Stuff Zionists Say

In a letter to the Sydney Morning Herald last year, Vic Alhadeff declared (with a straight face):

"What reputable Israeli leaders do is rely on the Bible to justify their 4,000-year connection to the land." (See my 31/5/13 post The things that you're liable to read into the Bible...)

Which is essentially what he's trying to do here:

"Unionists and Jewish leaders will be gathering in Sydney's Great Synagogue tonight for a Passover dinner co-hosted by the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies and Unions NSW. 'Moses was the first unionist,' Board of Deputies chief executive Vic Alhadeff observed to Strewth. 'He told the Jewish slaves in Egypt to down tools and go home. They did!'" (Original union heavy, Strewth, The Australian, 2/4/14)

Hilarious. Not.

History. Not.

The problem is he ignores the warning of the Prophet Gershwin that "The things that you're liable/ To read in the Bible/ It ain't necessarily so":

"In the thirteenth century BCE, the purported time of the Exodus, Canaan was ruled by the still-powerful pharaohs. This means that Moses led the freed slaves out of Egypt... to Egypt? According to the biblical narrative, the people he led through the wilderness for 40 years included 600,000 warriors; they would have been traveling with their wives and children, implying a party of around 3 million in total. Aside from the fact that it was utterly impossible for a population of such size to wander through the desert for so long, an event of such magnitude should have left some epigraphic or archaeological traces. The ancient Egyptians kept meticulous records of every event, and there is a great deal of documentation about the kingdom's political and military life. There are even documents about incursions of nomadic groups into the realm. Yet there is not a single mention of any 'Children of Israel' who lived in Egypt, or rebelled against it, or emigrated from it at any time." (The Invention of the Jewish People, Shlomo Sand, 2009, pp 118-19)