Jews

"What I saw are the Jewish people, because here in Israel, it's kinda much more Jewish mostly. I hope they aren't easily persecuted by the Coalition of the Red Star, of course."

--Su Ji-Hoon, Hell on Earth

Jews (/dʒuːz/; Hebrew: יְהוּדִים‬ ISO 259-3 Yehudim, Israeli pronunciation [jehuˈdim]), also known as Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and a nation originating from the Israelites, or Hebrews, of the Ancient Near East. Jewish ethnicity, nationhood, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish people, while its observance varies from strict observance to complete nonobservance.

Jews originated as an ethnic and religious group in the Middle East during the second millennium BCE, in the part of the Levant known as the Land of Israel. The Merneptah Stele appears to confirm the existence of a people of Israel somewhere in Canaan as far back as the 13th century BCE (Late Bronze Age). The Israelites, as an outgrowth of the Canaanite population, consolidated their hold with the emergence of the Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of Judah. Some consider that these Canaanite sedentary Israelites melded with incoming nomadic groups known as 'Hebrews.' Though few sources mention the exilic periods in detail, the experience of diaspora life, from the Ancient Egyptian rule over the Levant, to Assyrian Captivity and Exile, to Babylonian Captivity and Exile, to Seleucid Imperial rule, to the Roman occupation and Exile, and the historical relations between Jews and their homeland thereafter, became a major feature of Jewish history, identity and memory.