Israeli
Statistics
The
latest economic figures for the State of Israel show that
the Jewish State of Israel is one of the leading five nations
in the world in technology. The gross national income reached
110 billion dollars. Israel’s export amounts to 40
billion dollars. The average income per capita was 18 thousand
dollars.
Israel’s
budget for 2001 is 60 billion dollars "which nearly
equals the budgets of all the Arab countries".
Before
World War II there were 20 million Jews and two million
Moslems in Europe. Now the figures are 20 million Moslems
and two million Jews.
According
to Mr Ben-Porat there are 305 thousand Iraqi Jews in Israel
and elsewhere. Although this figure appears too low, considering
that they were over 160 thousand fifty years ago. However,
a close scrutiny reveals that the correct figure is not
even 305 thousand. The latest official statistics in Israel
show that Jews of Iraqi origin number 252 thousand. Add
to that 20 thousand in the United States, 8,000 in the UK,
2 thousand in Canada, 2 thousand in Australia and the Far
East, we have a total of only 284 thousand!
According
to former President Navon, the average number of children
for a Jewish family in Israel is only 1.6, not enough even
to replace the previous generation, whereas the Palestinians
are doubling and re-doubling their members every generation.
Add to that, that a million Jews have already left Israel,
we can see that there is going to be a serious demographic
crisis in Israel in the years to come. But according to
Mr Navon, Jews prefer quality to quantity, by which it means
that Jews prefer a television, a computer, a motor car and
a freezer to more babies.
Just
before the Six Day War, Israel was going through a crisis
not dissimilar to the present day situation. Jews were leaving
the country in great numbers in search of greener pastures,
and the joke was that a large notice was affixed at the
Ben Gurion airport that the last person to leave, let him
please switch off the lights! Let us hope that the present
situation will also end up in a political triumph of the
magnitude of the Six Day War.
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