Mae, what did you do?” Leroy answered, “What the hell you THINK I did??!! I didn’t let the nigguh sit for ONE SECOND, when I said, ‘ Uncle Joe, you sit over here—next to ME.’” Laughter in the barber shop again, and Ed’s barely able to ask his next question, he’s laughing so hard. “So, Leroy, what did he do then?” Leroy says, “He stood his ass up QUICK, going, ‘Oh, sure, sure. No problem.’” Then Leroy repeats, “Well, what are you gonna do? He’s family.”

Both Leroy’s family, as well as everybody in the hood, held Uncle Joe to a social contract. You’re cool, Uncle Joe. But, we know—and YOU know—you got a problem. So, if I EVER see you sitting on a porch talking to my daughter, that’s your ASS!! Uncle Joe thought he could get away with it on Thanksgiving. NOPE!! No one called him and told him to not come for Thanksgiving dinner. No one shunned him when he walked in. Everybody greeted him, courteously, with, “Hey, Uncle Joe, good to see you!!” Uncle Joe is family. But keep your ass away from Sally Mae! 😡

Again, there are family, social, national and international social contracts. And they all can be, and should be, in my opinion, strong, respected, and adhered to. There is an international social contract that does not countenance collective punishment, ethnic cleansing, genocide or extermination of a people, all of which, at this moment, are being perpetrated against the Palestinian people by the State of Israel (and the state of Israel).

A seasoned, expert class of intellectuals, military experts, historians, former ambassadors, former CIA analysts, etc., all are lining up accusing the State of Israel with unacceptable violations of international social contracts, not to mention the international legal contracts that can result in imprisonment, and even execution of individuals that violate those legal contracts.

At this very moment, in fact, while I was assembling the above pictures, Col. Karen Kwiatkowski (above, bottom-right) is being interviewed by Judge Napolitano. And she is speaking about the concept of the international social contract. This exchange is indicative of the fact that international social contracts are real.

I will highlight, in bold/Italics below, that part of Judge Napolitano’s interview of Col. Kwiatkowski which demonstrates that the average Israeli views Palestinians, and Arabs, as something “less than human.” You’ll see where Col. Kwiatkowski talks about such beliefs being unacceptable, a violation, to use my analogy, of an international social contract that we have evolved to create, as a species.

• JUDGE NAPOLITANO: “Does the Netanyahu government believe that any Palestinians are innocent?”

• COL. KWIATKOWSKI: “No. Netanyahu himself does not believe that. His alliance of right-wing parties does not believe that. And I would say, I think, from what I can gather, most Israelis don’t believe that.

  
  ”The level of contempt, in Israeli society, for Palestinians in particular, Arabs in general, but Palestinians in particular is cultivated in schools; in every aspect of society. So, I don’t think Americans can understand how—how they really feel, many of them, how most of Israel feels about these Palestinians. And they [Palestinians] to them [Israelis] are all terrorists, are all murderers. And if they’re not grown-up yet, like they’re children, they’ll be terrorists, they’ll be murderers.
  
  ”What better way to nip it in the bud? This sounds very evil, like I’m just making stuff up. But, the information from people that live in Israel kind of reveals that this is the case.

• JUDGE NAPOLITANO: “Don’t some [Israeli] Cabinet members, or haven’t some Cabinet members—Netanyahu Cabinet members—refer, and some of their American apologists…consider the Palestinians to be sub-human?

• COL. KWIATKOWSKI: “Sub-human. And they use that word, which is interesting because, you know, our country [the United States], you know, we have a lot of diversity, equity stuff, the Wokeness; we have a long history of Civil Rights movement; a conversation, an on-going conversation about racism in our country.
  
  “And, we don’t—if any person in this country, of any race, called another group of people sub-human, that would set off alarm bells in almost every American’s mind. Because we don’t use that language. And we DON’T use that language because it is so dangerous. It’s de-humanizing. It is hateful in a way that leads to death. I mean, it leads to death and murder.
  
  “Contempt is actually worse than hate in some ways. That’s what they say, anyway. And the contempt that many in Israel, many Israelis feel towards their neighbors, towards the Palestinian population—even those that are Israeli citizens—the feeling of contempt that they have for them is, is something I don’t think most Americans can really imagine. And it is often, I think, well-hidden from the American population how many in Israel actually view these people [Palestinians].”

Well-hidden? Why? It’s obvious. Because Israelis, especially Israeli government leaders, know that, in perceiving Palestinians as sub-human, and then proving that Israelis feel that way by attempting genocide against Palestinians, they are violating a social contract that we Americans have developed over centuries. That social contract says that we consider each and every single American, regardless of ethnicity, race, or religion as EQUAL to each other, NOT as being sub-human.

Many of the experts that I have shown above have said that, without American money ($4 billion a year, I’ve read, 99.7% of which goes to the Israeli military) and military support, Israel would cease to exist within a short period of time, maybe even just months. Both Scott Ritter and Larry Johnson give Israel no more than 20 years to exist, if it doesn’t take a good look at itself, and then change.

I feel that since my tax dollars, as an American citizen, are going to Israel, then Israel must adhere to the social contract that WE Americans have worked hard to live by, and that we DO live by. Otherwise, not a single PENNY should be sent to Israel. After all, as Colonel Douglas Macgregor has stated, “Israel has no formal treaty of alliance with us.” Well, then, I believe it must adhere to the social contract that we Americans adhere to, otherwise not be funded by our tax dollars.

All over the world, massive demonstrations against the State of Israel (and the state of Israel) are occurring, and I’ve twice heard that polls indicate that 90% of the world’s youth, between the ages of 18 and 35, are vehemently against the State of Israel and its attempted genocide against the Palestinians people. That speaks to an international social contract that the majority of the earth’s people accept. But not Israel. Why?

Few are talking about this, although some of the above experts have openly talked about this: Biblical interpretations, by Israelis, regarding their place as “The Chosen People of God,” as well as their “right” to the land of Israel as the land of their Biblical ancestors.

It is claimed that these beliefs create an extremely unstable and irrational sense of privilege that is based on an interpretation of verses of the Torah which, Israelis believe, gives them perpetual rights to declare Israel as a place given to them, and their ancestors, by God, no matter what. If you have not done so as yet, please check out the two videos that I embedded in Part 4 of a four-part Substack article that I created.

When social contracts are broken, danger—sometimes deadly danger—can threaten the community at large. Israel has broken the social contract. The mind-boggling, ongoing brutality that has been demonstrated in Israel’s breaking of the social contract, now makes it 1 billion percent legitimate to begin asking some questions. And here’s one: Since God, Israelis claim, made a Covenant with their ancestors, it is now legitimate to ask a simple question: Who are your ancestors?

And if it so happens that your ancestors were not, in any way whatsoever, related to the Biblical Israelites, then the only reason to accept Israel’s existence (which I do) is because the United Nations, in 1947, accepted it, not because you perceive, based on some interpretation of the Torah, that you have some kind of ancestral and religious right to that land.

One more thing before I get started: In my book, as I see things, a “Promised Person” is any human being on earth, of religion or NO religion, who lives righteously, whether that person adheres to Sanatana Dharma (Hinduism), Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Atheism, or no ism. Those are the Promised People these days. To claim some special relationship with Almighty God, while at the same time murdering innocent men, women, and children, is meaningless.

Israel has a right to exist. The United Nations agreed upon that. But, I would ask young Israelis to think again about who you are, as the following scholars—Dr. Schlomo Sand, Dr. Eran Elhaik, and Mr. Arthur Koestler, all Jews, did. What makes anyone special is NOT their claim to a special link to God, based on a book that was written a billion years ago (figuratively speak). What makes someone special is how they actually live. Ya’ll ain’t looking so “chosen” to me.

And isn’t there something in Deuteronomy that lists, yes, the Blessings that the Children of Israel would receive if [IF] they lived by God’s Laws, but that also lists the Curses that the Children of Israel would receive if they DID NOT live by God’s Laws? It would probably be a very good exercise to read that list of Curses that God [not ME] said would be placed upon the Children of Israel if they did not live by God’s Laws. Of course, again: In this day, just who are, if anybody, the “Children of Israel?”

Let’s begin. I’ll start with Dr. Elhaik, a born-and-raised Jew, to see what he, a super highly educated biogeneticist and researcher, says about whether or not today’s Jews are genetically connected to the Biblical Israelites. I am no geneticist.

The reader should know that the question of whether or not the Ashkenazi Jews of Israel are connected to the Biblical Israelites is a question answered, by some studies, in the affirmative: “Ashkenazi Jews derive their ancestry primarily from populations of the Middle East and Europe, that they possess considerable shared ancestry with other Jewish populations, and that there is no indication of a significant genetic contribution either from within or from north of the Caucasus region.”¹

There are a gazillion such studies that counter Dr. Elhaik’s conclusions, and even characterize his findings as being influenced by his self-hating Jew persona. It is claimed that he was influenced by a “myth” that was hatched by another Jew named Arthur Koestler, whose book, The Thirteenth Tribe, was published in the year 1976. Aside from dismissing both Dr. Elhaik and Arthur Koestler, these same scientists dismiss Dr. Shlomo Sand, an Israeli historian who teaches at Tel Aviv University, and who also believes that Ashkenazi Jews cannot trace their ancestry back to ancient Israel.

How is an ordinary individual to know? I can only speak for myself, and in very, very fundamental terms. Firstly, my dad taught me that a person should try to learn something every day.

Secondly, I was taught, as I’ve written in other Substack articles, by Franciscan priests and nuns to question everything, in the tradition of St. Augustine (354-430 A.D.), who taught that the believer should be involved in the constant pursuit of truth.

The priests at Hales Franciscan High School clearly appeared to regret that I took that teaching to heart and, from my Sophomore year onward to graduation, prepared, nightly, for the next day’s Religion Class, where I would point out every contradiction, interpolation, and absurdity (such as Ahazia, the youngest son of Jehoram, being OLDER than his father) that I could find in the Bible.

Thirdly, I am very, very big on the reliance on intuition. I wrote a Substack article, in fact, entitled, The Vast and Vital Importance of Intuition and Intuition Development, which, out of the over 210 Substack articles that I’ve written, clocked one of the highest views, from Substack readers, of my articles. One of the worst things, in my opinion, that has happened to society is its severely lopsided dependence on everything outside of themselves.

Intuition is real, always [always] accurate, but is being stomped out of existence. Just like muscles, if you don’t use your intuition, it will become weakened. My intuition tells me to at least present this information to my Substack readership so that you can draw your own conclusions.

Fourthly, I’m a ‘60s (1960s) person. We were not a generation of followers. We questioned everything. That which you young people, today, call “The Deep State,” we were fully aware of, but we called it “The System.” And that’s one reason we were able to shut down our government’s participation in the Vietnam war, as well as—within 35 years—destroy South African apartheid [HINT]. The following, of course, probably is a bit hyperbolic, but if there are any mottos that my generation could have used, those mottos could have been,

“Down with up!!”
“Out is in!!”
“Left is right!!”

I’m instinctively suspicious of “authority.” Have we not all witnessed the alleged “professional competence” and so-called “leadership” of our politicians and “healthcare” experts and systems, during the Covid “pandemic?” They lied, and did so for profit; to exercise power; to exercise control over people. So, yes, when it comes to those whom we are to believe are the absolute “authorities,” all I can say is that, for the last 60 years or so, “authorities” have turned out to be liars, profiteers, incompetents and cowards—cowards because they won’t stand for truth.

I try to be honest. So now you know where I’m coming from. When a Maverick stands up and says, “The system is lying,” I’ll have a tendency to, at the very least, perform research to see if it’s true. Which is why I did NOT get The Jab. Because Mavericks—but COMPETENT ones—like Dr. Malone, Dr. McCollough, and other highly skilled professional experts were doing their jobs and fearlessly warning the public of the dangers of The Jab.

And since, as I’ve stated, a couple of historians and at least one geneticist, have a different view regarding the idea of a direct genetic connection of Ashkenazi Jews to the ancient Hebrews, well, I’m going to check their views out, no question whatsoever about that, especially since this question of genetic and religious identity has, at this moment, the entire world teetering on the brink of destruction via a widening of the war in Gaza to possibly include the entire region of the Middle East, and then, possibly, the super powers, Russia and the United States. What does Dr. Elhaik say?

Dr. Eran ElHaik, Courtesy duckduckgo.com

Here is Dr. ElHaik’s homepage, for your reference. In the year 2013, Dr. ElHaik pissed off a WHOLE LOT of Jews, scientists or otherwise. There had already been a lot of scholarship conducted that had claimed to establish a direct, genetic link between today’s Ashkenazi Jews and the Jews (Hebrews) of ancient Israel. But, in 2013, Dr. ElHaik published a study refuting the belief that Ashkenazi Jews are genetically related to the Jews of ancient Israel. A section of an Abstract at the National Library of Medicine explains the two opposing views about Jewish ancestry Any emphasis is mine:

Well, as it turns out, Dr. Elhaik’s genetic studies, entitled, The missing link of Jewish European ancestry: contrasting the Rhineland and the Khazarian Hypotheses, supports the Khazarian hypothesis, which states that Ashkenazi Jews have no connection whatsoever, genetically, to the ancient Jews (Hebrews) of the land now called Israel. I reproduce a good summary of Dr. Elhaik’s findings. This is taken from EurekAlert. Any emphasis is mine:

Arthur Koestler, Courtesy duckduckgo.com

Arthur Koestler, as far as I know, is the first person to bring to public view the claim, in his book, The Thirteenth Tribe, of what has now come to be known as “The Khazarian Hypothesis,” that is, the belief that Ashkenazi Jews are not descended from the historical, Biblical Jews/Hebrews/Israelites of antiquity, but, rather, are descended from a fierce European people called Khazars, who converted to Judaism.

I have seen Ashkenazi population figures, for the State of Israel, that range between 31.8% to 45% of the total population of Israel. Israel’s government and economy are dominated by Ashkenazi Jews. This dominance is attributed to their early sizeable immigration to Palestine, as well as their organization skills and leadership of all the major pre-state public and private institutions.

Since I’ve already gone over the Khazarian Hypothesis, I am now going to focus on the conversion to Judaism that Arthur Koestler claimed occurred. It’s quite interesting, although, of course, those Jews that are opposed to the Khazarian theory claim that the theory is “simply” a myth. But, before reading the quote from Koestler’s book that I will provide, here is a short, 18-minute YouTube video about the Khazars, so that the reader will know that the existence of the Khazar people, and their Kingdom, Khazaria, is not a myth.

You will note that this short documentary ends with a mention of Arthur Koestler’s book and says that the book has been used—and it has—by groups with an “anti-Semitic agenda.” I want to make two statements about that. Firstly, I really wish that people would quit using the term “anti-Semitic,” and use, instead, “anti-Jewish.” The Jews are not the only Semitic people.

Please look at the list of people, including Arabs, who are Semites. Secondly, to criticize the State of Israel for what the entire world is now calling “collective punishment” or “ethnic cleansing” or “genocide” or “extermination” against the Palestinian people is not an expression of “anti-Semitism.” Those critics can be said to be people who are against inhuman treatment by the State of Israel. Over many decades, often, Jewish people have labeled any criticism of Israel and Israel’s policies as “anti-Semitic.” This turns out being a cheap way to place a guilt trip on the heads of those who are simply airing legitimate criticism of Israeli policies.

The person who wrote the book, The Thirteenth Tribe was a Jew. So, if there was any “anti-Semitism” inspiring his writing, that would be a great surprise. One can choose to conclude that his claims were myths, or one can conclude that his claims were accurate historical facts. But to assume that a Jew, Arthur Koestler, was inspired, in his authorship of The Thirteenth Tribe, by “anti-Semitism,” is a bit much. Or to assume—which is a habit of radical Zionist Jews—that Koestler was a “self-hating Jew” is unacceptable.

I’ll now quote the conversion story that Koestler tells in The Thirteenth Tribe, from the second chapter entitled, Conversion. Of course, I strongly encourage the reader to obtain and read the entire book. Any emphasis is mine:

The circumstances of the conversion are obscured by legend, but the principal Arab and Hebrew accounts of it have some basic features in common. Al-Masudi’s account of the Jewish rule in Khazaria, quoted earlier on, ends with a reference to a previous work of his, in which he gave a description of those circumstances.

That previous work of Masudi’s is lost; but there exist two accounts which are based on the lost book. The first, by Dimaski (written in 1327), reiterates that at the time of Harun al Rashid, the Byzantine Emperor forced the Jews to emigrate; these emigrants came to the Khazar country where they found “an intelligent but uneducated race to whom they offered their religion. The natives found it better than their own and accepted it.

The second, much more detailed account is in al-Bakri’s Book of Kingdoms and Roads (eleventh century):

“The reason for the conversion to Judaism of the King of the Khazars, who had previously been a pagan, is as follows. He had adopted Christianity.† Then he recognized its falsehood and discussed this matter, which greatly worried him, with one of his high officials. The latter said to him: ‘O king, those in possession of sacred scriptures fall into three groups. Summon them and ask them to state their case, then follow the one who is in possession of the truth.’

“So he sent to the Christians for a Bishop. Now there was with the King a Jew, skilled in argument, who engaged him in disputation. He asked the Bishop: ‘What do you say of Moses, the son of Amran, and the Torah which was revealed to him?’ The Bishop replied: ‘Moses is a prophet and the Torah speaks the truth.’ Then the Jew said to the King: ‘He has already admitted the truth of my creed. Ask him now what he believes in.’

“So the King asked him and he replied: ‘I say that Jesus the Messiah is the son of Mary, he is the Word, and he has revealed the mysteries in the name of God.’ Then said the Jew to the King of the Khazars: ‘He preaches a doctrine which I know not, while he accepts my propositions.’ But the Bishop was not strong in producing evidence.

“Then the King asked for a Muslim, and they sent him a scholarly, clever man who was good at arguments. But the Jew hired someone who poisoned him on the journey, and he died. And the Jew succeeded in winning the King for his faith, so that he embraced Judaism.”

The Arab historians certainly had a gift for sugaring the pill. Had the Muslim scholar been able to participate in the debate he would have fallen into the same trap as the Bishop, for both accepted the truth of the Old Testament, whereas the upholders of the New Testament and of the Koran were each outvoted two to one. The King’s approval of this reasoning is symbolic: he is only willing to accept doctrines which are shared by all three – their common denominator – and refuses to commit himself to any of the rival claims which go beyond that.

It is once more the principle of the uncommitted world, applied to theology. The story also implies, as Bury has pointed out, that Jewish influence at the Khazar court must already have been strong before the formal conversion, for the Bishop and the Muslim scholar have to be ‘sent for’, whereas the Jew is already ‘with him’ (the King).

We now turn from the principal Arab source on the conversion – Masudi and his compilers – to the principal Jewish source. This is the so-called ‘Khazar Correspondence’: an exchange of letters, in Hebrew, between Hasdai Ibn Shaprut, the Jewish chief minister of the Caliph of Cordoba, and Joseph, King of the Khazars – or, rather, between their respective scribes. The authenticity of the correspondence has been the subject of controversy but is now generally accepted with due allowance made for the vagaries of later copyists.* (Koestler, Arthur. The Thirteenth Tribe (pp. 44-45). PFD Books. Amazon Kindle Edition.)

The exchange of letters apparently took place after 954 and before 961, that is roughly at the time when Masudi wrote. To appreciate its significance a word must be said about the personality of Hasdai Ibn Shaprut – perhaps the most brilliant figure in the ‘Golden Age’ (900–1200) of the Jews in Spain.

In 929, Abd-al-Rahman III, a member of the Omayad dynasty, succeeded in unifying the Moorish possessions in the southern and central parts of the Iberian peninsula under his rule, and founded the Western Caliphate. His capital, Cordoba, became the glory of Arab Spain, and a focal centre of European culture – with a library of 400 000 catalogued volumes.

Hasdai, born 910 in Cordoba into a distinguished Jewish family, first attracted the Caliph’s attention as a medical practitioner with some remarkable cures to his credit. Abd-al-Rahman appointed him his court physician, and trusted his judgment so completely that Hasdai was called upon, first, to put the state finances in order, then to act as Foreign Minister and diplomatic trouble-shooter in the new Caliphate’s complex dealings with Byzantium, the German Emperor Otto, with Castile, Navarra, Arragon and other Christian kingdoms in the north of Spain.

Hasdai was a true uomo universale centuries before the Renaissance who, in between affairs of state, still found the time to translate medical books into Arabic, to correspond with the learned rabbis of Baghdad and to act as a Maecenas for Hebrew grammarians and poets. He obviously was an enlightened, yet a devoted Jew, who used his diplomatic contacts to gather information about the Jewish communities dispersed in various parts of the world, and to intervene on their behalf whenever possible. He was particularly concerned about the persecution of Jews in the Byzantine Empire under Romanus (see above, section 1).

Fortunately, he wielded considerable influence at the Byzantine court, which was vitally interested in procuring the benevolent neutrality of Cordoba during the Byzantine campaigns against the Muslims of the East. Hasdai, who was conducting the negotiations, used this opportunity to intercede on behalf of Byzantine Jewry, apparently with success.

According to his own account, Hasdai first heard of the existence of an independent Jewish kingdom from some merchant traders from Khurasan in Persia; but he doubted the truth of their story. Later he questioned the members of a Byzantine diplomatic mission to Cordoba, and they confirmed the merchants’ account, contributing a considerable amount of factual detail about the Khazar kingdom, including the name – Joseph – of its present King.

Thereupon Hasdai decided to send couriers with a letter to King Joseph. The letter (which will be discussed in more detail later on) contains a list of questions about the Khazar state, its people, method of government, armed forces, and so on – including an inquiry to which of the twelve tribes Joseph belonged. This seems to indicate that Hasdai thought the Jewish Khazars to hail from Palestine – as the Spanish Jews did – and perhaps even to represent one of the Lost Tribes.

Joseph, not being of Jewish descent, belonged, of course, to none of the tribes; in his Reply to Hasdai, he provides, as we shall see, a genealogy of a different kind, but his main concern is to give Hasdai a detailed – if legendary – account of the conversion – which took place two centuries earlier – and the circumstances that led to it. Joseph’s narrative starts with a eulogy of his ancestor, King Bulan, a great conqueror and a wise man who ‘drove out the sorcerers and idolators from his land’. Subsequently an angel appeared to King Bulan in his dreams, exhorting him to worship the only true God, and promising that in exchange He would ‘bless and multiply Bulan’s offspring, and deliver his enemies into his hands, and make his kingdom last to the end of the world’.

This, of course, is inspired by the story of the Covenant in Genesis; and it implies that the Khazars too claimed the status of a Chosen Race, who made their own Covenant with the Lord, even though they were not descended from Abraham’s seed. But at this point Joseph’s story takes an unexpected turn. King Bulan is quite willing to serve the Almighty, but he raises a difficulty:

“Thou knowest, my Lord, the secret thoughts of my heart and thou hast searched my kidneys to confirm that my trust is in thee; but the people over which I rule have a pagan mind and I do not know whether they will believe me. If I have found favour and mercy in thine eyes, then I beseech thee to appear also to their Great Prince, to make him support me. The Eternal One granted Bulan’s request, he appeared to this Prince in a dream, and when he arose in the morning he came to the King and made it known to him….”

There is nothing in Genesis, nor in the Arab accounts of the conversion, about a great prince whose consent has to be obtained. It is an unmistakable reference to the Khazar double kingship. The ‘Great Prince’, apparently, is the Bek; but it is not impossible that the ‘King’ was the Bek, and the ‘Prince’ the Kagan.

Moreover according to Arab and Armenian sources, the leader of the Khazar army which invaded Transcaucasia in 731 (i.e., a few years before the presumed date of the conversion) was called ‘Bulkhan’. Joseph’s letter continues by relating how the angel appeared once more to the dreaming King and bade him to build a place of worship in which the Lord may dwell, for: “the sky and the skies above the sky are not large enough to hold me”.

King Bulan replies bashfully that he does not possess the gold and silver required for such an enterprise, “although it is my duty and desire to carry it out”. The angel reassures him: all Bulan has to do is to lead his armies into Dariela and Ardabil in Armenia, where a treasure of silver and a treasure of gold are awaiting him. This fits in with Bulan’s or Bulkhan’s raid preceding the conversion; and also with Arab sources according to which the Khazars at one time controlled silver and gold mines in the Caucasus.

Bulan does as the angel told him, returns victoriously with the loot, and builds “a Holy Tabernacle equipped with a sacred coffer [the ‘Ark of the Covenant’], a candelabrum, an altar and holy implements which have been preserved to this day and are still in my [King Joseph’s] possession”. Joseph’s letter, written in the second half of the tenth century, more than two hundred years after the events it purports to describe, is obviously a mixture of fact and legend. His description of the scant furnishings of the place of worship, and the paucity of the preserved relics, is in marked contrast to the account he gives in other parts of the letter of the present prosperity of his country.

The days of his ancestor Bulan appear to him as remote antiquity, when the poor but virtuous King did not even have the money to construct the Holy Tabernacle – which was, after all, only a tent. However, Joseph’s letter up to this point is merely the prelude to the real drama of the conversion, which he now proceeds to relate. Apparently Bulan’s renunciation of idolatry in favour of the “only true God” was only the first step, which still left the choice open between the three monotheistic creeds. At least, this is what the continuation of Joseph’s letter seems to imply:

“After these feats of arms [the invasion of Armenia], King Bulan’s fame spread to all countries. The King of Edom [Byzantium] and the King of the Ishmaelim [the Muslims] heard the news and sent to him envoys with precious gifts and money and learned men to convert him to their beliefs; but the king was wise and sent for a Jew with much knowledge and acumen and put all three together to discuss their doctrines.”

So we have another Brains Trust, or round-table conference, just as in Masudi, with the difference that the Muslim has not been poisoned beforehand. But the pattern of the argument is much the same. After long and futile discussions, the King adjourns the meeting for three days, during which the discutants are left to cool their heels in their respective tents; then he reverts to a stratagem. He convokes the discutants separately. He asks the Christian which of the other two religions is nearer the truth, and the Christian answers, ‘the Jews’. He confronts the Muslim with the same question and gets the same reply. Neutralism has once more carried the day. So much for the conversion. (Koestler, Arthur. The Thirteenth Tribe (pp. 45-49). PFD Books. Kindle Edition.)

So, in both accounts, the Khazar king converted to Judaism, the result being that the entire Khazar kingdom followed in the footsteps of Joseph, the Khazar king, and converted to Judaism.

Now, here’s a short, 7-minute video which stands as an exclamation mark in ending this section.

Dr. Schlomo Sand, Courtesy duckduckgo.com

I now have two videos for you to watch. This first one is super short, just 1-minute and 6 seconds. Yet, it perfectly summarizes Dr. Shlomo Sands’ beliefs.

This next video contains a full 1-hr., 14-min. lecture by Dr. Sand, who teaches at Tel Aviv University, in Israel, in which he offers a very fascinating perspective surrounding the subject of Jewishness, Jewish identity, religious Judaism, secular Judaism, etc. His lecture is entitled, How I Stopped Being a Jew, and was delivered nine years ago. Please keep in mind that Dr. Sand speaks twice in the following video, with another speaker speaking in between.

Here’s a short excerpt from a December 5, 2023 article by CNN:

“The House passed a Republican-led resolution on Tuesday condemning antisemitism in the United States and globally.  A number of Democrats, however, expressed concern that the language of the GOP resolution is overly broad and would effectively define any criticism of the Israeli government or its policies as antisemitism. The vote was 311 to 14.” (CNN)

In my country, the United States of America, Skin Heads, Neo-Nazis, Ku Klux Klan members and other openly-declared racists have been telling us, for decades, that the federal government of our country is “controlled by Israel.” In the world of social media, one of the places these racists hang out is BitChute. BitChute itself is not a racist platform. It is a great, free-speech platform. But, it just happens that White racists, who hate “the Jews,” hang out there, “reminding” us that “the Jews run America.” As an American—a true American—I reject racism. But, in this issue regarding influence over the American government….What’s up?

Well, ever since October 7th, when Hamas launched its attack against Israel, or, as some prefer to say, launched its attack against “innocent Israeli citizens,” I have been religiously, as the expression goes, watching analyses of the situation in Israel that are given by very, very, very respectable, seasoned experts in the fields of politics, international relations, intelligence [CIA, FBI, etc], diplomacy [people like Alistair Crooke], international economics, etc.

I’ve mentioned ten of them, and included their pictures, above. And virtually all of them, at one time or another, have mentioned that “the Israeli Lobby,” which includes essentially two groups: AIPAC (American Israel Political Action Committee) and Evangelical Christian Zionists, control American foreign policy with respect to the State of Israel.

It is said that those two groups have so much money that no Congress person dare make a move contrary to the wishes of the Israel lobby, because, without question, they will lose their seats in office for lack of funding to push their campaigns. Don’t believe it? Well, look at those figures from that CNN report. The vote was 311 to 14. Do you really believe that such an overwhelming vote is based on a politician’s “love” for the State of Israel?

I’m going to leave you with a testimony regarding the power of the Israel Lobby, a testimony that comes from a former member of Congress, Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, one of the most knowledgeable and articulate people to have ever served in the Congress of the United States.

What I ask, with respect to this Substack article, is that you inform as many people as you can about this article, before our “Democratic” government decides that my article is “antisemitic,” rather than informative and reflecting my right of free speech.

In the West, as I said earlier, we recognize the right of a person to identify as a giraffe. We respect the right of a person to identify as an infant, as Phil does. We recognize the right of a person to identify as whatever.

But, there is a lesson that I think the State of Israel, and those who wish to identify as Jews, as the “Chosen People of God,” etc. Ralph identified as Superman. And to prove that he was Superman, he jumped in the air, leaped off of his porch, landed flat on his face, injured himself and was hospitalized. I ask the State of Israel to take a pause and think. You may identify as whatever you wish to identify as. But, if you decide to ignore the social contracts that the majority of the world’s people have signed onto, you will land—perhaps sooner than you think—on concrete, but you will not get up. A word to the wise is sufficient.

As we closed meetings, phone calls, and letters, back in the day, Peace out!

1. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25079123/