known back then, Canaan – was nestled
between the two major states that gave
birth to Western and Near-Eastern Civilisation: ancient Egypt to the South
and Mesopotamia to the North.
While the land of Israel lies at the
heart of Jewish history – both as our
birthplace and as the one land where
the Jewish people ever had any kind of
autonomy; where we could be (with
Hashem’s help, of course) the masters
of our own destiny – it has also been
fought over, conquered and ruled by
enough major and minor powers to
make it a microcosm of the entire history of Western civilisation.
Canaan started off as a mostly independent collection of city-states that
drew heavily on the influences of its
neighbouring civilisations, before being
ruled briefly by ancient Egypt. In time,
E