The Fiddler On The Roof Town of Odessa Shtetls and Their Lives With Russian Anti-Semites Causing Pogroms

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                 

Members of the Jewish Labour Bund with bodies of their comrades killed in Odessa during the Russian revolution of 1905.  This Bund was "General Federation of Jewish Workers in Lithuania, Poland, and Russia.  They were from the Jewish Socialist Party, founded at a conference in Vilna in 1897, out of the Jewish workers' movement which had existed in Russia from the end of the 1880's.  It served at first as both a trade union and a political party, struggling for better working conditions and for popular education, especially in social problems.  They were outlawed in Czarist Russia and members were severely punished if discovered by the police.  

The 1905 Pogrom of Odessa was the worst anti-Jewish pogrom in Odessa's history. Between 18 and 22 October 1905, ethnic Russians, Ukrainians, and Greeks killed over 400 Jews and damaged or destroyed over 1600 Jewish properties.

The Russian Revolution of 1905, also known as the First Russian Revolution, was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire.  The 1905 revolution was primarily spurred by the international humiliation as a result of the Russian defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, which ended in the same year. Late in the night on February 8, 1904, Japan launched a surprise attack against the Russian-held Port Arthur, along the coast of Manchuria, beginning the Russo-Japanese War. Russia faced many defeats as it battled Japan while also fighting a revolution on the home front.

       Nicholas II or Nikolai II Alexandrovich Romanov, known in the Russian Orthodox Church as Saint Nicholas the Passion-Bearer, was the last Emperor of Russia, King of Congress Poland and Grand Duke of Finland, ruling from 1 November 1894 until his abdication on 15 March 1917, end of WWI.  On 1 March 1881, following the assassination of his grandfather, Tsar Alexander II, Nicholas became heir apparent upon his father's accession as Alexander III.                                              

                     Tsar Nicholas II family portrait On 1 March 1881, following the assassination of his grandfather, Tsar Alexander II, Nicholas became heir apparent upon his father's accession as Alexander III.

 The mass unrest was directed against the Tsar alongside the nobility and ruling class.  The Russian Imperial Romanov family (Nicholas II of Russia, his wife Alexandra Feodorovna, and their five children: Olga, Tatiana, Maria, Anastasia, and Alexei) were shot and bayoneted to death by Bolshevik revolutionaries under Yakov Yurovsky on the orders of the Ural Regional Soviet in Yekaterinburg on the night of 16–17 July 1918.  Tsar Nicholas II enacted some constitutional reform (namely the October Manifesto). This took the form of establishing the State Duma, the multi-party system, and the Russian Constitution of 1906.                                             

     Women and children in the shtetl of Czortkow, Ukraine. (photo: Alter Kacyzne)

Previous pogroms occurred in 1821, 1859, 1871 and 1881.   These earlier incidents were thought to be a result of "frictions unleashed by modernization according to Jarrod Tanny, historian," rather than by a resurgence of medieval antisemitism, but the 1905 pogrom was definitely caused by anti-Semitism.  I'd say they all had been, and modernization really should have been a determent, and a prevention, not a cause.  Whatever were the Russians thinking that modernization actually meant?  Getting rid of the Jews?  

Jews were under unbelievable penalties for being of another faith in Russia.  About 600 oppressive enactments regarding the Jews were published during the reign of Nicholas I who regard them as an injurious element.  In 1827, military service was brutally imposed on Jews and young teen-age boys were taken into the army, called Cantonists; maybe meaning fodder for the canons?  One of several reasons was to dispel them from their Jewish families.  The frontiers of land called "The Pale of Settlement," land where Jews were allowed to live, was restricted in 1835 and remained effective until 1915.  A censorship was imposed on Jewish books in 1836, and in 1844, the Kahal (Jewish congregation having autonomous rights and responsible for taxation) was abolished; 

Czar Alexander II tried to Russify the Jews by education and gradually relaxed the restrictions, while the judicial law of 1864 contained no further anti-Jewish discrimination than already existed.  At this time, 65,000 Russian Jews were engaged in agriculture.  Jews became prominent in economics, culture, and left-wing politics;  social anti-Semitism now began to replace or reinforce the former religious prejudices. To me, anti-Semitism is that, regardless of original reasoning.  It's abhorrent and inexcusable.                            

                                Family portrait:  

As luck would have it, the well-meaning Alexander II was assassinated  in 1881 and this made the Jews chief victims. On 13 March [1 March, Old Style], 1881, Alexander II, the Emperor of Russia, was assassinated in Saint Petersburg, Russia while returning to the Winter Palace from Mikhailovsky Manège in a closed carriage.                    

 Main assassin organizer Andrei Zhelyabov, former Odessa law student kicked out for membership in student unrests, was hung with his wife and other Kiev student rebels. it was said he had been arrested a few days before the attack but was the accused assassin anyway.  He was not Jewish.    

The assassination was planned by the Executive Committee of Narodnaya Volya, chiefly by Andrei Zhelyabov. He had reigned from 1855 to 1881 and had alleviated some of the anti-Jewish decrees of his father, Nicholas I, and this encouraged emancipatory elements in Russian Jewry.    

      The Mir Shtetl  

Appalling pogroms of the early 1880's were the result, influencing the official view regarding the Jews as a foreign element to be kept apart from the village population which was expressed in the MAY LAWS. As for being foreigners, Jews had been living in Russian land since the 900s if not before.   

Czar Alexander III implemented the May Laws in 1882, which isolated Russian Jews even further. Under these laws, they were not allowed to live anywhere outside of shtetls and nearby towns. They also had to follow some Christian customs, such as closing businesses on Sundays and Christian holidays. This new law resulted in poverty and hunger amongst the Jewish community. Originally, regulations of May 1882 were intended only as temporary measures until a future revision of the laws concerning the Jews but remained in effect for more than thirty years.

Shtetls were isolated from other vibrant towns and cities in Russia, as they were located on the western border of Russia. Russian Jews were ordered to live in these run-down areas by Catherine the Great in 1791 due to business competition and the increase of anti-Semitism. They became the home for Russian Jews and others for over a century. 
                                    

Although shtetl means little town, history shows that hundreds and thousands of people could live in one shtetl together in very crowded conditions. Shtetls usually were made up of wooden houses, synagogues, study houses, a marketplace, and a Jewish cemetery. Because Russia was trying to drive out the Jews, some Christian churches could’ve also been found in shtetls. Shtetls were ran under a kahal, which means “community council." History also shows that Jews were not the only groups of people living in shtetls. Many non-Jews lived in shtetls, too. Because of this, no shtetl was a spitting image to another. Each shtetl was distinct in terms of dialect, politics, etc.
                                   

As the Russians feared that Jews were interfering with the country’s progress, the Jews were even more scared of the Russian government while they lived in shtetls. The Russian government would invade the shtetls and destroy homes and businesses at any time they pleased. These organized riots were known as pogroms, and they were so violent that they often led to injuries and deaths within the Russian Jewish community. Jews were never at ease while living in shtetls because a pogrom by the Russian government could happen at any minute.  

Resource:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1905_Russian_Revolution#:~:text=The%20Russian%20Revolution%20of%201905,the%20nobility%20and%20ruling%20class.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odessa_pogroms#:~:text=The%201905%20Pogrom%20of%20Odessa,destroyed%20over%201600%20Jewish%20properties.

https://www.stnj.org/explore/magazine/article/19-12-09-Fiddler-Russia-Scene-Notes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Execution_of_the_Romanov_family#:~:text=The%20Russian%20Imperial%20Romanov%20family,Yekaterinburg%20on%20the%20night%20of

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarrod_Tanny

Russian Dynasties who were Anti-Semitic; Alexander, Romanov

Nadene Goldfoot                                           
                                                                           

               Peter the Great,  reigned in Russia from May 7,1682  to February 8, 1725. Peter’s father, Romanov czar Alexis Mikhailovich, married twice. Both his wives bore him children, giving rise to a bitter and bloody succession struggle after his death.
Peter’s mother, Natalya Naryshkina, was Alexis’ second wife. Highly intelligent, Natalya was rare among Russian women for her European education. She also had a Karaite ancestor – one Naryshko of the Crimean Peninsula – about whom she was quite open. Karaites are a Jewish sect who reject the Oral Law and started in the 8th century in and around Persia.  Those Jews had not accepted the discipline of the Babylonian gaonate.  

Interestingly enough, all Romanov rulers after Peter remembered their descent from this gentleman, exercising tolerance toward the Karaite minority in both Crimea and Lithuania. Peter himself ignored his roots; the Karaite connection doesn’t seem to have affected his attitude toward Jews.  Those who disliked him called him the antiChrist, making him to dislike Jews.  

Peter had 2 wives and altogether, 14 children.  "He took Martha Skavronskaya, a Polish-Lithuanian peasant, as a mistress some time between 1702 and 1704. Martha converted to the Russian Orthodox Church and took the name Catherine. Though no record exists, Catherine and Peter are described as having married secretly between 23 Oct and 1 December 1707 in St. Petersburg. Peter valued Catherine and married her again (this time officially) at Saint Isaac's Cathedral in Saint Petersburg on 1712-02-19.  She is known as Catherine I.  In 1724 Peter had his second wife, Catherine, crowned as Empress, although he remained Russia's actual ruler. All of Peter's male children had died.
                                                                           

Catherine I b: April 15, 1684 in Estonia, actuallyPolish: Marta Helena Skowrońska, later known as Marta Samuilovna Skavronskaya, a Roman Catholic peasant
d: May 17, 1727 in Russia

 Catherine I was a Russian Empress.  She ruled from 1725 to 1727, and in May 1727, expelled all Jews living in Little Russia (Belarus and Ukraine).  This order was countermande after her death.  She was the 2nd wife of Peter the Great b: 1712 who; died in 1725.  When he died, she picked up the reigns.  . 

"Catherine was the first woman to rule Imperial Russia, opening the legal path for a century almost entirely dominated by women, including her daughter Elizabeth and granddaughter-in-law Catherine the Great, all of whom continued Peter the Great's policies in modernizing Russia. At the time of Peter's death the Russian Army, composed of 130,000 men and supplemented by another 100,000 Cossacks, was easily the largest in Europe. However, the expense of the military was proving ruinous to the Russian economy, consuming some 65% of the government's annual revenue. Since the nation was at peace, Catherine was determined to reduce military expenditure. For most of her reign, Catherine I was controlled by her advisers. However, on this single issue, the reduction of military expenses, Catherine was able to have her way."

                                                                           

Peter III"Peter III was Emperor of Russia for six months in 1762. He was born in Kiel, Germany as Charles Peter Ulrich of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorp, the only child of Charles Frederick, Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, and Anna Petrovna.Nature had made him mean, the smallpox had made him hideous, and his degraded habits made him loathsome. And Peter had all the sentiments of the worst kind of small German prince of the time. He had the conviction that his princeship entitled him to disregard decency and the feelings of others. He planned brutal practical jokes, in which blows had always a share. His most manly taste did not rise above the kind of military interest which has been defined as "corporal's mania," the passion for uniforms, pipeclay, buttons, the "tricks of parade and the froth of discipline." He detested the Russians, and surrounded himself with Holsteiners.
It was arranged for Peter to marry his 2nd cousin, Sophia Augusta Frederica (later Catherine the Great), daughter of Christian August, Prince of Anhalt-Zerbst and Princess Joanna Elisabeth of Holstein-Gottorp. The young princess formally converted to Russian Orthodoxy and took the name Ekaterina Alexeievna (i.e., Catherine). They married on 21 August 1745. The marriage was not a happy one but produced one son, the future Emperor Paul, and one daughter, Anna Petrovna (20 December 1757 – 19 March 1759). Catherine later claimed that Paul was not fathered by Peter: that, in fact, they had never consummated the marriage.  During the sixteen years of their residence in Oranienbaum, Catherine took numerous lovers, while her husband did the same in the beginning."  Seems she took her frustrations out on us Jews. 

Princess Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst Stettin, Pomerania, Prussia
(now Szczecin, Poland) AKA
Catherine II, known to her people as Catherine the Great
Antisemite most well known to today's Jews
who created the Pale of Settlement, which forced Jews
out of Russia and into nearby land she owned.
She had married Peter III

She came to power following a coup d'état that she organised—resulting in her husband, Peter III, being overthrown.  

She ruled from 1762 to 1796, and her Jewish policy was marked by a
combination of liberalism and coercion.  On the one hand, Jews were allowed
to register in the merchant and urban classes in 1780 but permission was restricted to White Russia in 1786.  This marked the beginning of the Pale of Settlement.  During her last years, which were marked by reaction in 1789 to 1796, she prevented the extension of Jewish settlement and in 1795, prohibited Jewish residence in Rural areas.  

Russia often treated Judaism as a separate entity, where Jews were maintained with a separate legal and bureaucratic system. Although the government knew that Judaism existed, Catherine and her advisers had no real definition of what a "Jew" is, since the term meant many things during her reign. Judaism was a small, if not nonexistent, religion in Russia until 1772. When Catherine agreed to the First Partition of Poland, the large new Jewish element was treated as a separate people, defined by their religion. In keeping with their treatment in Poland, Catherine allowed the Jews to separate themselves from Orthodox society, with certain restrictions. She levied additional taxes on the followers of Judaism; if a family converted to the Orthodox faith, that additional tax was lifted. Jewish members of society were required to pay double the tax of their Orthodox neighbours. Converted Jews could gain permission to enter the merchant class and farm as free peasants under Russian rule.

In an attempt to assimilate the Jews into Russia's economy, Catherine included them under the rights and laws of the Charter of the Towns of 1782. Orthodox Russians disliked the inclusion of Judaism, mainly for economic reasons. Catherine tried to keep the Jews away from certain economic spheres, even under the guise of equality; in 1790, she banned Jewish citizens from Moscow's middle class.

In 1785, Catherine declared Jews to be officially foreigners, with foreigners' rights. This re-established the separate identity that Judaism maintained in Russia throughout the Jewish Haskalah. Catherine's decree also denied Jews the rights of an Orthodox or naturalised citizen of Russia. Taxes doubled again for those of Jewish descent in 1794, and Catherine officially declared that Jews bore no relation to Russians.  

                                                                         

Nicholas Pavlovich Romanov
Emperor Nicholas I of the Romanav Dynasty,
b: July 6, 1796; d: March 2, 1855
The man was 6'9" tall.  

Jews lived under Russian Czars throughout the 19th century and had to endure many a pogrom before escaping to such places as the USA and Palestine.  The Nicholas Czars were all anti-Semitic.

Nicholas I reigned as Emperor in Russia from 1825 to 1855.  He was also king in Poland next door, also the home of many Jews.  He was also a Grand Duke of Finland.  He was the grandson of Catherine the Great.  He married Alexandra Feodorovna AKA Charlotte of Prussia and they had 7 children.  

                   Life of Jews under Nicholas I of Russia

In 1851 the Jewish population numbered at 2.4 million with 212,000 of them living in Russian controlled Poland territory. This made them one of the largest inorodtsy minorities in the Russian Empire.

He aimed at assimilating the Jews by police methods.  

On 26 August 1827 the edict of military conscription ("Ustav rekrutskoi povinnosti") was introduced, which required Jewish boys to serve in the Russian military for 25 years from the age of 18. Before that many of them were forcibly conscripted into Cantonist schools since the age of 12, while being a Cantonist did not count into the time of military service. They were sent far away from their families to serve in the military so they would have difficulties to practice Judaism and thus be Russified. The poor, village Jews and Jews without families or unmarried Jews were especially targeted for the military service. Between 1827 and 1854 it is estimated that there were 70,000 Jews conscripted. Some of the Jews who served in the Russian military eventually converted to Christianity.

By 1844, the Jewish community organization was abolished and secular government schools were introduced.  The Jewish costume was forbidden in 1850.  Intellectual life was strictly supervised.  Converts to Christianity were granted several years exemption from taxation.  

Under Nicholas I, the Jewish agricultural colonisation of Ukraine continued with the transfer of Siberian Jews to Ukraine. In Ukraine, Jews were given land, but had to pay for it, leaving very little to support their families. On the other hand, these Jews were exempt from the forced military conscription.

Under Nicholas I there were attempts to reform the education of the Jews in attempt of Russification. The study of the Talmud was disapproved as it was seen as a text that encouraged Jewish segregation from Russian society. Nicholas I further toughened censorship of the Jewish books in Yiddish and Hebrew by allowing these to be printed only in Zhitomir and Vilna, Lithuania. 

^{Tsar Nicholas I aimed to destroy Jewish life, and his reign is remembered as one of the most 
painful episodes for European Jewry. In 1825, Tsar Nicholas ordered the conscription of all
 Jewish males into the Russian imperial military beginning at age 12. In Jewish diasporal
 communities hailing from the Russian Empire, the 19th century is often recalled as a time 
where Jews were forced to the front lines of the army and used as "cannon fodder". Jews 
were forbidden from becoming officers.  Many of the boys forced into the military were 
captured by "snatchers" (khapers). Jewish agricultural communities in more Southern 
areas were often exempt as the Russian government liked to encourage agriculturalism among 
Jews, while other communities that were exempted were often expelled from their towns
 and villages.}                                                  
                                                             

Alexander I of Russia  reigned from 1801 to 1825.
born 23 December 1777; d: December 1, 1825.
He was the son of Paul I and Sophie Dorothea of Württemberg,Germany.  On 9 October 1793, Alexander married Louise of Baden, known as Elizabeth Alexeievna after her conversion to the Orthodox Church. He later told his friend Frederick William III that the marriage, a political match devised by his grandmother, Catherine the Great, regrettably proved to be a misfortune for him and his spouse. 
His 1st Jewish policy was a liberal one, and during his reign,
the 1st Jewish agricultural colonies were established in S. Russia.
His ultimate goal, however, was not the amelioration of the position of the
Jews, but the undermining of their religious individuality.

He changed his approach later, and imposed restrictions on the Jews
and ordered their expulsion from many regions in Russia.  With his mental health deteriorating, Alexander grew increasingly suspicious of those around him, more withdrawn, more religious, and more passive. Some historians conclude his profile "coincides precisely with the schizophrenic prototype: a withdrawn, seclusive, rather shy, introvertive, unaggressive, and somewhat apathetic individual"

                                                            

Son Alexander II of Russia  reigned from 1855 to 1881.
Born April 29, 1818; assassinated: March 13, 1881.
At the beginning of his reign, he eased up some of the anti-Jewish decrees of his father, Nicholas I, and this was encouraging to the Jews in hope for emancipation.  But, towards the end of his reign, an anti-Semitic tendency
was running through the palace as well which won out. Long-standing repressive policies and attitudes towards the Jews were intensified after the assassination of Tsar Alexander II on 13 March 1881. This event was wrongly blamed on the Jews and sparked widespread Anti-Jewish pogroms in the Russian Empire, which lasted for three years, from 27 April 1881 to 1884.

                                                                                                                          

Alexander III reigned from 1881 to 1894.
At 6'3", his reign is remembered for his harsh anti-Jewish measures including
the MAY LAWS, expulsions from villages and from Moscow, and widespread pogroms and anti-Semitism in universities.  This caused mass Jewish emigrations to the West and a fillip to the Zionist movement in Russia to return to Palestine (Israel). The 1st aliyah (return) was in 1880.  

 Alexander III; 10 March 1845 – 1 November 1894) was Emperor of Russia, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Finland from 13 March 1881 until his death on 1 November 1894.He was highly reactionary and reversed some of the liberal reforms of his father, Alexander II. Under the influence of Konstantin Pobedonostsev (1827–1907) he opposed any reform that limited his autocratic rule.  Tsar Alexander III (1881-1894) was hostile to Jews; his reign witnessed a sharp deterioration in the Jews' economic, social, and political condition.                

The Warsaw pogrom of 1881 worsened Polish-Jewish relations, and was criticized by some members of the Polish elite. Historian Michael Ochs notes that period from 1863 to 1881 was witnessing the increase of anti-Semitism in the Russian-controlled Poland.

They banned Jews from inhabiting rural areas and shtetls (even within the Pale of Settlement) and restricted the occupations in which they could engage. The Russian imperial police strictly applied the anti-Semitic discriminatory laws, while the Russian media engaged in unrestrained anti-Semitic propaganda. In 1891, all Jews were systematically expelled from Moscow. These repressions embittered many Jews against Russian society, convincing many that Russia could no longer be their home.

The Tsar's minister Konstantin Petrovich Pobedonostsev stated the aim of the government with regard to the Jews was that "One third will die out, one third will leave the country and one third will be completely dissolved in the surrounding population".  The pogroms and the repressive legislation resulted in the mass emigration of Jews to western Europe and America. Between 1881 and the outbreak of the First World War, an estimated 2.5 million Jews left Russia - one of the largest group migrations in recorded history.

After the Pesach pogrom of 1903, pogroms became the official policy of the Russian Empire, and the anti-Semitic terror reached its peak in October 1905.

Nikolai Alexandrovich Romanov
Emperor Nicholas II b: May 18, 1868; d: July 17, 1918
His wife was also Alexandra Feodorovna AKA Alix of Hesse (German).
They were married in 1894.  

^{Nicholas II, was the last emperor of Russia and reigned from November 1,} 

^{1894 to March 15, 1917.  He was forced to abdicate and then the whole family} 

^{was murdered, a plot that made movies and books as well as now on Netflix.}

^{A girl was found with amnesia, saying she was the last child of the family,} 

^{Anastasia, which turned out to be false.}  

^{Nicholas continued the harsh policies of his father, Alexander III}

 ^{toward the Jews.}

^{Severe pogroms occurred in 1903 to 1907, and the notorious Beilis trial took} 

^{place in 1913.  When his premier, Stolypin, presented a plan affording some relief} 

^{to the Jews, Nichals replied:  "As long as I am czar, the Jews of Russia shall}

 ^{not receive equal rights."}   With his family, he was imprisoned by the Bolsheviks at that time, exiled to Siberia, and executed the following year in July 1918.  

No wonder we had issues like the Bellis Affair happen.  Menahem Mendel Beilis was a Russian Jew accused of ritual murder in Kiev in the Russian Empire in a notorious 1913 trial, known as the "Beilis trial" or "Beilis affair". The process sparked international criticism of the antisemitic policies of the Russian Empire. The Beilis trial took place in Kiev from September 25 through October 28, 1913. The Beilis case was compared with the Leo Frank case in which an American Jew was convicted of raping and murdering 13-year-old Mary Phagan. After his acquittal, Beilis became an enormous hero and celebrity.

In World War I, many Jews felt they could improve their position in society if they contributed to defending Russia. Over 400,000 were mobilized and 80,000 served on the front lines. Despite this, when the Russian army faced defeat, anti-Semitic commanders blamed Jewish populations. Jews were accused of treason and spying for the Germans, with some Jews being kidnapped and tried for espionage. After their trials, mass expulsions of Jews living near the front lines were organized, with Jews being expelled from Courland and northern Lithuania in 1915. One month later, the printing of Hebrew characters was forbidden.

^Resource:  

^{The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia}

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_I_of_Russia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_the_Great

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_I_of_Russia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_III_of_Russia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism_in_the_Russian_Empire
https://segulamag.com/en/articles/in-the-service-of-the-czar/
https://www.haaretz.com/.premium-did-rasputin-get-a-bum-rap-1.5334399

Jerusalem in Judah's Judean Hills of Judea, Plains and It's History

Nadene Goldfoot                                                                  

Judea and Samaria;  the so called West Bank.  The tribe of Judah lived in the southern part of Israel, and broke off from it after King Solomon died as the state of Judah.  Romans called it Judea.  Through Israel and Judah one can see the Judean Hills.  This is the mountainous region of the central part of the land.  They were fertile and held many people in biblical days.  One can understand this, since the higher up one goes, the cooler the temperature is, and Israel is in a hot climate. During the 2nd Temple days, rabbinic studies were pursued in the Academy, another term for the University, a school of higher Jewish learning.  After the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE, they became the central authority of the Jewish people who remained.
                                                                         

The hills  were neglected and suffered severely from soil erosion after the Jews were taken away forcefully or scattered after 70 CE.  However, the 1st Academy founded after 70 CE was that set up by Johanan ben Zakkai at Jabneh (Jabneel) in Judah south of Jaffa.  It had been used as a barrier against Philistine expansion earlier.  . Zakkai  set the Academy up with a group of scholars and reestablished the  Great Sanhedrin which  sat in Jabneh until the Bar Kokhba revolt.  .  Later, others sprang up under the leadership of great scholars, such as that at Lydda which had been built by the tribe of Benjamin and became part of Judah in 145 BCE,  under Eliezer Ben Hyycanus, and that at Pekiin in Upper Galilee (Baka)  under Joshua Ben Hananiah.

 Pekiin was where Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai and his son Eleazar hid from the Romans in a cave for 13 years.  According to local tradition, the Jews of Pekiin never left their village and continued to live there from the times of the 2nd Temple; unbroken residence certain from the 16th century.  Population in 1990 was 3,400 mostly Druze and some Arab Christian and only one Jewish family left.  After Bar Kokhba's rebellion in 132-135 CE and the catastrophic decline in the population of Judea, the center of Jewish learning had moved north, to the Galilee. Again, they may have enjoyed the cool breezes there as the elevation was higher.

 The central school of authority was moved to Usha, where the pupils of Rabbi Akiva were the majority. It was near Haifa.  A synod was held here where far-reaching legislation was enacted.  It was also for a time the seat of the Sanhedrin.  It's Academy was led by distinguished scholars including Rabbi Meir and Rabbi Yose ha-Gelili.  A modern settlement was founded in 1937 by Zionist youth.  By 1990 the population was 393.   Later it moved to Shepharam,  in Lower Galilee where Druze and Christian Arabs live today.  In the 2nd century CE it was the seat of the Sanhedrin under Rabbi Judah ha-Nasi.
                                                               

The Crusaders fortified the town with a fortress, and later it was Saladin's base in his siege of Acre. Then the Sanhedrin moved to Bet Shearim which was a spiritual center in 170 CE when Judah Ha-Nasi transferred his academy and Sanhedrin there from Shepharam.  He was buried there which was a central burial -place for Jews from the Diaspora as well as from Palestine. The new building there is 3 miles from the ancient site now in the western valley of Jeezreel, founded in 1936 with a population in 1990 of 383,  and finally moved to Sepphoris in the Galilee, capital in late 2nd Temple times.  Sepphoris's population favored peace with the Romans and surrendered in 67 CE.  It was the seat of the patriarchate from Ha-Nasi until its removal to Tiberias in the 3rd century.    It was here that Rabbi Judah ha-Nasi compiled  the Mishnah.  After he died, the center moved to Tiberias which remained the chief school of Jewish learning for centuries.  It was here that the Jerusalem Talmud and later, the Masorah were compiled.  It was renamed Diocaesarea from the 2nd century but remained a Jewish city in Byzantine times, and was the center of revolt in 315.Finally, Jews were expelled after the 6th century.  Population in 1990 was 329.

Jews returned 2000 years later starting in 1892 and brought in 25,000 to 35,000 Jews.  In 1894  the First Aliyah of Jewish returnees from Yemen and then 7 months later, Eastern Europe   made up the foundation group of Motza.  This was a rural settlement near Jerusalem.  "While all throughout history Jews immigrated to Israel (such as the Vilna Gaon's group), these were generally smaller groups with more religious motives, and did not have a purely secular political goal in mind."  

These Europeans, a lot from Russia, were escaping political persecution being anti-Semitism.  "Russian persecution of Jews was also a factor. In 1881, the czar Alexander II of Russia was assassinated, and the ruling bodies blamed the Jews for the assassination.  They were being raided by Cossacks on horses periodically and attacked and injured or killed.  My own grandmother in Poland suffered from such an ordeal as a young girl and had both legs broken.  Golda Meier suffered from a pogrom like this and she came to the USA first.  "Anti-Semitic attacks affected Jewish societies in the Pale of Settlement, Galicia, and Romania."

Motza was a biblical town near Jerusalem and belonged to the tribe of Benjamin.  It still existed in 2nd Temple times.  After the destruction of the 2nd Temple, Vespasian ordered 800 Roman legionaires to settle at Motza, which was now known in Latin as Colonia Amasa.  The modern settlement was erected nearby.  In 1990, the population was 708.

The first king of Israel was from the tribe of Benjamin and was Saul, the son of Kish. The tribe of Benjamin occupied territory between Ephraim and Judah which included Jerusalem.     They were being threatened militarily by the Philistines and the Ammonites.  It was the prophet, Samuel (11th cent. BCE), a Levite, from the tribe of Levi, the same as Moses and Aaron, who selected Saul as king.   Saul immediately organized a trained army and started to defeat the enemy.   They also had to fight against the Moabites, Ammonites and Arameans.  Saul also worked on their religion brought to them by Moses.  He eliminated witchcraft.  Friction occurred and Samuel replaced Saul with David.

The second king, King David, was king from about 1,000 BCE to 960 BCE and was the youngest son of Jesse, who was the grandson of Ruth and Boaz., born in Bethlehem.  He had married Saul's daughter,  Michal.  He chose Hebron as his first capital as the king of Judah.  He later captured Jerusalem from the Jebusites and made it his capital.  It was there that he moved the Ark of the Covenant.

The territory belonging to the tribe of Benjamin was a bone of contention between the kingdoms of Israel and Judah after the division of the kingdom when King Solomon died.Eventually, it was partitioned between the two tribes.
                                                                         

1898 Kindergarten in 1st Aliyah 
These 5 year-olds would have been 50 years old on May 14, 1948 if they all lived. They were from Rishon LeZion on the Judean coastal plain.  

 Rosh Pinna in the upper Galilee as the 1st Jewish agricultural settlement in the modern period, Zikhron Ya'akov on Mt. Carmel (with height of 1,742, not a part of the Judean hills) but great for grapes for wine, and Gedera in the southern Judean plain etc were started in the 1st Aliyah as farming sites.  

From 1948 to 1967, only a small area of the Judean Hills, otherwise called the Jerusalem Corridor, and some of the foothills was incorporated into Israel at the time of its rebirth on May 14, 1948.  The rest of the hills were in the kingdom of Jordan.  This is because Israel lost 80% of their promised land that had been thee ancient  site of Israel to King Abdullah who was a king in need of a kingdom, and the Brits with the mandate went ahead and allowed him to take this from the Jews.
                                                                       

Jerusalem's Wall at night

After the 1967 Six Day War when Israel was attacked by her many neighbors  pulled a miracle and won the war,  the entire area has been under Israeli rule.  This happens when one wins a war that one does not start or want.  It turned out that she got her original land back, however.

This mountain range is crucial because this is where Jerusalem lies.   Jerusalem is situated roughly in the center of the Judean Mountains.  The original city was slightly east of the watershed between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea.  The New City of Jerusalem has spread across the watershed into a series of ridges and valleys facing west.   The hills reach 1,000 meters or 3,280 feet high.  Jerusalem can have snow in the winter.  Safed is about as high as Jerusalem.
                                                                 

"An Israel Railways line runs from Beit Shemesh along the Brook of Sorek and Valley of Rephaim into Jerusalem Malha Train Station."  The old joke was telling people not to put their arm outside the window or it would be in Jordan.  Truly, 9 miles width for Israel is not much at that point.  There's truth to this joke.  

Judea's history is the most integral part of the history of the Jews.  From Israel's southern end  to Judah,   the burning of Jerusalem in 70 CE and onward, the history has extended to today.   

Resource:  The New Jewish Encyclopedia
http://www.geographic.org/geographic_names/name.php?uni=-1120086&fid=3081&c=israel
https://www.google.com/search?q=Judean+Hills,+pictures&biw=984&bih=636&tbm=isch&imgil=SpPr4Rlo0JNpiM%253A%253BeTEsdYpoA-vdxM%253Bhttps%25253A%25252F%25252Fwww.flickr.com%25252Fphotos%25252Fder_rosenkavalier%25252F3049937411%25252F&source=iu&pf=m&fir=SpPr4Rlo0JNpiM%253A%252CeTEsdYpoA-vdxM%252C_&usg=__P5B6rTzvgokeZwpmPN4CTLpVUcQ%3D&dpr=1&ved=0CDEQyjc&ei=04QyVYPxLc71oASixYCICw#imgrc=SpPr4Rlo0JNpiM%253A%3BeTEsdYpoA-vdxM%3Bhttps%253A%252F%252Fc2.staticflickr.com%252F4%252F3248%252F3049937411_a38a2f0fb2.jpg%3Bhttps%253A%252F%252Fwww.flickr.com%252Fphotos%252Fder_rosenkavalier%252F3049937411%252F%3B500%3B333  pictures
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judaean_Mountains
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Aliyah