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145-673: Taglit-Birthright Israel ( Hebrew : תגלית ), also known as Birthright Israel or simply Birthright , is a free ten-day heritage trip to Israel , Jerusalem , and the Golan Heights for young adults of Jewish heritage between the ages of 18 and 26. The program is sponsored by the Birthright Israel Foundation, whose donors subsidize participation. Taglit is the Hebrew word for 'discovery'. During their trip, participants, most of whom are visiting Israel for

290-781: A Boeing 747-400F , ending its dedicated cargo flights. The airline plans to use charter services by other airlines for this purpose from now on. In March 2020, El Al suspended operations due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic . The Israeli government had announced that all foreign and Israeli passport holders would have to undergo a 14-day quarantine upon arrival into the country. El Al also converted some of their Boeing 787 Dreamliner airplanes to serve as cargo flights to transport medical goods from China to Europe through Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion Airport . El Al also offered some passenger flights to get stranded Israeli citizens home. These flights went from Tel Aviv to Miami, New York, London, Paris, and more. They also offered two services to Australia during

435-528: A bailout deal with the government, and a private buyer purchased a controlling stake (42.85%) in September of that year, with the government purchasing any unwanted shares (15%). In September 1948, Israel's first president , Chaim Weizmann , attended a conference in Geneva , Switzerland. Weizmann was scheduled to fly back to Israel in an Israeli government aircraft, but due to an embargo imposed on Israel at

580-585: A rite of passage for young Jews. Pew Research estimated that by 2020, around 20% of American Jews ages 18–46 had participated in Birthright. Birthright has been called the most influential organization in relations between Israel and the Jewish diaspora. The Birthright Israel program was founded in 1994 by philanthropists Charles Bronfman and Michael Steinhardt in cooperation with the Israeli government,

725-476: A "diaspora-building enterprise" to "ensure the continued existence of vibrant, Israel-oriented Jewish communities abroad". According to a Pew Research study in 2020, there was an 85% increase in American participants who reported attachment to Israel after the trip, a 54% increase in feelings of belonging to the Jewish people, and a 58% increase in feeling closer to their Israeli counterparts. In addition, there

870-577: A 24.9 percent stake in the airline until selling it back to Dan McKinnon in July 2003. By this time, El Al was operating a fleet of 20 aircraft, including nine Boeing 747s, and had begun replacing its aging Boeing 707s with the Boeing 757 . Early that year, following the collapse of the Soviet Union , El Al inaugurated regular flights to Moscow. No airlifts from the former Soviet Union were possible at

1015-630: A Hebrew form. Medieval Hebrew added 6421 words to (Modern) Hebrew. The approximate number of new lexical items in Israeli is 17,000 (cf. 14,762 in Even-Shoshan 1970 [...]). With the inclusion of foreign and technical terms [...], the total number of Israeli words, including words of biblical, rabbinic and medieval descent, is more than 60,000. In Israel, Modern Hebrew is currently taught in institutions called Ulpanim (singular: Ulpan). There are government-owned, as well as private, Ulpanim offering online courses and face-to-face programs. Modern Hebrew

1160-682: A Mega Event for all participants featuring speeches by dignitaries, including the Israeli Prime Minister , and musical performances by popular Israeli artists. The tours also include a 5- to 10-day mifgash (Hebrew for 'encounter') with Israeli peers, usually soldiers serving in the Israel Defense Forces . The stated purpose for the mifgash is for the participants and the soldiers to get to know each other and to better understand each other's worldview and Jewish identity. Guided discussion sessions explore topics such as

1305-816: A campaign called Return the Birthright, which criticizes the Birthright Israel program and urges young Jews to boycott it, stating: "it's unjust that we get a free Birthright trip, while Palestinian refugees can't return to their homes". Birthright Unplugged was founded in 2014 to counterbalance Birthright Israel, with the goal of exposing Jewish and non-Jewish visitors to Palestinian communities inside and outside of Israel. In response, Birthright has added optional activities involving Israeli Arabs . Hebrew language Hebrew ( Hebrew alphabet : עִבְרִית ‎, ʿĪvrīt , pronounced [ ʔivˈʁit ] or [ ʕivˈrit ] ; Samaritan script : ࠏࠨࠁࠬࠓࠪࠉࠕ ‎ ʿÎbrit )

1450-595: A century ago, was fluent enough in this idiom to be able to follow the Mishna Berurah without any trouble." Hebrew has been revived several times as a literary language, most significantly by the Haskalah (Enlightenment) movement of early and mid-19th-century Germany. In the early 19th century, a form of spoken Hebrew had emerged in the markets of Jerusalem between Jews of different linguistic backgrounds to communicate for commercial purposes. This Hebrew dialect

1595-584: A controlling share of the company had been transferred to Knafaim-Arkia Holdings Ltd. As of October 2014, El Al's major shareholders were Knafaim Holdings (36%), Ginsburg Group (10%) and Delek Group (10%). In August 2010, El Al and JetBlue signed an agreement to provide connecting through tickets between Israel and 61 destinations in the United States from October 2010, via John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. In 2015, El Al introduced

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1740-661: A corollary Hebrew ceased to function as a spoken language around the same time. Moshe Zvi Segal , Joseph Klausner and Ben Yehuda are notable exceptions to this view. During the latter half of the 20th century, accumulating archaeological evidence and especially linguistic analysis of the Dead Sea Scrolls has disproven that view. The Dead Sea Scrolls, uncovered in 1946–1948 near Qumran revealed ancient Jewish texts overwhelmingly in Hebrew, not Aramaic. The Qumran scrolls indicate that Hebrew texts were readily understandable to

1885-579: A distinct style of philosophical Hebrew. This is used in the translations made by the Ibn Tibbon family. (Original Jewish philosophical works were usually written in Arabic. ) Another important influence was Maimonides , who developed a simple style based on Mishnaic Hebrew for use in his law code, the Mishneh Torah . Subsequent rabbinic literature is written in a blend between this style and

2030-604: A diverse array of other interests, such as trips for the LGBTQ community, campus trips and accessibility trips. El Al , Israel's largest airline company, is the major operator of the trips' flights. A Birthright Israel trip lasts for 10 days, including travel to and from Israel. Tours travel throughout Israel and Jerusalem to religious and cultural sites, including the Western Wall and the Dead Sea . Trips also often include

2175-594: A gradually accepted movement. It was not, however, until the 1904–1914 Second Aliyah that Hebrew had caught real momentum in Ottoman Palestine with the more highly organized enterprises set forth by the new group of immigrants. When the British Mandate of Palestine recognized Hebrew as one of the country's three official languages (English, Arabic, and Hebrew, in 1922), its new formal status contributed to its diffusion. A constructed modern language with

2320-463: A lawyer from South Africa , was elected head of the company. The first international flight, from Tel Aviv to Paris , with refueling in Rome, took place on 31 July 1949. By the end of 1949, the airline had flown passengers to London and Johannesburg . A state-run domestic airline, Israel Inland Airlines , was founded in 1949 in which El Al had a 50% stake. From its earliest days, the operation of

2465-468: A literary language down through the Byzantine period from the 4th century CE. The exact roles of Aramaic and Hebrew remain hotly debated. A trilingual scenario has been proposed for the land of Israel. Hebrew functioned as the local mother tongue with powerful ties to Israel's history, origins and golden age and as the language of Israel's religion; Aramaic functioned as the international language with

2610-536: A literary language, especially in Spain, as the language of commerce between Jews of different native languages, and as the liturgical language of Judaism, evolving various dialects of literary Medieval Hebrew , until its revival as a spoken language in the late 19th century. In May 2023, Scott Stripling published the finding of what he claims to be the oldest known Hebrew inscription, a curse tablet found at Mount Ebal , dated from around 3200 years ago. The presence of

2755-520: A new King David Lounge at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris. New lounges at Heathrow Airport in London and JFK International Airport in New York had also opened in late 2007. In 2007, El Al invested NIS 1 billion in the purchase of two new Boeing 777-200s that included an updated El Al decal. The aircraft are fitted with upgraded seats with adjustable headrests and legrests. Each seat is equipped with

2900-444: A post-trip follow-up program. One NEXT initiative was I.D. , in which Birthright Israel alumni would perform monologues based on their experiences. Ultimately, a lack of funding for alumni programs in the face of an increased emphasis on youth Israel trips led NEXT to shut down by 2015. In 2010, Birthright launched an extension program called Birthright Excel. Birthright Excel is a 10-week summer program where students can either create

3045-413: A requirement that female flight attendants wear high heels until passengers had been seated. The airline's workers' union stated that the requirement would endanger the health and safety of the flight attendants and instructed its members to ignore the rule. Later that year the requirement was removed. In August 2017, El Al made their inaugural flight of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner . Their first variant of

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3190-475: A rescue package, bought $ 34 million worth of shares, for a stake that equals roughly 15% of the company. The holdings of El Al's owners before the bailout, Knafaim Holdings, fell to 15.2% from 38%. The new management will seek to emphasize "punctuality" and work to upgrade food services across all classes. On 17 April 2022, El-Al started its first direct flight between the Israeli coastal city of Tel Aviv and Egypt's Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh . Flight 5193

3335-548: A set of dialects evolving out of Late Biblical Hebrew and into Mishnaic Hebrew, thus including elements from both but remaining distinct from either. By the start of the Byzantine Period in the 4th century CE, Classical Hebrew ceased as a regularly spoken language, roughly a century after the publication of the Mishnah, apparently declining since the aftermath of the catastrophic Bar Kokhba revolt around 135 CE. In

3480-615: A spoken language, it continued to be used as a lingua franca among scholars and Jews traveling in foreign countries. After the 2nd century CE when the Roman Empire exiled most of the Jewish population of Jerusalem following the Bar Kokhba revolt , they adapted to the societies in which they found themselves, yet letters, contracts, commerce, science, philosophy, medicine, poetry and laws continued to be written mostly in Hebrew, which adapted by borrowing and inventing terms. After

3625-523: A staff of 6,056 globally. The company's revenues for 2016 were $ 2.04 billion, with losses of $ 81 million, compared to a profit of $ 57 million in 2010. In 2018, the company's revenue was $ 7.7 billion, with a net loss of $ 187.55 million. In July 2020, having lost hundreds of millions of dollars due to grounded flights and lay-offs as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic in Israel and abroad, the company reached

3770-612: A touch-screen entertainment system. The first aircraft, named " Sderot ", completed its maiden flight from New York to Tel Aviv on 26 July 2007. The second, " Kiryat Shmona ", was delivered at the end of August 2007. After the United States Federal Aviation Administration downgraded Israel's aviation safety rating to 2 in February 2009, an IATA member warned El Al, as well as competing airlines Arkia and Israir , that they may appear on

3915-472: A truly Semitic vocabulary and written appearance, although often European in phonology , was to take its place among the current languages of the nations. While many saw his work as fanciful or even blasphemous (because Hebrew was the holy language of the Torah and therefore some thought that it should not be used to discuss everyday matters), many soon understood the need for a common language amongst Jews of

4060-447: A venture or intern with a business. The number of participants averaged approximately 45,000 per year, with about 80% from the United States and Canada. After peaking at more than 48,000 participants in 2018, only 35,000 participants attended a Birthright Israel trip in 2022. Due to budgetary cuts, only 23,500 participants were anticipated to participate in the program in 2023. In 2022, Birthright Israel merged with Onward Israel, part of

4205-558: A vernacular in Judea until it was displaced by Aramaic, probably in the 3rd century CE. Certain Sadducee , Pharisee , Scribe , Hermit, Zealot and Priest classes maintained an insistence on Hebrew, and all Jews maintained their identity with Hebrew songs and simple quotations from Hebrew texts. While there is no doubt that at a certain point, Hebrew was displaced as the everyday spoken language of most Jews, and that its chief successor in

4350-518: Is 8198, of which some 2000 are hapax legomena (the number of Biblical Hebrew roots, on which many of these words are based, is 2099). The number of attested Rabbinic Hebrew words is less than 20,000, of which (i) 7879 are Rabbinic par excellence, i.e. they did not appear in the Old Testament (the number of new Rabbinic Hebrew roots is 805); (ii) around 6000 are a subset of Biblical Hebrew; and (iii) several thousand are Aramaic words which can have

4495-644: Is a Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic language family . A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages , it was natively spoken by the Israelites and remained in regular use as a first language until after 200 CE and as the liturgical language of Judaism (since the Second Temple period ) and Samaritanism . The language was revived as a spoken language in the 19th century, and

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4640-487: Is considered one of the world's most secure airlines, thanks to its stringent security procedures, both on the ground and on board its aircraft. Although it has been the target of many attempted hijackings and terror attacks , only one El Al flight has ever been hijacked; that incident did not result in any fatalities. As Israel's national airline, El Al has played an important role in humanitarian rescue efforts, airlifting Jews from other countries to Israel, setting

4785-514: Is fighting to stop businesses from using only English signs to market their services. In 2012, a Knesset bill for the preservation of the Hebrew language was proposed, which includes the stipulation that all signage in Israel must first and foremost be in Hebrew, as with all speeches by Israeli officials abroad. The bill's author, MK Akram Hasson , stated that the bill was proposed as a response to Hebrew "losing its prestige" and children incorporating more English words into their vocabulary. Hebrew

4930-477: Is followed by another video in English. In 2017, the safety video was presented by mentalist Lior Suchard . During the period of Shabbat , El Al observes Jewish religious traditions by refraining from flight operations and occasionally diverting flights or refraining from takeoff if the scheduled arrival would occur on a Saturday. Exceptions to this practice are exceptionally rare, having only occurred twice in

5075-581: Is one of several languages for which the constitution of South Africa calls to be respected in their use for religious purposes. Also, Hebrew is an official national minority language in Poland , since 6 January 2005. Hamas has made Hebrew a compulsory language taught in schools in the Gaza Strip. El Al EL AL is the only commercial airline to equip its planes with missile defense systems to protect its planes against surface-to-air missiles , and

5220-658: Is operated by El-Al subsidiary Sun d’Or. In October 2023, following the need for the urgent return of reserve soldiers due to the start of the Israel–Hamas war , El Al gained halachic approval from the Chief Rabbinate of Israel to break a 40-year policy of not flying on Shabbat , with the last time it flew on a Sabbath being in 1982 during the First Lebanon War . They also flew on the Sabbath following

5365-573: Is the only successful large-scale example of linguistic revival . It is the only Canaanite language, as well as one of only two Northwest Semitic languages, with the other being Aramaic , still spoken today. The earliest examples of written Paleo-Hebrew date back to the 10th century BCE. Nearly all of the Hebrew Bible is written in Biblical Hebrew , with much of its present form in the dialect that scholars believe flourished around

5510-457: Is the primary official language of the State of Israel. As of 2013 , there are about 9 million Hebrew speakers worldwide, of whom 7 million speak it fluently. Currently, 90% of Israeli Jews are proficient in Hebrew, and 70% are highly proficient. Some 60% of Israeli Arabs are also proficient in Hebrew, and 30% report having a higher proficiency in Hebrew than in Arabic. In total, about 53% of

5655-547: Is used to pronounce the Hebrew Bible; however, properly it should be distinguished from the historical Biblical Hebrew of the 6th century BCE, whose original pronunciation must be reconstructed. Tiberian Hebrew incorporates the scholarship of the Masoretes (from masoret meaning "tradition"), who added vowel points and grammar points to the Hebrew letters to preserve much earlier features of Hebrew, for use in chanting

5800-650: The Chayei Adam in Hebrew, as opposed to Yiddish , as a guide to Halacha for the " average 17-year-old" (Ibid. Introduction 1). Similarly, Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan 's purpose in writing the Mishnah Berurah was to "produce a work that could be studied daily so that Jews might know the proper procedures to follow minute by minute". The work was nevertheless written in Talmudic Hebrew and Aramaic, since, "the ordinary Jew [of Eastern Europe] of

5945-543: The Amadeus CRS system for reservation, inventory, check-in and online bookings. In November 2012, the United States FAA restored Israel's category 1 rating. El Al has a cargo branch, El Al Cargo, which became independent in 1997. As the national cargo airline of Israel, it operates between Tel Aviv, Liège , and New York, plus ad hoc worldwide charters with one Boeing 747-200F aircraft. Before 2001, when

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6090-727: The Ancient Greek Ἑβραῖος ( hebraîos ) and Aramaic 'ibrāy , all ultimately derived from Biblical Hebrew Ivri ( עברי ), one of several names for the Israelite ( Jewish and Samaritan ) people ( Hebrews ). It is traditionally understood to be an adjective based on the name of Abraham 's ancestor, Eber , mentioned in Genesis 10:21 . The name is believed to be based on the Semitic root ʕ-b-r ( ע־ב־ר ‎), meaning "beyond", "other side", "across"; interpretations of

6235-503: The Atlantic Ocean will be 20% smaller") to promote its non-stop transatlantic flights . This was a bold step: the airline industry had never used images of the ocean in its advertising because of the widespread public fear of airline crashes. The advertisement, which ran only once, proved effective. Within a year, El Al's sales tripled. Despite the purchase of its Britannia and the inauguration of non-stop transatlantic flights,

6380-547: The Canaanite group of languages . Canaanite languages are a branch of the Northwest Semitic family of languages. Hebrew was the spoken language in the Iron Age kingdoms of Israel and Judah during the period from about 1200 to 586 BCE. Epigraphic evidence from this period confirms the widely accepted view that the earlier layers of biblical literature reflect the language used in these kingdoms. Furthermore,

6525-642: The Egypt–Israel peace treaty . In late 1982, after a long period of labor disputes and strikes, El Al operations were suspended. The government appointed Amram Blum to run the company, which lost $ 123.3 million in the fiscal year ending April 1983. The airline also sold its stake in Arkia at this time. Operations resumed in January 1983 under receivership . The government purchased two new Boeing 737 aircraft and announced plans to acquire four Boeing 767 jets at

6670-596: The European blacklist of banned carriers . Giora Romm , head of the Civil Aviation Authority of Israel , responded to the claim, stating: "We are in close contact with the Europeans." He added: "I don't know what the fuss is about. The Europeans' e-mail is strange. We are doing everything we can to improve security." The European Union has yet to make an official statement on the matter. El Al uses

6815-572: The Gospel of Matthew . (See the Hebrew Gospel hypothesis or Language of Jesus for more details on Hebrew and Aramaic in the gospels.) The term "Mishnaic Hebrew" generally refers to the Hebrew dialects found in the Talmud , excepting quotations from the Hebrew Bible. The dialects organize into Mishnaic Hebrew (also called Tannaitic Hebrew, Early Rabbinic Hebrew, or Mishnaic Hebrew I), which

6960-461: The Greek diaspora , and Domovina Birthright Program for Croatians. Birthright also loosely inspired CubaOne Foundation for Cuban-Americans and Birthright Africa for young Americans of African descent, which was founded in 2015. In 2022, college basketball coach Bruce Pearl launched "Birthright for College Basketball," a 10-day trip bringing American college men's basketball teams to Israel. In 2023,

7105-645: The Jewish Agency for Israel , and Jewish diaspora communities, with the first program trip in 1999. The purpose of Birthright was to strengthen diaspora Jews' connection to Israel and increase a sense of Jewish identity, in response to the 1990 National Jewish Population Survey . By 2007, annual capacity had increased to 20,000 participants a year. That year, the late Sheldon Adelson pledged $ 25 million to Birthright Israel to take applicants off waiting lists and to increase annual capacity to 37,000 for 2007 and 2008. Birthright launched Birthright NEXT in 2007 as

7250-495: The Latin alphabet of ancient Rome . The Gezer calendar is written without any vowels , and it does not use consonants to imply vowels even in the places in which later Hebrew spelling requires them. Numerous older tablets have been found in the region with similar scripts written in other Semitic languages, for example, Proto-Sinaitic . It is believed that the original shapes of the script go back to Egyptian hieroglyphs , though

7395-682: The Maccabean Revolt (167–160 BCE) and the emergence of the Hasmonean kingdom , the Great Jewish Revolt (66–73 CE), and the Bar Kokhba revolt (132–135 CE). The nationalist significance of Hebrew manifested in various ways throughout this period. Michael Owen Wise notes that "Beginning with the time of the Hasmonean revolt [...] Hebrew came to the fore in an expression akin to modern nationalism. A form of classical Hebrew

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7540-536: The Second Aliyah , it replaced a score of languages spoken by Jews at that time. Those languages were Jewish dialects of local languages, including Judaeo-Spanish (also called "Judezmo" and "Ladino"), Yiddish , Judeo-Arabic and Bukhori (Tajiki), or local languages spoken in the Jewish diaspora such as Russian , Persian and Arabic . The major result of the literary work of the Hebrew intellectuals along

7685-462: The literary and liturgical language into everyday spoken language . However, his brand of Hebrew followed norms that had been replaced in Eastern Europe by different grammar and style, in the writings of people like Ahad Ha'am and others. His organizational efforts and involvement with the establishment of schools and the writing of textbooks pushed the vernacularization activity into

7830-403: The longest non-stop commercial flight : an El Al Boeing 707 flew from New York to Tel Aviv, covering 5,760 miles (9,270 km) in 9 hours and 33 minutes. By this time, El Al was carrying 56,000 passengers a year—on a par with Qantas and ahead of established airlines like Loftleiðir . In 1961, El Al ranked 35th in the world in accumulated passenger distance. El Al's success continued into

7975-620: The official language of the State of Israel . Estimates of worldwide usage include five million speakers in 1998, and over nine million people in 2013. After Israel, the United States has the largest Hebrew-speaking population, with approximately 220,000 fluent speakers (see Israeli Americans and Jewish Americans ). Modern Hebrew is the official language of the State of Israel, while pre-revival forms of Hebrew are used for prayer or study in Jewish and Samaritan communities around

8120-543: The ostraca found near Lachish , which describe events preceding the final capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian captivity of 586 BCE. In its widest sense, Biblical Hebrew refers to the spoken language of ancient Israel flourishing between c.  1000 BCE and c.  400 CE . It comprises several evolving and overlapping dialects. The phases of Classical Hebrew are often named after important literary works associated with them. Sometimes

8265-607: The 10th century BCE at the beginning of the Monarchic period , the traditional time of the reign of David and Solomon . Classified as Archaic Biblical Hebrew , the calendar presents a list of seasons and related agricultural activities. The Gezer calendar (named after the city in whose proximity it was found) is written in an old Semitic script, akin to the Phoenician one that, through the Greeks and Etruscans , later became

8410-454: The 1980s in the USSR , Hebrew studies reappeared due to people struggling for permission to go to Israel ( refuseniks ). Several of the teachers were imprisoned, e.g. Yosef Begun , Ephraim Kholmyansky , Yevgeny Korostyshevsky and others responsible for a Hebrew learning network connecting many cities of the USSR. Standard Hebrew, as developed by Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, was based on Mishnaic spelling and Sephardi Hebrew pronunciation. However,

8555-535: The 19th century was a lexical modernization of Hebrew. New words and expressions were adapted as neologisms from the large corpus of Hebrew writings since the Hebrew Bible, or borrowed from Arabic (mainly by Ben-Yehuda) and older Aramaic and Latin. Many new words were either borrowed from or coined after European languages, especially English, Russian, German, and French. Modern Hebrew became an official language in British-ruled Palestine in 1921 (along with English and Arabic), and then in 1948 became an official language of

8700-495: The 6th century BCE, during the time of the Babylonian captivity . For this reason, Hebrew has been referred to by Jews as Lashon Hakodesh ( לְשׁוֹן הַקֹּדֶש , lit.   ' the holy tongue ' or ' the tongue [of] holiness ' ) since ancient times. The language was not referred to by the name Hebrew in the Bible , but as Yehudit ( transl.  ' Judean ' ) or Səpaṯ Kəna'an ( transl.  "the language of Canaan " ). Mishnah Gittin 9:8 refers to

8845-437: The 777-200. Their Economy Class now also featured large personal touch screen entertainment and WiFi. In Business Class, the seats go to a 90° flat bed, have personal service, large touchscreen personal entertainment screens, and storage. In April 2018 the Israel Postal Company issued a stamp with different El Al-planes commemorating the 70th anniversary of the airline. In July 2019, El Al retired its sole freight aircraft,

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8990-579: The Aramaized Rabbinic Hebrew of the Talmud. Hebrew persevered through the ages as the main language for written purposes by all Jewish communities around the world for a large range of uses—not only liturgy, but also poetry, philosophy, science and medicine, commerce, daily correspondence and contracts. There have been many deviations from this generalization such as Bar Kokhba 's letters to his lieutenants, which were mostly in Aramaic, and Maimonides' writings, which were mostly in Arabic; but overall, Hebrew did not cease to be used for such purposes. For example,

9135-503: The British Mandate who at the turn of the 20th century were arriving in large numbers from diverse countries and speaking different languages. A Committee of the Hebrew Language was established. After the establishment of Israel, it became the Academy of the Hebrew Language . The results of Ben-Yehuda's lexicographical work were published in a dictionary ( The Complete Dictionary of Ancient and Modern Hebrew , Ben-Yehuda Dictionary ). The seeds of Ben-Yehuda's work fell on fertile ground, and by

9280-465: The German government through the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany . Leonard Saxe of Brandeis University 's Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies has evaluated the program's impact since its inception in 1999. As of 2020, findings include: Birthright has been called the most influential organization in relations between Israel and the Jewish diaspora. Sociologist Shaul Kelner of Vanderbilt University described Birthright Israel as

9425-416: The Great conquered Babylon, he allowed the Jewish people to return from captivity. In time, a local version of Aramaic came to be spoken in Israel alongside Hebrew. By the beginning of the Common Era , Aramaic was the primary colloquial language of Samarian , Babylonian and Galileean Jews, and western and intellectual Jews spoke Greek , but a form of so-called Rabbinic Hebrew continued to be used as

9570-432: The Hebrew name of god , Yahweh, as three letters, Yod-Heh-Vav (YHV), according to the author and his team meant that the tablet is Hebrew and not Canaanite. However, practically all professional archeologists and epigraphers apart from Stripling's team claim that there is no text on this object. In July 2008, Israeli archaeologist Yossi Garfinkel discovered a ceramic shard at Khirbet Qeiyafa that he claimed may be

9715-437: The Hebrew Bible. The Masoretes inherited a biblical text whose letters were considered too sacred to be altered, so their markings were in the form of pointing in and around the letters. The Syriac alphabet , precursor to the Arabic alphabet , also developed vowel pointing systems around this time. The Aleppo Codex , a Hebrew Bible with the Masoretic pointing, was written in the 10th century, likely in Tiberias, and survives into

9860-594: The Israeli air cargo market opened up to competition, El Al Cargo enjoyed a monopoly. Now, its main competition comes from Challenge Airlines IL . As of December 2022 the company employs a staff of 4,610 globally, and has a fleet of 47 aircraft. The company's revenues for 2023 were $ 2.503 billion, totaling profits of $ 263.7 million, compared to losses of $ 80.7 million in 2016 and a profit of $ 57 million in 2010. El Al has offices in 46 countries, half of them in Europe. El Al has Hebrew language voiceovers and Arabic language subtitles in its flight safety videos , which

10005-454: The Israeli population speaks Hebrew as a native language, while most of the rest speak it fluently. In 2013 Hebrew was the native language of 49% of Israelis over the age of 20, with Russian , Arabic , French , English , Yiddish and Ladino being the native tongues of most of the rest. Some 26% of immigrants from the former Soviet Union and 12% of Arabs reported speaking Hebrew poorly or not at all. Steps have been taken to keep Hebrew

10150-424: The Jewish Agency, which offers programs for young adults to travel to Israel for 6 to 10 weeks to live, work and study. In 2023, Birthright had its first second-generation participant. To participate, individuals must have at least one parent of recognized Jewish descent or who have converted to Judaism through a recognized Jewish movement, and who do not actively practice another religion. They must also be between

10295-689: The Jewish Quarter of the Old City . The cost for each participant, approximately $ 4,500 as of 2020, is covered by a variety of funding sources. According to Birthright Israel, 67% of funding comes from individual donors, 27% from the Israeli government, 3% from Jewish federations , and 3% from the Jewish Agency. The program's largest individual donors have been Sheldon Adelson and Miriam Adelson , who had given more than $ 250 million to Birthright Israel by 2015. Other major donors include prominent philanthropists Charles Bronfman , Edgar Bronfman, Sr. , Daniel Och , Marlene Post, Lynn Schusterman , and Michael Steinhardt. The program also receives funding from

10440-489: The Jewish tradition in the modern world, how Jewish life in Israel differs from Jewish life abroad, and how mandatory military service impacts young Israelis' perceptions of service and commitment to their country. More than 115,000 Israelis have participated in the mifgash program since 2000. For security reasons, Birthright Israel trips do not include travel to the West Bank , Gaza Strip , or East Jerusalem , other than

10585-477: The Middle East was the closely related Aramaic language, then Greek , scholarly opinions on the exact dating of that shift have changed very much. In the first half of the 20th century, most scholars followed Abraham Geiger and Gustaf Dalman in thinking that Aramaic became a spoken language in the land of Israel as early as the beginning of Israel's Hellenistic period in the 4th century BCE, and that as

10730-546: The Sabbath. In 1982 the newly re-elected prime minister Menachem Begin , brought before the Knesset a vote to ban Sabbath flights once again (it passed by a vote of 58 to 54). Outraged, the secular community threatened to boycott the airline. In August 1982 El Al workers blocked Orthodox and Hasidic Jews from entering the airport. In 1977 El Al established a charter subsidiary, El Al Charter Services Ltd., later renamed Sun D'Or International Airlines Ltd . Two years earlier

10875-674: The Talmud, the Gemara , generally comments on the Mishnah and Baraitot in two forms of Aramaic. Nevertheless, Hebrew survived as a liturgical and literary language in the form of later Amoraic Hebrew, which occasionally appears in the text of the Gemara, particularly in the Jerusalem Talmud and the classical aggadah midrashes . Hebrew was always regarded as the language of Israel's religion, history and national pride, and after it faded as

11020-460: The Talmud, various regional literary dialects of Medieval Hebrew evolved. The most important is Tiberian Hebrew or Masoretic Hebrew, a local dialect of Tiberias in Galilee that became the standard for vocalizing the Hebrew Bible and thus still influences all other regional dialects of Hebrew. This Tiberian Hebrew from the 7th to 10th century CE is sometimes called "Biblical Hebrew" because it

11165-488: The ability to speak the language and attempted to promote its use. According to the Jerusalem Talmud , Megillah 1:9: "Rebbi Jonathan from Bet Guvrrin said, four languages are appropriate that the world should use them, and they are these: The Foreign Language (Greek) for song, Latin for war, Syriac for elegies, Hebrew for speech. Some are saying, also Assyrian (Hebrew script) for writing." The later section of

11310-478: The above phases of spoken Classical Hebrew are simplified into "Biblical Hebrew" (including several dialects from the 10th century BCE to 2nd century BCE and extant in certain Dead Sea Scrolls) and "Mishnaic Hebrew" (including several dialects from the 3rd century BCE to the 3rd century CE and extant in certain other Dead Sea Scrolls). However, today most Hebrew linguists classify Dead Sea Scroll Hebrew as

11455-536: The ages of 18 and 26, have completed high school, have never traveled to Israel on a peer educational trip or study program after the age of 18, and have not lived in Israel for more than 3 months after the age of 12. Between 2017 and 2022, Birthright raised the upper age limit for eligibility to 32 to reflect the broader cultural shift of young adults delaying major life decisions like getting married and having children. Trips are organized by different organizations and companies accredited by Birthright Israel, which sets

11600-541: The airline had suffered its first losses since the late 1950s, largely a product of the global recession. The management changed three times towards the end of the 1970s until Itzhak Shander was named president. As the political situation in Iran deteriorated, El Al began to airlift Jews to Israel. All the airline's infrastructure in Iran was eventually destroyed. El Al flights to Cairo were inaugurated in April 1980, following

11745-470: The airline in keeping with Jewish tradition has been a source of friction; when the Israeli prime minister David Ben-Gurion was forming his first coalition, the religious parties would not join unless Ben-Gurion promised that El Al would serve only kosher food on its flights and would not fly on the Jewish Sabbath . El Al owes its name to David Remez , the first Minister of Transport, who based

11890-664: The airline initiated charter services to the United States, followed by scheduled flights soon after. In 1950–1951 El Al expanded its activities in Europe and added new destinations such as Vienna and Istanbul , Athens and Nicosia . On 31 July 1950, the company celebrated the first anniversary of its regular flight program. The airline was involved in several covert operations: In the early 1950s, El Al airlifted over 160,000 immigrants to Israel from Iran , Iraq and Yemen as part of Operation Magic Carpet and Operation Ezra and Nehemiah . In 1960, Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann

12035-459: The airline remained unprofitable. When Efraim Ben-Arzi took over the company in the late 1950s, the Britannias were replaced in the next decade by the Boeing 707 and Boeing 720 jet airliners. The first year that El Al turned a profit was 1960. That year, more than 50 percent of the passengers flying into Israel arrived on El Al flights. On 15 June 1961, the airline set a world record for

12180-403: The airline's history: first during the First Lebanon War and later during the 2023 Israel-Hamas war , when flights operated on Shabbat due to exceptional circumstances. The key trends for El Al Israel Airlines Ltd. are shown below (as at year ending 31 December): The main business of Borenstein, a company fully owned by El Al, registered in the U.S. and operating at New York's JFK airport,

12325-452: The airline's passengers are Israeli. In 2006, El Al posted a $ 44.6 million loss on revenues of $ 1.665 billion. The company is facing four lawsuits, two of which have been approved as class actions , which could cost the company $ 176.2 million. El Al spends $ 100 million a year to conform with airline security measures required by Israel's Shin Bet security service. In early 2007, El Al opened

12470-522: The attacks on Israeli football supporters in November 2024. El Al's headquarters are located on the grounds of Ben Gurion Airport in Central District , Israel , near Lod . In 2022, El Al announced it would be moving its U.S. headquarters from New York to Miami. During 2005, the airline transported 3.5 million passengers, a rise from 3.2 million in 2004 and 2.8 million in 2003. 60% of

12615-561: The average Jew, and that the language had evolved since Biblical times as spoken languages do. Recent scholarship recognizes that reports of Jews speaking in Aramaic indicate a multilingual society, not necessarily the primary language spoken. Alongside Aramaic, Hebrew co-existed within Israel as a spoken language. Most scholars now date the demise of Hebrew as a spoken language to the end of the Roman period , or about 200 CE. It continued on as

12760-547: The beginning of the 20th century, Hebrew was well on its way to becoming the main language of the Jewish population of both Ottoman and British Palestine. At the time, members of the Old Yishuv and a very few Hasidic sects, most notably those under the auspices of Satmar , refused to speak Hebrew and spoke only Yiddish. In the Soviet Union, the use of Hebrew, along with other Jewish cultural and religious activities,

12905-537: The company began in June 2003, the policy regarding Shabbat flights was expected to change. The first phase of the long-delayed privatization of the company commenced in June 2003 and by Israel's Government Companies Authority, headed by Eyal Gabbai . 15 percent of El Al's shares were listed on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange . By June 2004, 50% of the company had been sold to the public. By January 2005,

13050-602: The composition of 1 Maccabees in archaizing Hebrew, Hasmonean coinage under John Hyrcanus (134-104 BCE), and coins from both the Great Revolt and Bar Kokhba Revolt featuring exclusively Hebrew and Palaeo-Hebrew script inscriptions. This deliberate use of Hebrew and Paleo-Hebrew script in official contexts, despite limited literacy, served as a symbol of Jewish nationalism and political independence. The Christian New Testament contains some Semitic place names and quotes. The language of such Semitic glosses (and in general

13195-468: The content of Hebrew inscriptions suggests that the written texts closely mirror the spoken language of that time. Scholars debate the degree to which Hebrew was a spoken vernacular in ancient times following the Babylonian exile when the predominant international language in the region was Old Aramaic . Hebrew was extinct as a colloquial language by late antiquity , but it continued to be used as

13340-492: The cost of $ 200 million. Within four years, El Al was profitable again. It broke another record since then surpassed, in May 1988 with a non-stop flight from Los Angeles to Tel Aviv, a journey of 7,000 nautical miles (13,000 km) in 13 hours and 41 minutes. Flights to Poland and Yugoslavia were started in 1989. In January 1990, North American Airlines began providing feeder services to El Al's US destinations. El Al held

13485-517: The country. The cancellation of Birthright and other heritage trips due to COVID-19 cost the Israeli economy $ 200 million, according to Calcalist . Birthright Israel has inspired similar heritage programs for other diasporas, including Birthright Armenia for the Armenian diaspora , ReConnect Hungary for young adults of the Hungarian diaspora in the U.S. and Canada, Birthright Greece for

13630-568: The dialects of Classical Hebrew that functioned as a living language in the land of Israel. A transitional form of the language occurs in the other works of Tannaitic literature dating from the century beginning with the completion of the Mishnah. These include the halachic Midrashim ( Sifra , Sifre , Mekhilta etc.) and the expanded collection of Mishnah-related material known as the Tosefta . The Talmud contains excerpts from these works, as well as further Tannaitic material not attested elsewhere;

13775-423: The earliest Hebrew writing yet discovered, dating from around 3,000 years ago. Hebrew University archaeologist Amihai Mazar said that the inscription was "proto-Canaanite" but cautioned that "[t]he differentiation between the scripts, and between the languages themselves in that period, remains unclear", and suggested that calling the text Hebrew might be going too far. The Gezer calendar also dates back to

13920-513: The earliest speakers of Modern Hebrew had Yiddish as their native language and often introduced calques from Yiddish and phono-semantic matchings of international words. Despite using Sephardic Hebrew pronunciation as its primary basis, modern Israeli Hebrew has adapted to Ashkenazi Hebrew phonology in some respects, mainly the following: The vocabulary of Israeli Hebrew is much larger than that of earlier periods. According to Ghil'ad Zuckermann : The number of attested Biblical Hebrew words

14065-532: The early 6th century BCE, the Neo-Babylonian Empire conquered the ancient Kingdom of Judah , destroying much of Jerusalem and exiling its population far to the east in Babylon . During the Babylonian captivity , many Israelites learned Aramaic, the closely related Semitic language of their captors. Thus, for a significant period, the Jewish elite became influenced by Aramaic. After Cyrus

14210-660: The failed hijacking of an El Al 707 by Patrick Arguello and Leila Khaled on 6 September 1970, as part of the Dawson's Field hijackings . El Al acquired its first Boeing 747 jet in 1971. Many felt it was a risky purchase given the high cost of the plane and fear of attacks, but El Al operations flourished after the purchase. Another Boeing 747 was delivered in 1973 and was used to start non-stop service from Tel Aviv to New York (El Al – Boeing 707s had flown eastward nonstop since around 1961). El Al passengers and passengers from other airlines were attacked at Lod Airport in 1972, it

14355-711: The first Middle East printing press, in Safed (modern Israel), produced a small number of books in Hebrew in 1577, which were then sold to the nearby Jewish world. This meant not only that well-educated Jews in all parts of the world could correspond in a mutually intelligible language, and that books and legal documents published or written in any part of the world could be read by Jews in all other parts, but that an educated Jew could travel and converse with Jews in distant places, just as priests and other educated Christians could converse in Latin. For example, Rabbi Avraham Danzig wrote

14500-419: The first time, are encouraged to discover new meaning in their personal Jewish identity and connection to Jewish history and culture. Between the program's first trip in 1999 and 2024, more than 850,000 young Jews from 68 countries in the Jewish diaspora have participated in Birthright Israel. It is the largest educational tourism organization in the world. Participation in Birthright Israel has been called

14645-497: The flight, the aircraft was repainted and returned to military use. The Airline was incorporated and became Israel's national flag carrier on 15 November 1948, although it used leased aircraft until February 1949, when two unpressurized DC-4s were purchased from American Airlines . The acquisition was funded by the government of Israel , the Jewish Agency , and other Jewish organizations. The first plane arrived at Lod Airport (later renamed Ben Gurion) on 3 April 1949. Aryeh Pincus,

14790-491: The framework of Operation Solomon . Two babies were born during the flight. The plane carried twice as many passengers as it was designed for. In less than 36 hours, 14,500 Ethiopian Jews were flown to Israel. On 27 April 1994, El Al received its first Boeing 747-400 . El Al flights were inaugurated to the Far East and, in 1995, El Al signed its first codesharing agreement with American Airlines . In February 1995,

14935-406: The generic term for these passages is Baraitot . The dialect of all these works is very similar to Mishnaic Hebrew. About a century after the publication of the Mishnah, Mishnaic Hebrew fell into disuse as a spoken language. By the third century CE, sages could no longer identify the Hebrew names of many plants mentioned in the Mishnah. Only a few sages, primarily in the southern regions, retained

15080-400: The government to make up the hundreds of millions of dollars it had lost due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Israel and abroad. The proposed deal would net the airline $ 250 million in government loans (with a guarantee for 75 percent of the loan in case of defaults) and an additional $ 150 million from its own sale of company shares which, if not sold, would be purchased by the government. The deal

15225-462: The language as Ivrit , meaning Hebrew; however, Mishnah Megillah refers to the language as Ashurit , meaning Assyrian , which is derived from the name of the alphabet used , in contrast to Ivrit , meaning the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet . Hebrew ceased to be a regular spoken language sometime between 200 and 400 CE, as it declined in the aftermath of the unsuccessful Bar Kokhba revolt , which

15370-465: The language spoken by Jews in scenes from the New Testament) is often referred to as "Hebrew" in the text, although this term is often re-interpreted as referring to Aramaic instead and is rendered accordingly in recent translations. Nonetheless, these glosses can be interpreted as Hebrew as well. It has been argued that Hebrew, rather than Aramaic or Koine Greek, lay behind the composition of

15515-471: The language. The revival of the Hebrew language as a mother tongue was initiated in the late 19th century by the efforts of Ben-Yehuda. He joined the Jewish national movement and in 1881 immigrated to Palestine , then a part of the Ottoman Empire . Motivated by the surrounding ideals of renovation and rejection of the diaspora " shtetl " lifestyle, Ben-Yehuda set out to develop tools for making

15660-415: The late 1960s. In 1968, regular flights to Bucharest were inaugurated, and cargo flights began to Europe and the United States. The airline also established a catering subsidiary, Teshet Tourism, and Aviation Services Ltd. All these ventures brought in a profit of $ 2 million that year. In 1968, El Al experienced the first of many acts of terrorism that have been perpetrated against the airline. On 23 July,

15805-470: The logistical, educational, and security standards. All groups are led by licensed Israeli tour guides and are accompanied by an armed security guard. Tours may vary according to age group and the religious background of the participants. Trips may be geared for graduate students, undergraduates at a particular university, participants from a particular city, participants who identify with a particular stream of Judaism , tours for hiking or music enthusiasts, and

15950-447: The name on a passage from the book of Hosea. (Hosea 11:7) A regular service to London was inaugurated in the middle of 1950. Later that year, El Al acquired Universal Airways, which was owned by South African Zionists. El Al's cargo service was inaugurated in 1950 and initially relied on military surplus Curtiss C-46 Commando aircraft. The same aircraft type was used also for passengers transportation in certain routes. The same year

16095-727: The newly declared State of Israel . Hebrew is the most widely spoken language in Israel today. In the Modern Period, from the 19th century onward, the literary Hebrew tradition revived as the spoken language of modern Israel, called variously Israeli Hebrew , Modern Israeli Hebrew , Modern Hebrew , New Hebrew , Israeli Standard Hebrew , Standard Hebrew and so on. Israeli Hebrew exhibits some features of Sephardic Hebrew from its local Jerusalemite tradition but adapts it with numerous neologisms, borrowed terms (often technical) from European languages and adopted terms (often colloquial) from Arabic. The literary and narrative use of Hebrew

16240-527: The only successful hijacking of an El Al aircraft took place, when a Boeing 707 carrying 10 crew and 38 passengers were taken over by three members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). The aircraft, El Al Flight 426 , which was en route from Rome to Tel Aviv, was diverted to Algiers by the hijackers. Negotiations with the hijackers lasted for 40 days. Both the hijackers and

16385-403: The pandemic. This was the first ever nonstop flight from Israel to Australia. El Al offered one flight from Tel Aviv to Perth and Tel Aviv to Melbourne. On 1 July 2020, after returning substantial amounts of leased aircraft (and canceling current leases) the airline canceled all flights and suspended operations indefinitely. On 6 July, the company announced it had worked out a bailout deal with

16530-500: The passengers, including 21 Israeli hostages, were eventually freed. On 26 December of the same year, two PFLP members attacked an El Al aircraft at Athens International Airport , killing an Israeli mechanic. The Israeli Defense Forces responded to the incident on 29 December, with a night-time raid on Lebanon's Beirut Airport , destroying 14 planes on the ground belonging to Middle East Airlines , Trans Mediterranean Airways and Lebanese International Airways . The military action

16675-534: The phonetic values are instead inspired by the acrophonic principle. The common ancestor of Hebrew and Phoenician is called Canaanite , and was the first to use a Semitic alphabet distinct from that of Egyptian. One ancient document is the famous Moabite Stone , written in the Moabite dialect; the Siloam inscription , found near Jerusalem , is an early example of Hebrew. Less ancient samples of Archaic Hebrew include

16820-579: The plane circled the Mediterranean. One-day shopping trips to London and visits to religious sites in eastern Europe were also promoted. In 1997, El Al opened a separate cargo division. El Al's first Boeing 777 embarked on its maiden flight in March 2000. Later that year the controversy over flights on Shabbat erupted again, when the airline announced that it was losing US$ 55 million a year by grounding its planes on Saturdays. After privatization of

16965-451: The plane was the 787-9, but in late 2019, they took delivery of the 787-8. The inaugural service was from Tel Aviv to London and Paris, with the transatlantic inaugural flight from Tel Aviv to Newark. El Al introduced a Premium Economy to this aircraft, in a 2-3-2 configuration. They also launched an upgraded Business Class with “pods” in a 1-2-1 configuration. This was upgraded from the original 2-3-2 configuration of their Business Class on

17110-591: The present day. It is perhaps the most important Hebrew manuscript in existence. During the Golden age of Jewish culture in Spain , important work was done by grammarians in explaining the grammar and vocabulary of Biblical Hebrew; much of this was based on the work of the grammarians of Classical Arabic . Important Hebrew grammarians were Judah ben David Hayyuj , Jonah ibn Janah , Abraham ibn Ezra and later (in Provence ), David Kimhi . A great deal of poetry

17255-635: The primary language of use, and to prevent large-scale incorporation of English words into the Hebrew vocabulary. The Academy of the Hebrew Language of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem currently invents about 2,000 new Hebrew words each year for modern words by finding an original Hebrew word that captures the meaning, as an alternative to incorporating more English words into Hebrew vocabulary. The Haifa municipality has banned officials from using English words in official documents, and

17400-477: The receivership under which the airline had technically been operating since 1982 came to an end. In June 1996, El Al recorded its first flight from Israel to Amman , Jordan . In 1996, El Al recorded US$ 83.1 million in losses, due to the resumption of terrorist activities and the government's open skies policy. To keep its planes flying during this period, El Al introduced flights "to nowhere": passengers were offered various kinds of in-flight entertainment as

17545-674: The rest of the Middle East; and eventually Greek functioned as another international language with the eastern areas of the Roman Empire. William Schniedewind argues that after waning in the Persian period, the religious importance of Hebrew grew in the Hellenistic and Roman periods, and cites epigraphical evidence that Hebrew survived as a vernacular language – though both its grammar and its writing system had been substantially influenced by Aramaic. According to another summary, Greek

17690-493: The southern villages of Judea." In other words, "in terms of dialect geography, at the time of the tannaim Palestine could be divided into the Aramaic-speaking regions of Galilee and Samaria and a smaller area, Judaea, in which Rabbinic Hebrew was used among the descendants of returning exiles." In addition, it has been surmised that Koine Greek was the primary vehicle of communication in coastal cities and among

17835-474: The spoken language of the Russian Jews, should be treated as their only national language, while Hebrew was to be treated as a foreign language. Hebrew books and periodicals ceased to be published and were seized from the libraries, although liturgical texts were still published until the 1930s. Despite numerous protests, a policy of suppression of the teaching of Hebrew operated from the 1930s on. Later in

17980-470: The term "Hebrew" generally render its meaning as roughly "from the other side [of the river/desert]"—i.e., an exonym for the inhabitants of the land of Israel and Judah , perhaps from the perspective of Mesopotamia , Phoenicia or Transjordan (with the river referred to being perhaps the Euphrates , Jordan or Litani ; or maybe the northern Arabian Desert between Babylonia and Canaan ). Compare

18125-471: The time but permission was granted in 1991. Charter flights commenced in August 1991, with immigrants also occupying all available seats on El Al's scheduled routes. In cooperation with Aeroflot , El Al flew more than 400,000 Jewish immigrants to Israel within a three-year period. On 24 May 1991, an El Al Boeing 747 cargo plane airlifted a record-breaking 1,088 Ethiopian Jews from Addis Ababa to Israel in

18270-414: The time, this was not possible. An Israeli C-54 military transport aircraft was instead converted into a civilian plane to transport Weizmann home. The aircraft was painted with the logo of the "El Al/Israel National Aviation Company" and fitted with extra fuel tanks to enable a non-stop flight from Geneva to Israel. It departed from Ekron Air Base on 28 September and returned to Israel the next day. After

18415-763: The trip included a stop in the UAE . Birthright trips have been described as a form of propaganda . Jewish Currents wrote, "Birthright has served as one of the most effective propaganda campaigns on behalf of the Israeli government and its occupation of the Palestinian territories ." The organization has been scrutinized for the large proportion of its funding coming from major Trump and Netanyahu backer Adelson. In 2006, Salon.com alleged that Birthright Israel screened out applicants for political reasons. Birthright Israel claims it does not ask applicants for their political views. The pro-Palestinian Jewish Voice for Peace runs

18560-580: The upper class of Jerusalem , while Aramaic was prevalent in the lower class of Jerusalem, but not in the surrounding countryside. After the suppression of the Bar Kokhba revolt in the 2nd century CE, Judaeans were forced to disperse. Many relocated to Galilee, so most remaining native speakers of Hebrew at that last stage would have been found in the north. Many scholars have pointed out that Hebrew continued to be used alongside Aramaic during Second Temple times, not only for religious purposes but also for nationalistic reasons, especially during revolts such as

18705-505: The word Habiru or cognate Assyrian ebru , of identical meaning. One of the earliest references to the language's name as " Ivrit " is found in the prologue to the Book of Sirach , from the 2nd century BCE. The Hebrew Bible does not use the term "Hebrew" in reference to the language of the Hebrew people; its later historiography, in the Book of Kings , refers to it as יְהוּדִית Yehudit " Judahite (language)". Hebrew belongs to

18850-513: The world record for the most passengers on a commercial aircraft (single plane record of 1,088 passengers on a 747 ) by Operation Solomon when 14,500 Jewish refugees were transported from Ethiopia in 1991. El Al offers only kosher in-flight meals , and does not fly passengers on the Jewish Shabbat or religious holidays. In 2012, El Al operated an all- Boeing fleet of 42 aircraft, flying over 4 million passengers, and employed

18995-595: The world today; the latter group utilizes the Samaritan dialect as their liturgical tongue. As a non- first language , it is studied mostly by non-Israeli Jews and students in Israel, by archaeologists and linguists specializing in the Middle East and its civilizations , and by theologians in Christian seminaries . The modern English word "Hebrew" is derived from Old French Ebrau , via Latin from

19140-421: Was a spoken language , and Amoraic Hebrew (also called Late Rabbinic Hebrew or Mishnaic Hebrew II), which was a literary language . The earlier section of the Talmud is the Mishnah that was published around 200 CE, although many of the stories take place much earlier, and were written in the earlier Mishnaic dialect. The dialect is also found in certain Dead Sea Scrolls. Mishnaic Hebrew is considered to be one of

19285-434: Was an 160% increase in participants' desire to have a Jewish spouse. According to a study by Ernst and Young , Birthright Israel had contributed more than $ 1.1 billion to the Israeli economy by 2016, including $ 840 million in hotel, tourism, and flights revenue, and $ 325 million in participant spending. During the two main period when Birthright trips are operating, Birthright participants make up as many as 12% of tourists in

19430-426: Was approved by a Knesset committee. On 17 September, it was announced that Kanfei Nesharim, a company owned by 27-year-old Eli Rozenberg (son of US Centers Health Care nursing home chain founder Kenny Rozenberg), had bought a controlling 42.85% stake in the airline with a $ 107 million offer. Under the prior negotiated bailout deal, the Israeli government, which had committed to buying any unwanted shares as part of

19575-534: Was captured and flown from Argentina to Israel on an El Al aircraft. In 1955, after using Lockheed Constellations for several years, the airline purchased two Bristol Britannia aircraft. El Al was the second airline in the world to fly this plane, after the British Overseas Airways Corporation . In 1958, El Al ran a newspaper advertisement in the United States featuring a picture of a "shrunken" Atlantic Ocean ("Starting Dec. 23,

19720-457: Was carried out against the Roman Empire by the Jews of Judaea . Aramaic and, to a lesser extent, Greek were already in use as international languages, especially among societal elites and immigrants. Hebrew survived into the medieval period as the language of Jewish liturgy , rabbinic literature , intra-Jewish commerce, and Jewish poetic literature . The first dated book printed in Hebrew

19865-509: Was known as the Lod Airport massacre . In the mid-1970s El Al began to schedule flights from airports outside of Israel that departed on the Jewish shabbat and landed in Israel after it had finished. However, the religious parties in the government were outraged by this change believing that it was a violation of Jewish law and contrary to the agreement signed in the early days of the state, in which El Al promised to refrain from flying on

20010-491: Was now a more significant written language than Aramaic within Judaea." This nationalist aspect was further emphasized during periods of conflict, as Hannah Cotton observing in her analysis of legal documents during the Jewish revolts against Rome that "Hebrew became the symbol of Jewish nationalism, of the independent Jewish State." The nationalist use of Hebrew is evidenced in several historical documents and artefacts, including

20155-566: Was published by Abraham Garton in Reggio ( Calabria , Italy) in 1475. With the rise of Zionism in the 19th century, the Hebrew language experienced a full-scale revival as a spoken and literary language. The creation of a modern version of the ancient language was led by Eliezer Ben-Yehuda . Modern Hebrew ( Ivrit ) became the main language of the Yishuv in Palestine , and subsequently

20300-570: Was responsible for the demise of the LIA, which had most of its fleet destroyed. On 18 February 1969, Palestinians attacked an El Al plane at Zurich Airport , killing the copilot and injuring the pilot. One Palestinian attacker was killed and others were convicted but later released. Between September and December of that year, bomb and grenade attacks occurred at El Al offices in Athens , West Berlin , and Brussels . This wave of violence culminated in

20445-629: Was revived beginning with the Haskalah movement. The first secular periodical in Hebrew, Ha-Me'assef (The Gatherer), was published by maskilim in Königsberg (today's Kaliningrad ) from 1783 onwards. In the mid-19th century, publications of several Eastern European Hebrew-language newspapers (e.g. Hamagid , founded in Ełk in 1856) multiplied. Prominent poets were Hayim Nahman Bialik and Shaul Tchernichovsky ; there were also novels written in

20590-531: Was suppressed. Soviet authorities considered the use of Hebrew "reactionary" since it was associated with Zionism, and the teaching of Hebrew at primary and secondary schools was officially banned by the People's Commissariat for Education as early as 1919, as part of an overall agenda aiming to secularize education (the language itself did not cease to be studied at universities for historical and linguistic purposes ). The official ordinance stated that Yiddish, being

20735-551: Was the language of government, Hebrew the language of prayer, study and religious texts, and Aramaic was the language of legal contracts and trade. There was also a geographic pattern: according to Bernard Spolsky , by the beginning of the Common Era, " Judeo-Aramaic was mainly used in Galilee in the north, Greek was concentrated in the former colonies and around governmental centers, and Hebrew monolingualism continued mainly in

20880-408: Was to a certain extent a pidgin . Near the end of that century the Jewish activist Eliezer Ben-Yehuda , owing to the ideology of the national revival ( שיבת ציון , Shivat Tziyon , later Zionism ), began reviving Hebrew as a modern spoken language. Eventually, as a result of the local movement he created, but more significantly as a result of the new groups of immigrants known under the name of

21025-570: Was written, by poets such as Dunash ben Labrat , Solomon ibn Gabirol , Judah ha-Levi , Moses ibn Ezra and Abraham ibn Ezra , in a "purified" Hebrew based on the work of these grammarians, and in Arabic quantitative or strophic meters. This literary Hebrew was later used by Italian Jewish poets. The need to express scientific and philosophical concepts from Classical Greek and Medieval Arabic motivated Medieval Hebrew to borrow terminology and grammar from these other languages, or to coin equivalent terms from existing Hebrew roots, giving rise to

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