JEWS AND EDUCATION: a mix for creating geniuses?

WHAT EVERY JEWISH GRANDMOTHER KNOWS: HER LTTLE ONES ARE ALL GENIUSES!
The headline in The Ausralian, 10/4/07, said so:"Jews are geniuses, claims social radical".
The Letter to the Editor below explains it all.

Jewish respect for education
Thursday, April 12, 2007
Letters


IF there is any truth in the headline “Jews are geniuses, claims social radical” (Worldwide, 10/4), then I missed out badly on the relevant genes. However, the Jewish respect for education is beyond dispute.

The education system in Israel and the educational level of the Israeli workforce are among the world’s best. The Ministry of Education occupies the biggest government building in Jerusalem. If the Arab world had been pragmatic enough to peaceably accept the creation of Israel by the UN in 1948, three generations of Palestinian youngsters could have had an educational spin-off, leading their people to a secure economic niche in the world. But while Israel produces more academic research papers than the whole Arab world, many of those youngsters are kitted out as suicide bombers.
Norman Rich
Newport, NSW
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I agree with the writer above. Those 'genius genes' seem to escape most of us,- but quite a few of the world's minority of geniuses apparently are from among the Jewish people. This is because education,- whether Jewishly or secularly has always been encoraged as a basis of survival for Jews throughout the Centuries of persecution in exile.

When Israel was re-established as an independent nation, it was a 'given' from the start that much of its resources would be put into top-class educational institutions. In spite of its constant need to be on guard against its terrorist neighbours and fighting a number of acual wars to survive,

I have always maintained that the Palestinian people as a whole must be the stupidest group on earth for relying on their fellow Arabs instead of on the Israelis. There are intelligent Palestinians,- including some of those who decided to stay-put and take their chances with the Jews in Israel,- who would rather be in alliance, in a federation actually,- with Israel rather than with any of their other Arab States. I heard one of them say this on a BBC interview a couple of years ago!
I wonder if he survived.
Miriam M