Indeed, Yiddish is used in Israel, but consider the demographics here. Foreigners don’t come into much contact with the Yiddish-using Haredim. The Haredim tend to stay within their own communities, which are not neighbourhoods where just any tourist is going to pass through. Even when I have often been picked up by Haredim when hitchhiking in Israel, it is hard to have any kind of exchange with them; they will help out a non-religious person, but not chat with them.
So, the Israelis whom foreigners are likely to come into contact with are the whole rest of the population. They do not use Yiddish or know a thing about it. Considering how much the more secular part of the country dislikes the Haredim, I can see how they would bristle at any question about a cultural feature they see as Haredim-linked.
"Ashkenazi Ultra-Orthodox community" ... that's my point. They are not "Israeli" in the sense understood by this term today. They might as well be in Brooklin or some shtetl in Poland. Israel is not relveant for them in any meaningful way (excpet for the traditional "shnor").
Those Eastern European Jews are also the secular Israeli mainstream, and also most of American Jews. They are, as the paper says, mixed European and Middle Eastern. That paper's results had the mixture for Ashkenazim as approximately 80/20, while others have it at 50/50 or 40/60, with varying low levels of admixture from the Caucasus.
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Yiddish is spoken in Israel by significant parts of the Ashkenazi Ultra-Orthodox community.
The number of speakers is probably in the low hundreds of thousands.
Indeed, Yiddish is used in Israel, but consider the demographics here. Foreigners don’t come into much contact with the Yiddish-using Haredim. The Haredim tend to stay within their own communities, which are not neighbourhoods where just any tourist is going to pass through. Even when I have often been picked up by Haredim when hitchhiking in Israel, it is hard to have any kind of exchange with them; they will help out a non-religious person, but not chat with them.
So, the Israelis whom foreigners are likely to come into contact with are the whole rest of the population. They do not use Yiddish or know a thing about it. Considering how much the more secular part of the country dislikes the Haredim, I can see how they would bristle at any question about a cultural feature they see as Haredim-linked.
"Ashkenazi Ultra-Orthodox community" ... that's my point. They are not "Israeli" in the sense understood by this term today. They might as well be in Brooklin or some shtetl in Poland. Israel is not relveant for them in any meaningful way (excpet for the traditional "shnor").
These are blatant racist tropes about religious Jews!
At least you didn’t say antisemitic. Assuming there’s anything “Semitic” about Eastern Europeans Jews (as per the above linked research paper).
BTW talking of which, it’s always fun to go back and read Arthur Ruppin's ideas about race.
That’s an ashkenazi eugenist whom couple of institutes in Israel are named after, including the Ruppin academic center.
Those Eastern European Jews are also the secular Israeli mainstream, and also most of American Jews. They are, as the paper says, mixed European and Middle Eastern. That paper's results had the mixture for Ashkenazim as approximately 80/20, while others have it at 50/50 or 40/60, with varying low levels of admixture from the Caucasus.