Jewish cuisine influences, as this part of Europe (up to the borders of present-day Austria and Poland) was for a time part of the Ottoman Empire. Since the rise of Ashkenazi Jewish migration to 19th-Century Palestine and the establishment of the State of Israel, increased contact between Ashkenazi, Sephardi, and Mizrahi Jews has led to a rising importance of Middle Eastern and Mediterranean cuisine amongst Jews of all ethnicities. While Ashkenazi cuisine as it is known today is largely based within the context of American-Jewish and Ashkenazi-Israeli food, much of the culinary tradition of Ashkenazi Jews springs from Central and Eastern Europe.
Ethnoreligious group and ancestral ties. The legal assignement what is an ethnoreligious group can differ from the above given definition. Some ethnoreligious groups' identities are reinforced by the experience of living within a larger community as a distinct minority. Ethnoreligious groups can be tied to ethnic nationalism if the ethnoreligious group possesses a historical base in a specific region. In many ethnoreligious groups emphasis is placed upon religious endogamy, and the concurrent discouragement of interfaith marriages or intercourse, as a means of preserving the stability and historical longevity of the community and culture. Prior to the Babylonian exile the Israelites had already