Israeli names

[nkafkafi]

> Naama (not Anamar!) wrote:
> 
> > I wouldn't have thought that any American is called Naama. It's 
an 
> > Israeli name. Possibly your fellow student is originally from 
> Israel, 
> > or has Israeli parents?

> David wrote:
> What exactly is an Israeli name?  Are there distinctively Israeli 
> names, as opposed to Jewish ones?  If so, whence do they come?
> 

Neri explains:
Jewish names are mostly biblical names, or names in the language of 
the country where the specific jew lives. During the 2000 years 
of "Diaspora", Hebrew had become practically a dead language, used 
only for religious ceremonies and studies (much like Latin). A very 
important part of the Zionist revolution was to reinstate Hebrew as a 
spoken language, and adapt it to modern times. This has included also 
many new Hebrew names that were rarely or never used before. Some of 
them are biblical names that for some reasons were not used by jews 
in the Diaspora, such as Evyatar (a highest priest during king 
David's time), Omri (one of the kings of Israel) or my own name Neri 
(same as Ner, the father of Abner the war leader). Many names are 
after places in Israel, celebrating the return to the homeland, such 
as Kineret (the biblical name for the Sea of Galil), Yardena (a 
girl's name derived from "Yarden" - the Jorden river), Sharon (a 
region to the north of Tel Aviv). Some new names are just Hebrew 
words that have some symbolic meaning or simply a nice sound: Einat 
(a spring), Shachar (dawn), Doron (a present). All the names above 
are purely "Israeli" names. You won't find them on any non-israeli 
jew around the world.

Naama is a biblical name. I think she was the mother of one of the 
kings of Judea (can't remember whom offhand). As "naamagatus" wrote, 
it is of the same root as Naomi, both meaning pleasant or pleasing. 
The name is certainly used in Israel today. In fact my first 
girlfriend in highschool was called Naama, which is why I like the 
name and probably why I bother to write this long explanation 8-) but 
I think this name was very rarely used by jews through most history, 
perhaps because the original Naama was not a jew but an ammonites. 
The Ammonites were a related Semitic people that was sometimes at war 
with the Judea and Israeli kingdoms. 

Hope this clarifies things,

Neri