Coordinates	9°1′48″N38°44′24″N
Group	Ashkenazi Jews( ''Y'hude Ashk'naz'' in Biblical Hebrew; ''Y'hudey Ashknoz'' in Ashkenazi Hebrew)
Poptime	8–11.2 million
Region1
Pop1	5–6 million
Region2
Pop2	2.8–4 million
Langs	''Historical:'' Yiddish ''Modern:'' Local languages, primarily: English, Hebrew, Russian
Rels	primarily Judaism
Related	Sephardi Jews, Mizrahi Jews, and other Jewish ethnic divisions. }}

Ashkenazi Jews, also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim (, , singular: ; also , ''Y'hudey Ashkenaz'', "the Jews of Ashkenaz"), are the Jews descended from the medieval Jewish communities along the Rhine in Germany from Alsace in the south to the Rhineland in the north. ''Ashkenaz'' is the medieval Hebrew name for this region and thus for Germany. Thus, ''Ashkenazim'' or ''Ashkenazi Jews'' are literally "German Jews." Later, Jews from Western and Central Europe came to be called "Ashkenaz" because the main centers of Jewish learning were located in Germany. Ashkenaz is also a Japhetic patriarch in the Table of Nations (Genesis 10).

Many Ashkenazi Jews later migrated, largely eastward, forming communities in non German-speaking areas, including Hungary, Poland, Belarus, Lithuania, Russia, Ukraine, Eastern Europe, and elsewhere between the 11th and 19th centuries. With them, they took and diversified Yiddish, a Germanic language with Hebrew influence, written in Hebrew letters. It had developed in medieval times as the ''lingua franca'' among Ashkenazi Jews. The Jewish communities of three cities along the Rhine: Speyer, Worms and Mainz, created the SHUM league (SHUM after the first Hebrew letters of Shpira, Vermayza, and Magentza). The ShUM-cities are considered the cradle of the distinct Ashkenazi culture and liturgy.

Although in the 11th century, they composed only 3 percent of the world's Jewish population, at their peak in 1931, Ashkenazi Jews accounted for 92 percent of the world's Jews. Today they make up approximately 80 percent of Jews worldwide. Most Jewish communities with extended histories in Europe are Ashkenazim, with the exception of those associated with the Mediterranean region. The majority of the Jews who migrated from Europe to other continents in the past two centuries are Ashkenazim, Eastern Ashkenazim in particular.

Definition

The exact definition of Jewishness is not universally agreed upon—neither by religious scholars (especially across different denominations); nor in the context of politics (as applied to those who wish to make Aliyah); nor even in the conventional, everyday sense where 'Jewishness' may be loosely understood by the casual observer as encompassing both religious and secular Jews, or religious Jews alone. This makes it especially difficult to define who is an Ashkenazi Jew. The people have been defined differently from religious, cultural, or ethnic perspectives.

Since the overwhelming majority of Ashkenazi Jews no longer live in Eastern Europe, the isolation that once favored a distinct religious tradition and culture has vanished. Furthermore, the word ''Ashkenazi'' is being used in non-traditional ways, especially in Israel. By conservative and orthodox philosophies, a person can only be considered a Jew if his or her mother was Jewish (meaning, more specifically, either matrilineal descent from a female believed to be present at Mt. Sinai when the ten commandments were given, or else descent from a female who was converted to Judaism before the birth of her children), or if he or she has personally converted to Judaism. This means that a person can be Ashkenazi but not considered a Jew by some of those within the Jewish communities, making the term "Ashkenazi" more applicable as broad ethnicity which evolved from the practice of Judaism in Europe.

By religion

Religious Jews have Minhagim, customs, in addition to Halakha, or religious law, and different interpretations of law. Different groups of religious Jews in different geographic areas historically adopted different customs and interpretations. On certain issues, Orthodox Jews are required to follow the customs of their ancestors, and do not believe they have the option of picking and choosing. Therefore, observant Jews at times find it important for religious reasons to ascertain who their household's religious ancestors are in order to know what customs their household should follow. These times include, for example, when two Jews of different ethnic background marry, when a non-Jew converts to Judaism and determines what customs to follow for the first time, or when a lapsed or less observant Jew returns to traditional Judaism and must determine what was done in his or her family's past. In this sense, "Ashkenazic" refers both to a family ancestry and to a body of customs binding on Jews of that ancestry.

In a religious sense, an Ashkenazi Jew is any Jew whose family tradition and ritual follows Ashkenazi practice. Until the Ashkenazi community first began to develop in the Early Middle Ages, the centers of Jewish religious authority were in the Islamic world, at Baghdad and in Islamic Spain. Ashkenaz (Germany) was so distant geographically that it developed a ''minhag'' of its own. Ashkenazi Hebrew came to be pronounced in ways distinct from other forms of Hebrew.

In this respect, the counterpart of Ashkenazi is Sephardic, since most non-Ashkenazi Orthodox Jews follow Sephardic rabbinical authorities, whether or not they are ethnically Sephardic. By tradition, a Sephardic or Mizrahi woman who marries into an Orthodox or Haredi Ashkenazi Jewish family raises her children to be Ashkenazi Jews; conversely an Ashkenazi woman who marries a Sephardi or Mizrahi man is expected to take on Sephardic practice and the children inherit a Sephardic identity, though in practice many families compromise. A convert generally follows the practice of the beth din that converted him or her.

With the integration of Jews from around the world in Israel, North America, and other places, the religious definition of an Ashkenazi Jew is blurring, especially outside Orthodox Judaism. Many Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews have joined liberal movements that originally developed within Ashkenazi Judaism. In recent decades, the congregations which they have joined have often embraced them, and absorbed new traditions into their ''minhag''. Rabbis and cantors in most non-Orthodox movements study Hebrew in Israel, where they learn Sephardic rather than Ashkenazi Hebrew pronunciation. Ashkenazi congregations are adopting Sephardic or modern Israeli melodies for many prayers and traditional songs. Since the middle of the 20th century, there has been a gradual syncretism and fusion of traditions. This is affecting the ''minhag'' of all but the most traditional congregations.

New developments in Judaism often transcend differences in religious practice between Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews. In North American cities, social trends such as the chavurah movement, and the emergence of "post-denominational Judaism" often bring together younger Jews of diverse ethnic backgrounds. In recent years, there has been increased interest in ''Kabbalah'', which many Ashkenazi Jews study outside of the Yeshiva framework. Another trend is the new popularity of ecstatic worship in the Jewish Renewal movement and the Carlebach style minyan, both of which are nominally of Ashkenazi origin.

By culture

Culturally, an Ashkenazi Jew can be identified by the concept of ''Yiddishkeit'', which means “Jewishness” in the Yiddish language. ''Yiddishkeit'' is specifically the Jewishness of Ashkenazi Jews.

Before the Haskalah and the emancipation of Jews in Europe, this meant the study of Torah and Talmud for men, and a family and communal life governed by the observance of Jewish Law for men and women. From the Rhineland to Riga to Romania, most Jews prayed in liturgical Ashkenazi Hebrew, and spoke Yiddish in their secular lives.

But with modernization, ''Yiddishkeit'' now encompasses not just Orthodoxy and Hasidism, but a broad range of movements, ideologies, practices, and traditions in which Ashkenazi Jews have participated and somehow retained a sense of Jewishness. Although a far smaller number of Jews still speak Yiddish, ''Yiddishkeit'' can be identified in manners of speech, in styles of humor, in patterns of association. Broadly speaking, a Jew is one who associates culturally with Jews, supports Jewish institutions, reads Jewish books and periodicals, attends Jewish movies and theater, travels to Israel, visits ancient synagogues in Prague, and so forth. It is a definition that applies to Jewish culture in general, and to Ashkenazi Yiddishkeit in particular.

Contemporary population migrations have contributed to a reconfigured Jewishness among Jews of Ashkenazi descent that transcends Yiddishkeit and other traditional articulations of Ashkenazi Jewishness. As Ashkenazi Jews moved away from Eastern Europe, settling mostly in Israel, North America, and other English-speaking areas, the geographic isolation which gave rise to Ashkenazim has given way to mixing with other cultures, and with non-Ashkenazi Jews who, similarly, are no longer isolated in distinct geographic locales. For Ashkenazi Jews living in Eastern Europe, chopped liver and gefilte fish were archetypal Jewish foods. To contemporary Ashkenazi Jews living both in Israel and in the diaspora, Middle Eastern foods such as hummus and falafel, neither traditional to the historic Ashkenazi experience, have become central to their lives as Ashkenazi Jews in the current era. Hebrew has replaced Yiddish as the primary Jewish language for many Ashkenazi Jews, although many Hasidic and Hareidi groups continue to use Yiddish in daily life.

France's blended Jewish community is typical of the cultural recombination that is going on among Jews throughout the world. Although France expelled its original Jewish population in the Middle Ages, by the time of the French Revolution, there were two distinct Jewish populations. One consisted of Sephardic Jews, originally refugees from the Inquisition and concentrated in the southwest, while the other community was Ashkenazi, concentrated in formerly German Alsace, and speaking mainly Yiddish. The two communities were so separate and different that the National Assembly emancipated them separately in 1791.

But after emancipation, a sense of a unified French Jewry emerged, especially when France was wracked by the Dreyfuss affair in the 1890s. In the 1920s and 1930s, Ashkenazi Jews from eastern Europe arrived in large numbers as refugees from antisemitism, the Russian revolution, and the economic turmoil of the Great Depression. By the 1930s, Paris had a vibrant Yiddish culture, and many Jews were involved in radical political movements. After the Vichy years and the Holocaust, the French Jewish population was augmented once again, first by refugees from Eastern Europe, and later by immigrants and refugees from North Africa, many of them francophone.

Then, in the 1990s, yet another Ashkenazi Jewish wave began to arrive from countries of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. The result is a pluralistic Jewish community that still has some distinct elements of both Ashkenazi and Sephardic culture. But in France, it is becoming much more difficult to sort out the two, and a distinctly French Jewishness has emerged.

By ethnicity

In an ethnic sense, an Ashkenazi Jew is one whose ancestry can be traced to the Jews of Central and Eastern Europe. For roughly a thousand years, the Ashkenazim were a reproductively isolated population in Europe, despite living in many countries, with little inflow or outflow from migration, conversion, or intermarriage with other groups, including other Jews. Human geneticists have identified genetic variations that have high frequencies among Ashkenazi Jews, but not in the general European population. This is true for patrilineal markers (Y-chromosome haplotypes) as well as for matrilineal markers (mitotypes).

Since the middle of the 20th century, many Ashkenazi Jews have intermarried, both with members of other Jewish communities and with people of other nations and faiths, while some Jews have also adopted children from other ethnic groups or parts of the world and raised them as Jews. Conversion to Judaism, rare for nearly 2,000 years, has become more common.

A 2006 study found Ashkenazi Jews to be a clear, relatively homogenous genetic subgroup. Strikingly, regardless of the place of origin, Ashkenazi Jews can be grouped in the same genetic cohort — that is, regardless of whether an Ashkenazi Jew's ancestors came from Poland, Russia, Hungary, Lithuania, or any other place with a historical Jewish population, they belong to the same ethnic group. The research demonstrates the endogamy of the Jewish population in Europe and lends further credence to the idea of Ashkenazi Jews as an ethnic group. Moreover, though intermarriage among Jews of Ashkenazi descent has become increasingly more common, many Ultra-Orthodox Jews, particularly members of Hasidic or Hareidi sects, continue to marry exclusively fellow Ashkenazi Jews. This trend keeps Ashkenazi genes prevalent and also helps researchers further study the genes of Ashkenazi Jews with relative ease. It is noteworthy that these Ultra-Orthodox Jews often have extremely large families.

Realignment in Israel

In Israel, the term ''Ashkenazi'' is now used in ways that have nothing to do with its original meaning; it is often applied to all Jews of European background living in Israel, including sometimes for those whose ethnic background is actually Sephardic. Jews of any non-Ashkenazi background, including Mizrahi, Yemenite, Kurdish and others who have no connection with the Iberian Peninsula, have similarly come to be lumped together as Sephardic. Jews of mixed background are increasingly common, partly because of intermarriage between Ashkenazi and non-Ashkenazi, and partly because many do not see such historic markers as relevant to their life experiences as Jews.

Religious Ashkenazi Jews living in Israel are obliged to follow the authority of the chief Ashkenazi rabbi in halakhic matters. In this respect, a religiously Ashkenazi Jew is an Israeli who is more likely to support certain religious interests in Israel, including certain political parties. These political parties result from the fact that a portion of the Israeli electorate votes for Jewish religious parties; although the electoral map changes from one election to another, there are generally several small parties associated with the interests of religious Ashkenazi Jews. The role of religious parties, including small religious parties which play important roles as coalition members, results in turn from Israel's composition as a complex society in which competing social, economic, and religious interests stand for election to the Knesset, a unicameral legislature with 120 seats.

History

History of Jews in Europe before the Ashkenazim

Although the historical record is very limited, there is a scholarly consensus of cultural, linguistic, and genetic evidence that the Ashkenazi Jewish population originated in the Middle East. Jews have lived in Germany, or "Ashkenaz", at least since the early 4th century. They brought with them both Rabbinic Judaism and the Babylonian Talmudic culture that underlies it. Yiddish, once spoken by the vast majority of Ashkenazi Jewry, is a Germanic language that developed from the Middle High German vernacular, written with Hebrew characters, and heavily influenced by Hebrew and Aramaic.

After the Roman empire had overpowered the Jewish resistance in the First Jewish–Roman War in Judea and destroyed the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE, the complete Roman takeover of Judea followed the Bar Kochba rebellion of 132-135 CE. Though their numbers were greatly reduced, Jews continued to populate large parts of Iudaea province (renamed to Palaestina), remaining a majority in Galilee for several hundred years. However, the Romans no longer recognized the authority of the Sanhedrin or any other Jewish body, and Jews were prohibited from living in Jerusalem. Outside the Roman Empire, a large Jewish community remained in Mesopotamia. Other Jewish populations could be found dispersed around the Mediterranean region, with the largest concentrations in the Levant, Egypt, Asia Minor, Greece, and Italy, including Rome. Smaller communities are recorded in southern Gaul (France), Spain, and North Africa.

Jews were denied full Roman citizenship until 212 CE, when Emperor Caracalla granted all free peoples this privilege. But, as a penalty for the first Jewish Revolt, Jews were required to pay a poll tax until the reign of Emperor Julian in 363. In the late Roman Empire, Jews were free to form networks of cultural and religious ties and enter into various local occupations. But, after Christianity became the official religion of Rome and Constantinople in 380, Jews were increasingly marginalized, and brutally persecuted.

In Syria-Palaestina and Mesopotamia, where Jewish religious scholarship was centered, the majority of Jews were still engaged in farming, as demonstrated by the preoccupation of early Talmudic writings with agriculture. In diaspora communities, trade was a common occupation, facilitated by the easy mobility of traders through the dispersed Jewish communities.

Throughout this period and into the early Middle Ages, some Jews assimilated into the dominant Greek and Latin cultures, mostly through conversion to Christianity. In Syria-Palaestina and Mesopotamia, the spoken language of Jews continued to be Aramaic, but elsewhere in the diaspora, most Jews spoke Greek. Conversion and assimilation were especially common within the Hellenized or Greek-speaking Jewish communities, amongst whom the Septuagint and Aquila of Sinope (Greek translations and adaptations of the Tanakh or Hebrew Bible) were the source of scripture. A remnant of this Greek-speaking Jewish population (the Romaniotes) survives to this day.

In the late Roman Empire, Jews are known to have lived in Cologne and Trier, as well as in what is now France. However, it is unclear whether there is any continuity between these late Roman communities and the distinct Ashkenazi Jewish culture that began to emerge about 500 years later. King Dagobert I of the Franks expelled the Jews from his Merovingian kingdom in 629. Jews in former Roman territories now faced new challenges as harsher anti-Jewish Church rulings were enforced.

In Mesopotamia, and in Persian lands free of Roman imperial domination, Jewish life fared much better. Since the conquest of Judea by Nebuchadnezzar II, this community had always been the leading diaspora community, a rival to the leadership of Judea. After conditions for Jews began to deteriorate in Roman-controlled lands, many of the religious leaders of Judea and the Galilee fled to the east. At the academies of Pumbeditha and Sura near Babylon, Rabbinic Judaism based on Talmudic learning began to emerge and assert its authority over Jewish life throughout the diaspora. Rabbinic Judaism created a religious mandate for literacy, requiring all Jewish males to learn Hebrew and read from the Torah. This emphasis on literacy and learning a second language would eventually be of great benefit to the Jews, allowing them to take on commercial and financial roles within Gentile societies where literacy was often quite low.

After the Islamic conquest of the Middle East and North Africa, new opportunities for trade and commerce opened between the Middle East and Western Europe. The vast majority of Jews now lived in Islamic lands. Urbanization, trade, and commerce within the Islamic world allowed Jews, as a highly literate people, to abandon farming and live in cities, engaging in occupations where they could use their skills. The influential, sophisticated, and well organized Jewish community of Mesopotamia, now centered in Baghdad, became the center of the Jewish world. In the Caliphate of Baghdad, Jews took on many of the financial occupations that they would later hold in the cities of Ashkenaz. Jewish traders from Baghdad began to travel to the west, renewing Jewish life in the western Mediterranean region. They brought with them Rabbinic Judaism and Babylonian Talmudic scholarship.

Charlemagne's expansion of the Frankish empire around 800, including northern Italy and Rome, brought on a brief period of stability and unity in Western Europe. This created opportunities for Jewish merchants to settle once again north of the Alps. Charlemagne granted the Jews freedoms similar to those once enjoyed under the Roman Empire. In addition, Jews from southern Italy, fleeing religious persecution, began to move into central Europe. These Jews carried with them, the Haplogroup G2c (Y-DNA) which now accounts for the largest haplogroup within the Ashkenazi population. Returning once again to Frankish lands, many Jewish merchants took on occupations in finance and commerce, including money lending, or usury. (Church legislation banned Christians from lending money in exchange for interest.) From Charlemagne's time to the present, there is a well-documented record of Jewish life in northern Europe, and by the 11th century, when Rashi of Troyes wrote his commentaries, Ashkenazi Jews had emerged also as interpreters and commentators on the Torah and Talmud.

High and Late Middle Ages migrations

Historical records show evidence of Jewish communities north of the Alps and Pyrenees as early as the 8th and 9th century. By the end of the first millenum, Jewish populations were well-established in Western Europe, later followed the Norman Conquest into England in 1066, and settled in many cities of the Rhine area by the end of the 11th century. With the onset of the Crusades, and the expulsions from England (1290), France (1394), and parts of Germany (15th century), Jewish migration pushed eastward into Poland, Lithuania, and Russia. Over this period of several hundred years, some have suggested, Jewish economic activity was focused on trade, business management, and financial services, due to several presumed factors: Christian European prohibitions restricting certain activities by Jews, preventing certain financial activities (such as "usurious" loans) between Christians, high rates of literacy, near universal male education, and ability of merchants to rely upon and trust family members living in different regions and countries.

By the 15th century, the Ashkenazi Jewish communities in Poland were the largest Jewish communities of the Diaspora. This area, which eventually fell under the domination of Russia, Austria, and Prussia (Germany), would remain the main center of Ashkenazi Jewry until the Holocaust.

The answer to why there was so little assimilation of Jews in Eastern Europe for so long would seem to lie in part in the probability that the alien surroundings in Eastern Europe were not conducive, though contempt did not prevent some assimilation. Furthermore, Jews lived almost exclusively in shtetls, maintained a strong system of education for males, heeded rabbinic leadership, and scorned the life-style of their neighbors; and all of these tendencies increased with every outbreak of antisemitism.

===Usage of the name=== In reference to the Jewish peoples of Northern Europe and particularly the Rhineland, the word ''Ashkenazi'' is often found in medieval rabbinic literature. References to Ashkenaz in Yosippon and Hasdai ibn Shaprut's letter to the king of the Khazars would date the term as far back as the 10th century, as would also Saadia Gaon's commentary on Daniel 7:8.

The word ''Ashkenaz'' first appears in the genealogy in the Tanakh (Genesis 10) as a son of Gomer and grandson of Japheth. It is thought that the name originally applied to the Scythians (Ishkuz), who were called ''Ashkuza'' in Assyrian inscriptions, and lake Ascanius and the region Ascania in Anatolia derive their names from this group.

''Ashkenaz'' in later Hebrew tradition became identified with the peoples of Germany, and in particular to the area along the Rhine.

Ashkenaz and the Ashkenazi contrast to the land of Knaan, a geo-ethnological term denoting the Jewish populations living east of the Elbe river as opposed to the Ashkenazi Jews living to the West of it, and the Sephardic Jews of Iberian Peninsula.

The autonym was usually ''Yidn'', however.

Medieval references

In the first half of the 11th century, Hai Gaon refers to questions that had been addressed to him from Ashkenaz, by which he undoubtedly means Germany. ''Rashi'' in the latter half of the 11th century refers to both the language of Ashkenaz and the country of Ashkenaz. During the 12th century, the word appears quite frequently. In the ''Mahzor Vitry'', the kingdom of Ashkenaz is referred to chiefly in regard to the ritual of the synagogue there, but occasionally also with regard to certain other observances.

In the literature of the 13th century, references to the land and the language of Ashkenaz often occur. Examples include Solomon ben Aderet's Responsa (vol. i., No. 395); the Responsa of Asher ben Jehiel (pp. 4, 6); his ''Halakot'' (Berakot i. 12, ed. Wilna, p. 10); the work of his son Jacob ben Asher, ''Tur Orach Chayim'' (chapter 59); the Responsa of Isaac ben Sheshet (numbers 193, 268, 270).

In the ''Midrash'' compilation ''Genesis Rabbah'', Rabbi Berechiah mentions Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah as German tribes or as German lands. It may correspond to a Greek word that may have existed in the Greek dialect of the Palestinian Jews, or the text is corrupted from "Germanica." This view of Berechiah is based on the Talmud (Yoma 10a; Jerusalem Talmud Megillah 71b), where Gomer, the father of Ashkenaz, is translated by ''Germamia'', which evidently stands for Germany, and which was suggested by the similarity of the sound.

In later times the word Ashkenaz is used to designate southern and Western Germany, the ritual of which sections differs somewhat from that of Eastern Germany and Poland. Thus the prayer-book of Isaiah Horowitz, and many others, give the piyyutim according to the Minhag of Ashkenaz and Poland.

According to 16th century mystic Rabbi Elijah of Chelm, Ashkenazi Jews lived in Jerusalem during the 11th century. The story is told that a German-speaking Palestinian Jew saved the life of a young German man surnamed Dolberger. So when the knights of the First Crusade came to siege Jerusalem, one of Dolberger’s family members who was among them rescued Jews in Palestine and carried them back to Worms to repay the favor. Further evidence of German communities in the holy city comes in the form of halakhic questions sent from Germany to Jerusalem during the second half of the 11th century.

Modern history

In an essay on Sephardi Jewry, Daniel Elazar at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs summarized the demographic history of Ashkenazi Jews in the last thousand years, noting that at the end of the 11th century, 97% of world Jewry was Sephardic and 3% Ashkenazi; in the mid-17th century, "Sephardim still outnumbered Ashkenazim three to two", but by the end of the 18th century, "Ashkenazim outnumbered Sephardim three to two, the result of improved living conditions in Christian Europe versus the Ottoman Muslim world." By 1931, Ashkenazi Jews accounted for nearly 92% of world Jewry.

Ashkenazi Jews developed the Hasidic movement as well as major Jewish academic centers across Poland, Russia, and Belarus in the generations after emigration from the west. After two centuries of comparative tolerance in the new nations, massive westward emigration occurred in the 19th and 20th centuries in response to pogroms in the east and the economic opportunities offered in other parts of the world. Ashkenazi Jews have made up the majority of the American Jewish community since 1750.

Ashkenazi cultural growth led to the ''Haskalah'' or Jewish Enlightenment, and the development of Zionism in modern Europe.

The Holocaust

Of the estimated 8.8 million Jews living in Europe at the beginning of World War II, the majority of whom were Ashkenazi, about 6 million — more than two-thirds — were systematically murdered in the Holocaust. These included 3 million of 3.3 million Polish Jews (91%); 900,000 of 1.5 million in Ukraine (60%); and 50–90% of the Jews of other Slavic nations, Germany, Hungary, and the Baltic states, and over 25% of the Jews in France. Sephardi communities suffered similar depletions in a few countries, including Greece, the Netherlands and the former Yugoslavia. As the large majority of the victims were Ashkenazi Jews, their percentage dropped from nearly 92% of world Jewry in 1931 to nearly 80% of world Jewry today. The Holocaust also effectively put an end to the dynamic development of the Yiddish language in the previous decades, as the vast majority of the victims of the Holocaust, around five million, were Yiddish speakers. Many of the surviving Ashkenazi Jews emigrated to countries such as Israel, Canada, Argentina, Australia, and the United States after the war.

In Israel

Today, Ashkenazi Jews constitute the largest group among Jews, and among Israeli Jews as well. They have played a prominent role in the economy, media, and politics of Israel since its founding. During the first decades of Israel as a state, strong cultural conflict occurred between Sephardic and Ashkenazi Jews (mainly east European Ashkenazim). The roots of this conflict, which still exists to a much smaller extent in present day Israeli society, are chiefly attributed to the concept of the "melting pot". That is to say, all Jewish immigrants who arrived in Israel were strongly encouraged to "melt down" their own particular exilic identities within the general social "pot" in order to become Israeli.

Ashkenazi Chief Rabbis in the Yishuv and Israel

Abraham Isaac Kook: (23 February 1921 – 1 September 1935)

Isaac Halevi Herzog: (1937 – 25 July 1959)

Isser Yehuda Unterman: (1964–1972)

Shlomo Goren: (1972–1983)

Avraham Shapira: (1983–1993)

Israel Meir Lau: (1993 – 3 April 2003)

She'ar Yashuv Cohen (acting): (3 April 2003 – 14 April 2003)

Yona Metzger: (14 April 2003 – present)

Customs, laws and traditions

The ''Halakhic'' practices of (Orthodox) Ashkenazi Jews may differ from those of Sephardi Jews, particularly in matters of custom. Differences are noted in the ''Shulkhan Arukh'' itself, in the gloss of Moses Isserles. Well known differences in practice include:

Observance of ''Pesach'' (Passover): Ashkenazi Jews traditionally refrain from eating legumes, grain, millet, and rice (quinoa, however, has become accepted as foodgrain in the North American communities), whereas Sephardi Jews typically do not prohibit these foods.

Ashkenazi Jews freely mix and eat fish and milk products; some Sephardic Jews refrain from doing so.

Ashkenazim are more permissive toward the usage of wigs as a hair covering for married and widowed women.

In the case of ''kashrut'' for meat, conversely, Sephardi Jews have stricter requirements—this level is commonly referred to as ''Beth Yosef''. Meat products which are acceptable to Ashkenazi Jews as kosher may therefore be rejected by Sephardi Jews. Notwithstanding stricter requirements for the actual slaughter, Sephardi Jews permit the rear portions of an animal after proper Halakhic removal of the sciatic nerve, while many Ashkenazi Jews do not. This is not because of different interpretations of the law; rather, slaughterhouses could not find adequate skills for correct removal of the sciatic nerve and found it more economical to separate the hindquarters and sell them as non-kosher meat.

Ashkenazi Jews frequently name newborn children after deceased family members, but not after living relatives. Sephardi Jews, on the other hand, often name their children after the children's grandparents, even if those grandparents are still living. A notable exception to this generally reliable rule is among Dutch Jews, where Ashkenazim for centuries used the naming conventions otherwise attributed exclusively to Sephardim such as Chuts.

Ashkenazi tefillin bear some differences from Sephardic tefillin. In the traditional Ashkenazic rite, the tefillin are wound towards the body, not away from it. Ashkenazim traditionally don tefillin while standing, whereas other Jews generally do so while sitting down.

Ashkenazic traditional pronunciations of Hebrew differ from those of other groups. The most prominent consonantal difference from Sephardic and Mizrahic Hebrew dialects is the pronunciation of the Hebrew letter tav in certain Hebrew words (historically, in postvocalic undoubled context) as an /s/ and not a /t/ or /θ/ sound. The prayer shawl, or tallit (or tallis in Ashkenazi Hebrew), is worn by the majority of Ashkenazi men after marriage, but western European Ashkenazi men wear it from Bar Mitzvah. In Sephardi or Mizrahi Judaism, the prayer shawl is commonly worn from early childhood.

Relationship with other Jews

The term ''Ashkenazi'' also refers to the ''nusach Ashkenaz'' (Hebrew, "liturgical tradition", or rite) used by Ashkenazi Jews in their ''Siddur'' (prayer book). A ''nusach'' is defined by a liturgical tradition's choice of prayers, order of prayers, text of prayers and melodies used in the singing of prayers. Two other major forms of nusach among Ashkenazic Jews are Nusach Sefard (not to be confused with Sephardi), which is the same as the general Polish (Hasidic) Nusach; and Nusach Chabad, otherwise known as Lubavitch Chasidic, Nusach Arizal or Nusach Ari.

This phrase is often used in contrast with Sephardi Jews, also called Sephardim, who are descendants of Jews from Spain and Portugal. There are some differences in how the two groups pronounce certain Hebrew letters and in points of ritual.

Several famous people have Ashkenazi as a surname, such as Vladimir Ashkenazy. Ironically, most people with this surname hail from within Sephardic communities, particularly from the Syrian Jewish community. The Sephardic carriers of the surname would have some Ashkenazi ancestors since the surname was adopted by families who were initially of Ashkenazic origins who move to Sephardi countries and joined those communities. Ashkenazi would be formally adopted as the family surname having started off as a nickname imposed by their adopted communities. Some have shortened the name to Ash.

The theory that the majority of Ashkenazi Jews are the descendants of the non-Semitic converted Khazars was advocated by various racial theorists and antisemitic sources in the late-19th and 20th centuries, especially following the publication of Arthur Koestler's ''The Thirteenth Tribe''. Despite recent genetic evidence to the contrary, and a lack of any real mainstream scholarly support, this belief is still popular among antisemites.

Notable Ashkenazim

Ashkenazi Jews have a noted history of achievement in western societies. They have won a large number of the Nobel awards. In those societies where they have been free to enter any profession, they have a record of high occupational achievement, entering professions and fields of commerce where higher education is required. For example, during the 20th century in the United States, Ashkenazi Jews represented approximately 3% of the population, but won 27% of the US Nobel Prizes in science, and 25% of the ACM Turing Awards (the Nobel-equivalent in computer science).

Genetics

Genetic origins

Efforts to identify the origins of Ashkenazi Jews through DNA analysis began in the 1990s. Like most DNA studies of human migration patterns, the earliest studies focused on two segments of the human genome, the Y-chromosome (passed on only by males), and the mitochondrial genome (mtDNA, passed on only by females). Both segments are unaffected by recombination. Genome-wide association studies have also been employed to yield findings relevant to genetic origins.

Male lineages: Y-chromosomal DNA

A study of haplotypes of the Y-chromosome, published in 2000, addressed the paternal origins of Ashkenazi Jews. Hammer ''et al.'' found that the Y-chromosome of Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews contained mutations that are also common among Middle Eastern peoples, but uncommon in the general European population. This suggested that the male ancestors of the Ashkenazi Jews could be traced mostly to the Middle East. The proportion of male genetic admixture in Ashkenazi Jews amounts to less than 0.5% per generation over an estimated 80 generations, with "relatively minor contribution of European Y chromosomes to the Ashkenazim," and a total admixture estimate "very similar to Motulsky's average estimate of 12.5%." This supported the finding that "Diaspora Jews from Europe, Northwest Africa, and the Near East resemble each other more closely than they resemble their non-Jewish neighbors."

A 2001 study by Nebel ''et al.'' showed that both Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jewish populations share the same overall paternal Near Eastern ancestries. In comparison with data available from other relevant populations in the region, Jews were found to be more closely related to groups in the north of the Fertile Crescent. The authors also report on Eu 19 (R1a) chromosomes, which are very frequent in Eastern Europeans (54%-60%) at elevated frequency (12.7%) in Ashkenazi Jews. They hypothesized that the differences among Ashkenazim Jews could reflect low-level gene flow from surrounding European populations and/or genetic drift during isolation. A later 2005 study by Nebel ''et al.'', found a similar level of 11.5% of male Ashkenazim belonging to R1a1a (M17+), the dominant Y-chromosome haplogroup in Eastern Europeans, suggesting possible gene flow.

Female lineages: Mitochondrial DNA

Before 2006, geneticists largely attributed the genesis of most of the world's Jewish populations, including Ashkenazi Jews, to founding effects by males who migrated from the Middle East and "by the women from each local population whom they took as wives and converted to Judaism." In line with this model of origin, David Goldstein, now of Duke University, reported in 2002 that, unlike male lineages, the female lineages in Ashkenazi Jewish communities "did not seem to be Middle Eastern", and that each community had its own genetic pattern and even that "in some cases the mitochondrial DNA was closely related to that of the host community." In his view this suggested "that Jewish men had arrived from the Middle East, taken wives from the host population and converted them to Judaism, after which there was no further intermarriage with non-Jews."

However, a 2006 study by Behar ''et al.'', based on high-resolution analysis of haplogroup K(mtDNA), suggested that about 40% of the current Ashkenazi population is descended matrilineally from just four women, or "founder lineages", that were "likely from a Hebrew/Levantine mtDNA pool" originating in the Middle East in the 1st and 2nd centuries CE. Although Haplogroup K is common throughout western Eurasia, "the observed global pattern of distribution renders very unlikely the possibility that the four aforementioned founder lineages entered the Ashkenazi mtDNA pool via gene flow from a European host population:

"..Both the extent and location of the maternal ancestral deme from which the Ashkenazi Jewry arose remain obscure. Here, using complete sequences of the maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), we show that close to one-half of Ashkenazi Jews, estimated at 8,000,000 people, can be traced back to only four women carrying distinct mtDNAs that are virtually absent in other populations, with the important exception of low frequencies among non-Ashkenazi Jews. We conclude that four founding mtDNAs, likely of Near Eastern ancestry, underwent major expansion(s) in Europe within the past millennium.."

In addition, Behar ''et al.'' have suggested that the rest of Ashkenazi mtDNA is originated from ~150 women, most of those likely of Middle Eastern origin. However, other studies by Behar indicate that this mtDNA is different from other Jewish populations found outside of Europe, leaving the possibility of a separate origin or even a European origin a distinct possibility.

Genome-wide association and linkage studies

In genetic epidemiology, a genome-wide association study (GWA study, or GWAS) is an examination of all or most of the genes (the genome) of different individuals of a particular species to see how much the genes vary from individual to individual. These techniques were originally designed for epidemiological uses, to identify genetic associations with observable traits.

A 2006 study by Seldin ''et al.'' used over five thousand autosomal SNPs to demonstrate European genetic substructure. The results showed “a consistent and reproducible distinction between ‘northern’ and ‘southern’ European population groups”. Most northern, central, and eastern Europeans (Finns, Swedes, English, Irish, Germans, and Ukrainians) showed >90% in the ‘northern’ population group, while most individual participants with southern European ancestry (Italians, Greeks, Portuguese, Spaniards) showed >85% in the 'southern' group. Both Ashkenazi Jews as well as Sephardic Jews showed >85% membership in the “southern” group. Referring to the Jews clustering with southern Europeans, the authors state the results were "consistent with a later Mediterranean origin of these ethnic groups".

A 2007 study by Bauchet ''et al.'' found that Ashkenazi Jews were most closely clustered with Arabic North African populations when compared to Global population, and in the European structure analysis, they share similarities only with Greeks and Southern Italians, reflecting their east Mediterranean origins.

A 2010 study on Jewish ancestry by Atzmon-Ostrer ''et al.'' stated "Two major groups were identified by principal component, phylogenetic, and identity by descent (IBD) analysis: Middle Eastern Jews and European/Syrian Jews. The IBD segment sharing and the proximity of European Jews to each other and to southern European populations suggested similar origins for European Jewry and refuted large-scale genetic contributions of Central and Eastern European and Slavic populations to the formation of Ashkenazi Jewry.", as both groups - the Middle Eastern Jews and European/Syrian Jews shared common ancestors in the Middle East about 2500 years ago. The study examines genetic markers spread across the entire genome and shows that the Jewish groups (Ashkenazi and non Ashkenazi) share large swaths of DNA, indicating close relationships and that each of the Jewish groups in the study (Iranian, Iraqi, Syrian, Italian, Turkish, Greek and Ashkenazi) has its own genetic signature but is more closely related to the other Jewish groups than to their fellow non-Jewish countrymen. Atzmon's team found that the SNP markers in genetic segments of 3 million DNA letters or longer were 10 times more likely to be identical among Jews than non-Jews. Results of the analysis also tally with biblical accounts of the fate of the Jews. Using their DNA analysis, the authors traced the ancestors of all Jews to Persia and Babylon, areas that now form part of Iran and Iraq. The study also found that with respect to non-Jewish European groups, the population most closely related to Ashkenazi Jews are modern-day Italians. The study speculated that the genetic-similarity between Ashkenazi Jews and Italians may be due to inter-marriage and conversions in the time of the Roman Empire. It was also found that any two Ashkenazi Jewish participants in the study shared about as much DNA as fourth or fifth cousins.

A 2010 study by Bray ''et al'', using SNP microarray techniques and linkage analysis, estimated that 35 to 55 percent of the modern Ashkenazi genome may be of European origin, and that European "admixture is considerably higher than previous estimates by studies that used the Y chromosome". The study assumed Druze and Palestinian Arabs populations to represent the reference to world Jewry ancestor genome. With this reference point, the linkage disequilibrium in the Ashkenazi Jewish population was interpreted as "matches signs of interbreeding or 'admixture' between Middle Eastern and European populations". In their press release, Bray stated: "We were surprised to find evidence that Ashkenazi Jews have higher heterozygosity than Europeans, contradicting the widely-held presumption that they have been a largely isolated group". Nevertheless, the authors indicated possible Achilles' heel for the study is that their calculations might "overestimated the level of admixture" in case that the true Jewish ancestor was genetically closer to Southern Europeans than Druze and Palestinian Arabs are and predicted that using the non Ashkenazi Jewish Diaspora populations as reference for the Jewish ancestor genome would "underestimate the level of admixture", as they assume the non Ashkenazi Jewish Diaspora has also "undergone the similar admixture".

Medical genetics

There are many references to Ashkenazi Jews in the literature of medical and population genetics. Indeed, much awareness of "Ashkenazi Jews" as an ethnic group or category stems from the large number of genetic studies of disease, including many that are well reported in the media, that have been conducted among Jews. Jewish populations have been studied more thoroughly than most other human populations, for a variety of reasons:

Geneticists are intrinsically interested in Jewish populations as a disproportionate percentage of genetics researchers are Jewish. Israel in particular has become an international center of such research.

Jewish populations, and particularly the large Ashkenazi Jewish population, are ideal for such research studies, because they exhibit a high degree of endogamy, yet they are sizable.

Jewish populations are overwhelmingly urban, and are concentrated near biomedical centers where such research has been carried out. Such research is especially easy to carry out in Israel, where cradle-to-grave medical insurance is available, together with universal screening for genetic disease.

Jewish communities are comparatively well informed about genetics research, and have been supportive of community efforts to study and prevent genetic diseases.

Participation of Jewish scientists and support from the Jewish community alleviates ethical concerns that sometimes hinder such genetic studies in other ethnic groups.

The result is a form of ascertainment bias. This has sometimes created an impression that Jews are more susceptible to genetic disease than other populations. Healthcare professionals are often taught to consider those of Ashkenazi descent to be at increased risk for colon cancer.

A study by the Albert Einstein College of Medicine examines a particular genetic trait that increases the lifespan of the Ashkenazi population. The study focuses on telomerase, the enzyme responsible for maintaining telomeres at the ends of chromosomes during cell division.

Genetic counseling and genetic testing are recommended for couples where both partners are of Ashkenazi ancestry. Some organizations, most notably Dor Yeshorim, organize screening programs to prevent homozygosity for the genes that cause these diseases. E. L. Abel's book ''Jewish Genetic Disorders: A Layman's Guide'' (McFarland, 2008: ISBN 0-7864-4087-2) is a comprehensive reference text on the topic; also see the Chicago Center for Jewish Genetic Disorders for more information.

See also

Ashkenazi intelligence

Rosalind Franklin

History of the Jews in Germany

Jews and Judaism in Europe

Jewish ethnic divisions

Oberlander Jews

Nusach Ashkenaz

Three hares

List of Israeli Ashkenazi Jews

Notes

References

References for "Who is an Ashkenazi Jew?"

Other references

Beider, Alexander (2001): ''A Dictionary of Ashkenazic Given Names: Their Origins, Structure, Pronunciations, and Migrations''. Avotaynu. ISBN 1-886223-12-2.

Biale, David (2002): ''Cultures of the Jews: A New History''. Schoken Books. ISBN 0-8052-4131-0.

Brook, Kevin Alan (2003): "The Origins of East European Jews" in ''Russian History/Histoire Russe'' vol. 30, nos. 1-2, pp. 1–22.

Gross, N. (1975): ''Economic History of the Jews''. Schocken Books, New York.

Haumann, Heiko (2001): ''A History of East European Jews''. Central European University Press. ISBN 963-9241-26-1.

Kriwaczek, Paul (2005): ''Yiddish Civilization: The Rise and Fall of a Forgotten Nation''. Alfred A. Knopf, New York. ISBN 1-40000-4087-6

Lewis, Bernard (1984): ''The Jews of Islam''. Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-05419-3.

Vital, David (1999): ''A People Apart: A History of the Jews in Europe''. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-821980-6.

External links

The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe

Ashkenazi history at the Jewish Virtual Library

"Ashkenazi Jewish mtDNA haplogroup distribution varies among distinct subpopulations: lessons of population substructure in a closed group" (''European Journal of Human Genetics'' - 2007)

"Analysis of genetic variation in Ashkenazi Jews by high density SNP genotyping"

Nusach Ashkenaz, and Discussion Forum

Ashkenaz Heritage

Category:Ethnic groups in Israel Category:Ethnic groups in the United States Category:Ethnic groups in Russia Category:Jews by country Category:Jewish ethnic groups Category:Semitic peoples

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Coordinates	9°1′48″N38°44′24″N
name	Michael Chertoff
order	2nd Secretary of Homeland Security
term start	February 15, 2005
term end	January 21, 2009
president	George W. Bush
predecessor	Tom Ridge
successor	Janet Napolitano
birth date	November 28, 1953
birth place	Elizabeth, New Jersey, United States
party	Republican
spouse	Meryl Chertoff
children	Two
alma mater	Harvard College (A.B.) Harvard Law School (J.D.)
occupation	Attorney Jurist
religion	Judaism
footnotes	From 1979-1980 he served as a clerk to Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, Jr.
title2	Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
term start2	June 10, 2003
term end2	February 15, 2005
predecessor2	Morton I. Greenberg
successor2	Michael Chagares
title3	U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey
term start3	1990
term end3	1994
predecessor3	Samuel Alito, Jr.
successor3	Faith S. Hochberg }}

Michael Chertoff (born November 28, 1953) was the second United States Secretary of Homeland Security under President George W. Bush and co-author of the USA PATRIOT Act.

He previously served as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, as a federal prosecutor, and as assistant U.S. Attorney General. He succeeded Tom Ridge as United States Secretary of Homeland Security on February 15, 2005.

Since leaving government service, Chertoff has worked as Senior Of Counsel at the Washington, D.C. law firm of Covington & Burling. He also co-founded the Chertoff Group, a risk management and security consulting company, which employs several senior officials from his time as Secretary of Homeland Security as well as Michael Hayden, a former Director of the National Security Agency and the Central Intelligence Agency.

Early life

Chertoff was born in Elizabeth, New Jersey to Rabbi Gershon Baruch Chertoff (1915–1996), the former leader of the Congregation B'nai Israel in Elizabeth and Talmud scholar, and Livia Chertoff (née Eisen), El Al flight attendant. His paternal grandfather, Rabbi Paul Chertoff (emigrated with his parents from czarist Russia, present day Belarus) was a noted Talmud scholar.

Chertoff went to the Jewish Educational Center in Elizabeth as well as the Pingry School. He later attended Harvard College, where he was a research assistant on John Hart Ely's book ''Democracy and Distrust'', graduating in 1975 and then spending one year at the London School of Economics and Political Science in the United Kingdom. He then graduated ''magna cum laude'' from Harvard Law School in 1978, going on to clerk for appellate judge Murray Gurfein for a year before clerking for United States Supreme Court Justice William Brennan from 1979 to 1980. He worked in private practice with Latham & Watkins from 1980 to 1983 before being hired as a prosecutor by Rudolph Giuliani, then the U.S. attorney for Manhattan, working on Mafia and political corruption-related cases. In the mid 1990s, Chertoff returned to Latham & Watkins for a brief period, founding the firm's office in Newark, New Jersey.

Public service

In September 1986, together with U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Rudolph Giuliani, Chertoff was instrumental in the crackdown on organized crime in the Mafia Commission Trial.

In 1990, Chertoff was appointed by President George H. W. Bush as U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey. Among his most important cases, in 1992 Chertoff put second-term Jersey City Mayor Gerald McCann in federal prison for over two years on charges of defrauding money from a savings and loan scam. Chertoff was asked to stay in his position when the Clinton administration took office in 1993, at the request of Democratic Senator Bill Bradley. He was the only U.S. attorney not replaced and stayed with the U.S. Attorney's office until 1994, when he entered private practice, returning to Latham & Watkins as a partner.

Despite his friendly relationship with some Democrats, Chertoff took an active role in the Whitewater investigation against Bill and Hillary Clinton, serving as the special counsel for the Senate Whitewater Committee studying allegations against the Clintons.

In 2000, Chertoff worked as special counsel to the New Jersey State Senate Judiciary Committee, investigating racial profiling in New Jersey. He also did some fundraising for George W. Bush and other Republicans during the 2000 election cycle and advised Bush's presidential campaign on criminal justice issues. From 2001 to 2003, he headed the criminal division of the Department of Justice, leading the prosecution's case against terrorist suspect Zacarias Moussaoui.

Chertoff also led the prosecution's case against accounting firm Arthur Andersen for destroying documents relating to the Enron collapse. The prosecution of Arthur Andersen was controversial, as the firm was effectively dissolved, resulting in the loss of 26,000 jobs. The Supreme Court overturned the conviction and the case has not been retried. At the Department of Justice, he also came under fire as one of the chief architects of the Bush administration's legal strategies in the War on Terror, particularly regarding the detention of thousands of Middle Eastern immigrants .

On March 5, 2003, Chertoff was nominated by President Bush to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit vacated by Morton I. Greenberg. Hillary Clinton (then a Senator from New York) cast the lone dissenting vote against Chertoff's confirmation. He was confirmed by the Senate 88-1 on June 9, 2003, and received his commission the following day. Mrs. Clinton explained that her vote was in protest of the way junior White House staffers were "very badly treated" by Chertoff's staff during the Whitewater investigation.

Secretary of Homeland Security

In late 2004, Bernard Kerik was forced to decline President Bush's offer to replace Tom Ridge, the outgoing Secretary of Homeland Security. After a lengthy search to find a suitable replacement, Bush nominated Chertoff to the post in January 2005, citing his experience with post-9/11 terror legislation. He was unanimously approved for the position by the United States Senate on February 15, 2005.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, most of the criticism was directed toward the Federal Emergency Management Agency, but DHS was criticized as well for its lack of preparation.

Chertoff was the Bush administration's point man for pushing the comprehensive immigration reform bill, a measure that stalled in the Senate in June 2007.

Chertoff was asked by the Obama administration to stay in his post until 9 a.m. on January 21, 2009 (one day after President Obama's inauguration), "to ensure a smooth transition".

Views

Construction of border fence

In April 2008, Chertoff was criticized in a ''New York Times'' editorial for waiving the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act, and other environmental protection legislation to construct a fence along the Mexico–United States border. The ''Times'' wrote: "To the long list of things the Bush administration is willing to trash in its rush to appease immigration hard-liners, you can now add dozens of important environmental laws and hundreds of thousands of acres of fragile habitat on the southern border."

According to ''New York Times'' columnist Adam Liptak, Chertoff had excluded the Department of Homeland Security from having to follow laws "protecting the environment, endangered species, migratory birds, the bald eagle, antiquities, farms, deserts, forests, Native American graves and religious freedom."

A report issued by the Congressional Research Service, the non-partisan research division of the Library of Congress, said that the unchecked delegation of powers to Chertoff was unprecedented: "After a review of federal law, primarily through electronic database searches and consultations with various CRS experts, we were unable to locate a waiver provision identical to that of §102 of H.R. 418—i.e., a provision that contains 'notwithstanding' language, provides a secretary of an executive agency the authority to waive all laws such secretary determines necessary, and directs the secretary to waive such laws."

Actions regarding illegal immigration

In September 2007, Chertoff told a House committee that the DHS would not tolerate interference by sanctuary cities that would block the "Basic Pilot Program", which requires some types of employers to validate the legal status of their workers. He said that the DHS is exploring its legal options and intends to take action to prevent any interference with the law.

In 2008 it became public that the housekeeping company Chertoff had hired to clean his house employed illegal immigrants.

Globalization

At the Global Creative Leadership Summit in 2009, Chertoff described globalization as a double-edged sword. Although globalization may help raise the standard of living for people around the world, Chertoff claims that it can also enable terrorists and transnational criminals.

Body Scanners

Michael Chertoff has been an advocate of enhanced technologies, such as full body scanners, that reduce security vulnerabilities and enhance detection capabilities for those threats not easily detected by metal detectors.

References

{{U.S. Secretary box | before= Tom Ridge | after= Janet Napolitano | years= 2005 – 2009 | president= George W. Bush, Barack Obama | department= Secretary of Homeland Security}}

Category:United States Assistant Attorneys General Category:George W. Bush Administration cabinet members Category:Harvard Law School alumni Category:Pingry School alumni Category:Law clerks of the Supreme Court of the United States

Category:New York lawyers Category:People from Potomac, Maryland Category:People from Elizabeth, New Jersey Category:American people of Russian descent Category:American people of Romanian descent Category:United States Attorneys for the District of New Jersey Category:Judges of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit Category:United States court of appeals judges appointed by George W. Bush Category:United States Secretaries of Homeland Security Category:United States Senate lawyers Category:Jewish American politicians Category:1953 births Category:Living people Category:Recipients of the Order of the Three Stars, 2nd Class

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Coordinates	9°1′48″N38°44′24″N
Name	Gavriel "Gabi" Ashkenazi
Birth date	February 25, 1954
Birth place	Hagor, Israel
Placeofburial label	Place of burial
Allegiance
Serviceyears	1972 - 2011
Rank
Commands	IDF Chief of StaffDeputy Chief of Staff of the IDFHead of IDF Northern CommandHead of IDF Operations DirectorateArmored Division CommanderGolani Brigade Commanding Officer
Battles	Yom Kippur WarOperation ThunderboltOperation Litani1982 Lebanon War2006 Lebanon War
Laterwork	}}

Gavriel "Gabi" Ashkenazi (, born February 25, 1954), was the Chief of General Staff (Hebrew: רמטכ"ל Ramatkal) of the Israel Defence Forces from 2007 to 2011.

Life and career

Background and early life

Ashkenazi was born and grew up in Hagor, a moshav, or cooperative agricultural community in the Sharon region of central Israel. Ashkenazi's father, a Bulgarian Jewish Holocaust survivor, and mother, a Syrian Jew, helped found the community. Ashkenazi completed high school at a military boarding school affiliated with the prestigious Gymnasia Herzliya in Tel Aviv. His roommates included Yigal Schwartz, a major figure in Israeli literature, and Yoav Toker, a Paris-based broadcast journalist.

Golani Brigade (1972–1988)

Drafted into Israel's Golani Brigade in 1972, Ashkenazi first saw action in the Sinai Peninsula during the 1973 Yom Kippur War. In July 1976 Ashkenazi was a platoon commander in the force that carried out Operation Thunderbolt, a mission to rescue hostages held in Uganda, but he did not participate in the battle at Entebbe Airport. Ashkenazi's first of many experiences in Lebanon came in 1978 during Operation Litani. Ashkenazi was wounded in the fighting and left the IDF before being asked to return as a battalion commander two years later. During the 1982 Lebanon War, Ashkenazi served as Deputy Commander of the Golani Brigade and commanded the forces which captured Beaufort Castle, and the towns of Nabatieh and Jabel Baruch. Promoted to Commander of the Golani in 1987, Ashkenazi was reportedly popular with his brigade's combat soldiers during his nearly two-year tenure in that post.

Northern Command (1988–2002)

In 1988, Ashkenazi was appointed head of Intelligence for Israeli Northern Command. He commanded a reserve armor division in the early 1990s and later worked as the chief of Israel's civil administration in Lebanon, and in 1994 was promoted to chief of the General Staff's Operations Directorate. In 1998, Ashkenazi was appointed head of the Israeli Northern Command, a position that would make him responsible for Israel's withdrawal from its Security Zone in Southern Lebanon, ending Israel's 18 year presence in the country. Ashkenazi criticized the withdrawal, believing that it should have been accompanied by negotiations with Syria.

Deputy Chief of the General Staff (2002–2005)

Appointed IDF Deputy Chief of Staff in 2002, Ashkenazi was considered the most moderate member of the Israeli General Staff during the Al-Aqsa Intifada, according to the Israeli newspaper ''Haaretz''. When Israel began to construct a West Bank barrier in order to physically separate Israeli and Palestinian communities with the purpose of preventing terrorist attacks within Israel, Ashkenazi was placed in charge of the project. He advocated building the barrier as close to the Green Line as possible, a position which would minimize the effects of the barrier on Palestinians. The General also "objected to aggressive acts against the Palestinians" during the Intifada and once described his "greatest fear" for the IDF as "the loss of humanity [of Israeli soldiers] because of the ongoing warfare."

In early 2005, Ashkenazi became a leading candidate to replace outgoing Chief of Staff Moshe Ya'alon. Ultimately, Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz decided to pick Israeli Air Force Commander Dan Halutz as Ya'alon's successor in February 2005. According to ''Haaretz,'' "Halutz was seen to have an advantage over Ashkenazi" given his personal ties with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. As a result of the decision, Ashkenazi officially retired from the IDF in May 2005, leaving in "enormous pain and disappointment." He then became a partner in a security consultancy company based in Tel Aviv.

Director-General of the Defense Ministry (2006)

One year later, Defense Minister Amir Peretz brought Ashkenazi back to the military to serve as the Ministry of Defense's Director-General. In this position, Ashkenazi became the relatively inexperienced Minister's "right hand man" during the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict and, according to ''Ynetnews'', proved to be "much more proficient" than his boss. ''Ynetnews'' attributes Peretz's decision to promote Ashkenazi to Chief of Staff to the two men's successful working relationship during the Lebanon war.

Chief of the General Staff (Rav Aluf) (2007–2011)

Ashkenazi became the Chief of the General Staff of the Israel Defense Forces on 14 February 2007.

As a Rav Aluf, Ashkenazi had to deal with the events of the Second Lebanon War and to draw conclusions for improvements. Under his command, the IDF went through a process of fixing its faults and weaknesses which manifested in the Second Lebanon War. Ashkenazi emphasized many intensive military trainings and military exercises, ranging from reinserting basic skills forgotten, up to large multi-corps exercise (which sometimes included full brigades).

In December 2007 Ashkenazi met with Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the United States - this was the first time in ten years that an Israeli chief of staff met with his U.S. counterpart. While on visit in the United States in July 2008 Mullen gave Ashkenazi the Legion of Merit military decoration with the Commander rank.

At the end of February 2008, Ashkenazi commanded Operation Hot Winter during which the IDF fought alleged terrorist organizations in Gaza for two days. The fighting ended in an truce agreement between Israel and Hamas. At the end of 2008 and in early 2009 Ashkenazi commanded also Operation Cast Lead during which the IDF fought again against the alleged terrorist organizations in Gaza, headed by the Hamas. In the eyes of many Israelis and military commentators, IDF conduct in the operation, which resulted in a hard blow to Hamas (including at least 700 Hamas operatives dead, but also a large number of civilian deaths) and a very low number of Israeli casualties, proved that the IDF has learned the lessons from the Second Lebanon War and regained its reputation and deterrence against Israel's enemies.

Ashkenazi enjoyed very good reputation among Israeli public and his term was considered successful.

On February 14, 2011, Ashkenazi retired from the army, and was succeeded by Benny Gantz.

Education and family life

Ashkenazi studied at the Tel Aviv Junior Command Preparatory School and the U.S. Marine Corps University's Command and Staff College. He also holds a B.A. in political science from the University of Haifa and is a graduate of a Harvard Business School program in management for senior executives.

He lives in Kfar Saba with his wife Ronit and their two children, Gali and Itai.

Gabi Ashkenazi's brother, Tat Aluf Avi Ashkenazi, was appointed head of the National Center for Training on Land (מל"י) in 2009.

Notes

Category:1954 births Category:Living people Category:University of Haifa alumni Category:Harvard Business School alumni Category:People from Center District Category:Israeli Jews Category:Israeli people of Syrian origin Category:Israeli people of Bulgarian origin Category:People from Kfar Saba

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