oneputtdavid:
As far as the "can only be a Jew if your mother was a Jew" goes, that has been discarded by Israel in order to keep the number of Jews up because the Israeli government wants to keep a Jewish majority in "greater" Israel in order to oppress the Palestinians. Israel would call a ham sandwich a Jew if they had to in order to keep this majority.
I understand where you're coming from CRH, about "Israel" and their population. But the correct term for the people of the nation, Israel would be "Israeli(s)". Not necessarily "Jews" because of interracial marriage (gentiles) and turning away from the faith of serving One God. The Muslim or Arabic nations still call them "Jews" because of the hatred, which date back to around 700 AD?, or the time of Mohammad, the founder of Islam.
I did not call all Israelis Jews. No Arab would call all Israelis Jews either, as there are some Christians and many Muslims that live in Israel as well.
Regardless, if the Israeli government calls a person a Jew, even if they are not born of a Jewish mother or are atheist, then that person is, on some levels, a Jew. Israeli law recognizes as Jews those who had a Jewish mother, grandmother, great grandmother, or great-great grandmother even if they were merely converts, and anyone who is a convert themselves.
You can convert without a problem and be considered a Jew, and if you have a wife, she too can convert. After conversion you two will be guaranteed housing, amongst other things,
and be allowed to live, start a business, and, without harassment and
red tape, work in Israel, which are "privileges" not afforded to non-Jews living in Israel (even if their families have lived there for centuries.)
Before you go out and get you and your wife (should you have one) converted, I feel I should warn you that in order to convert, she has to be bathed, naked, by three rabbis in a mikveh ceremony. According to some, however, it is mandatory that she have sex with you after mikveh, and she has to be cleansed at mikveh after every period, so you are guaranteed sex at least once a month, so it's not all bad news.
The fact that Plato's Republic was brought up in this thread is actually quite interesting because in it, every citizen is subjected to an authority from which he must get approval in order to do anything significant. Judaism is actually quite similar to this, and you should expect this if you plan on converting. If a rabbi doesn't like what you're doing, he can order you to be beaten, imprisoned, expelled, or killed. In the past, they have sometimes gotten a little imaginative with their methods of dealing with "heretics" and done things such as tossed them in vats of bowling water or poisoned them... so watch what you do, and if you're not sure, it's best to ask.
The Israeli military's censors can also get in on the action and confiscate your belongings should they not like your political views, especially if they are mildly sympathetic to Gentiles, although I do not suspect that you would ever have sympathy for an Arab or Israeli Christian and would never do such a thing.
You also won't be able to work on the Sabbath, but the good news is that you can hire an Arab to "hang around to do things when you cannot," but you are forbidden to explain or confirm that this refers to the Sabbath. You are also not allowed to instruct him during the Sabbath. You have to give him hints. It is sort of like a game of Pictionary or Jeopardy, where contestants have to give answers, awkwardly, in the form of a question, except in this case, you have to form a request in the form of a comment in which you do not directly say what you want done. For example, if you have run out of something in the fridge, you can say, "Oh no. I have run out of orange juice.", at which point your Arab sidekick will go to the store to fetch you some OJ. If your food is cold, do not ask him to heat it up for you, but you can give your Arab sidekick his cue to warm it up for you if you say "This food is cold," by asking your wife, "Is your food as cold as mine is?," or some such similar comment.
Similarly, should you ever become a rabbi, you will be facing multiple obstacles: not only can you not be paid for work on Saturday, but you can't be paid for preaching at all, so it is a double whammy... but good news! You can sit around and do nothing on any other day and be paid for your laziness. For example, if you work on Saturday, and you happen to sleep late on Sunday, you can ask for money for being lazy on Sunday and sleeping in. You are compensated, allegedly, for your laziness.
It is believed that God, despite being all-knowing and all-seeing, somehow gets tricked by the Arab sidekick and "compensation for laziness" stuff.
There are many things that you will be able to do to pass the time, like debating whether Gentiles are simply half-human, half-animals who should be trained to serve you or something more sinister: tentacles of Satan with whom coexistence is an impossibility.
There is so much more, but I wouldn't want to ruin the surprise for you. Should you decide to convert, you can look forward to a life of backwards, awkward insanity, which is probably right up your alley anyways, so I say go for it.