ISRAEL By: Erin Popalis

Map and Location

Size  Area: 20,330 sq. km. (7,850 sq. mi.)  About the size of New Jersey  Highest and Lowest Elevation  Highest- Har Meron 1,208 m  Lowest- Dead Sea 408 m

Population  Population of million  Ethnic groups: Jews 76.2%; Arabs 19.5%; other 4.3%

Date it became a State. Became a nation on May 14,

Nickname, Motto & Flag  The Motto- “To learn and to teach, to observe and to do.”  The Nickname- “The Holy Land.”  The Flag-  White - peace and honesty  Blue - vigilance, truth and loyalty, perseverance & justice  Star of David

Capital  Jerusalem  Oldest City in the World

Anthem  Hatikvah (“The Hope”) As long as deep in the heart, The soul of a Jew yearns, And forward to the East To Zion, an eye looks Our hope will not be lost, The hope of two thousand years, To be a free nation in our land, The land of Zion and Jerusalem.

Coat of arms  It was adopted in  Sometimes it is gold and blue.

Famous People  Natalie Portman- Was born is Jerusalem  Her father is from Israel  Her mother is from Ohio

Computer & Phone usage  Since the mid 1980s Israel is apart of world wide web.  In % is nonusers and 40% are internet users.

Gross National Product

Import & Export goods  Some Exports items  olive oils, wine, and grains  Some Import items  tin, lead, silver, copper, iron and gold

Foods or crops produced  In Israel 215,000 hectares of land are devoted to field crops.  156,000 are for winter crops including wheat, hay and safflower.  60,000 are for summer crops including cotton, sunflowers, beans, corn and watermelon.

School  The school system has kindergartens  6 year primary schools  3 year junior secondary schools  3 year senior secondary schools

Clothing  Women in Israel get used to wearing pants.  Very few wear shorts.  Men dress very casually

Sports  Israel is very competitive when it comes to sports.  They have won many metals in the Olympics  Israeli grandmaster is the holder of the 2009 Chess World Cup.  Some major achievements come from tennis and pole vaulting.

Sports cont.  Some other sports they do are  Association football, basketball, track and field, swimming, handball, chess, softball, boxing, wrestling, cricket, rugby, American football, netball, baseball, ice hockey, figure skating, and martial arts.

Language  Hebrew, Arabic, English, and Russian.  English and Russian are the most popular unofficial languages in Israel.

Religion  Not all of Israel is religions.  7.59 million Israelis in 2010, about 76% were counted as Jewish. The other is 23.8%  32.9% of Israelis were born outside of Israel.

Types of Government  “Parliamentary democracy - a political system in which the legislature (parliament) selects the government - a prime minister, premier, or chancellor along with the cabinet ministers - according to party strength as expressed in elections; by this system, the government acquires a dual responsibility: to the people as well as to the parliament” 

Health Care  They have high standard health services.  Modern hospitals.

Climate  A subtropical region  Hot and dry summers  Cold and rainy winters

Global Issues  Israel is getting a lot of criticism about not upholding and respect human rights.  On the mainstream there was a lot of reports about the terrorist attacks on the Jewish states.

Natural resources  Some of Israel’s natural resources are timber, potash, copper ore, natural gas, phosphate rock, magnesium bromide, clays, and sand.

Recycling initiatives  Waste disposal reached 20% in 2004 and 50% in 2010  EACH PERSON in Israel generates 1.6 kilograms (kg) of waste per day.

Political system  The Knesset  instead of voting for individual candidates they vote for an entire party.  Any party with 2 percent in percent is assigned a certain amount of seats in the 120 member-legislature

Transportation  Israel has pretty much the same ways to move around as we do.  Bus, Car, Train, Subway, Cable cars, Plane, Boat.

Cost of living

Cost of an average House  A two bedroom house in Tel Aviv is about $400,000.  Others can be around $180,000 in place around Tel Aviv.

Average income DisposableGross 19,17724,275constant 2005 US$ at PPP 68,16086,280 current new shekels

Taxes  In 2011 Israel’s corporate income tax rate is 24%  Individual income tax is about 10%-45%. Tax%Income 10%1-60,840 14%60, ,921 23%103, ,840 30%168, ,880 33%254, ,760 45%482,761 and over

Work Cited                 