What makes israel special

In fact, they the only country over the last years to see a net gain of trees. Their work is preventing global hunger, disease, and poverty.

Israeli-based IDE Technologies is the world leader in thermal and membrane desalinization. These processes for removing salt from seawater have innumerable applications for the world during a time of high demand for fresh water, increased regulations on water quality, and ballooning costs for traditional water sources.

Israel is leading the way in organic farming with firms like BioBee breeding beneficial insects and mites to help pollinate and control pests in greenhouses and open fields. The company exports the insects to 50 nations. Israeli startup Waze became a must-have app, helping motorists save time via crowdsourcing. Launched in , the startup was eventually purchased by Google. Intel Israel designed the processor that was used in the original IBM PC, the MMX microprocessor, and Centrino mobile technology that allowed for thinner and faster mobile computers.

Israeli company MobileEye is using software algorithms and small cameras to revolutionize safety for motor vehicles. Their lane departure alerts, collision warnings, and pedestrian detection is being used by 27 vehicle manufacturers including GM, BMW, Volvo.

They also developed autonomous driving technology and were acquired by Intel. Israeli MyHeritage is one of the largest online family tree and DNA testing websites with over 91 million users from around the world. Israeli web development platform Wix allows users with limited technical knowledge to build their own HTML5 web and mobile sites.

The company now has over million users. No other people group has remained a distinct people through multiple expulsions and dispersion. The Jews still speak Hebrew more than years after immigrating to other nations.

The development of the Jewish people can be identified in purely material terms sociological, economic, geographical, linguistic, etc.

The Jews were driven out of their land by force some 2, years ago, and they had every right to return to their historical homeland, which they have done over the past years. In recent years, mainstream opinions about the meaning of a Jewish state—among both religious and secular Jews—have moved to the right.

As the religious community has grown in influence, it has pushed for laws on the public keeping of the sabbath, for rules on kosher food, and for religious norms to apply in the military, especially regarding the role of women. It has also argued for more extreme positions on foreign policy. All these stances have been supported by the right-wing government.

Up to now a form of democracy has been in place in Israel, with free elections, a critical media, a plethora of political parties, and religious freedom.

Does the Jewish religion have something to say about what is the best form of government? I put these questions to two religious thinkers, one a rabbi and peace activist, the other a religiously observant professor of law. Both are uneasy with the direction the country has taken as regards its Jewishness. For Rabbi Michael Melchior, an Orthodox rabbi and former member of the Knesset, talk of a Jewish state brings to mind a medieval book called the Kuzari, written by the Spanish rabbi Yehuda Halevi.

It contains a purported dialogue between the king of the Khazars and a Christian, a Muslim, and a Jew, with the aim of discovering which of these religious paths the king and his people should follow.

Will power corrupt you? The prophets, who confronted those in power, spoke the truth. Their words have lasted, not only among Jews but also Christians and Muslims. Is this a model for today, when political power is more prevalent than ethical, human values? Melchior is especially concerned about how Jewishness has been defined in the struggle to make peace with Palestinians who live in the West Bank and Gaza, land occupied by Israel after the Six-Day War of Israel relinquished control of Gaza in They felt that any peace would mean giving up the land of Israel.

It would weaken the Jewishness of the Jewish state. This was not a project of which they wanted to be part. You have to rethink your strategy. For Melchior, religious identity should spur action for peace. Israel is the only country in the world with bus drivers and taxi drivers who read Spinoza and Maimonides.

Israel is the only country in the world where no one cares what rules say when an important goal can be achieved by bending them. Israel is the only country in the world where reservists are bossed around and commanded by officers, male and female, younger than their own children. Israel is the only country in the world where everyone on a flight gets to know one another before the plane lands.

In many cases, they also get to know the pilot and all about his health or marital problems.