how did the Jews become the smartest race on the planet?

That's funny because there hasn't been a racially pure Jew in centuries. Most of the so called Jewish Intellectuals you speak of among the Rothschilds and Wittgensteins, Manhattan Project Scientists, 19th and 20th Century Physicists, Nobel Prize Winners, University 170 IQ Students and so on are merely Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews with significant German, Slavic, Italian and Greek admixture. Jewish purity in European and American Jews goes anywhere between 20% to 70% and on average a Jew could in fact really be 50% Jew and 50% Aryan/German so it depends on what you mean by Jew at this point.

Meanwhile Mizrahi Jews in the Middle East who make up half of Israel's Jewish population have their IQs at around 80-90 who are far more pure Jew/Semitic than Ashkenazis. It has nothing to do with race or being Jewish racially..

So how did Half Jewish Half White Ashkenazis manage to be more successful than both Pure Jews and Pure Whites on average?

Answer is that It's more like a cultural thing because our dedication to our liturgical religion mixed with Europe's intellectual history enticed us to more enthusiastic intellectualism among many many other things. It was by chance and just so happen as happen. It's more complicated than this, I'll explain it another time, but that's one of the main gists.

In Medieval Europe, Jews were considered to be more tan skinned and far more curlier hair than the Jews of Europe you see today. So as you can see, as time goes on, Jewish Genes degrades little by little. It's mostly cultural evolution.

Kind of funny that the only reason Jews ever settled in the Central Europe was because many German and Slavic Kings invited us there from Greece after Roman expulsion from Judea. Actually it was as you say whites that shaped Jews the way we are now.

An example is one of Charlemagne, the Famous Iconic Germanic Frank King from the 8th Century who employed many Jews

Quote
Jews in Charlemagne's realm[edit]
Early in Charlemagne's rule he tacitly allowed Jews to monopolise money lending. Then lending of money for interest was proscribed in 814 because it violated Church law. Charlemagne introduced the Capitulary for the Jews, a prohibition on Jews engaging in money-lending due to the religious convictions of the majority of his constituents, in essence banning it across the board, a reversal of his earlier recorded general policy.[104] In addition to this broad change, Charlemagne also performed a significant number of microeconomic reforms, such as direct control of prices and levies on certain goods and commodities.

His Capitulary for the Jews, however, was not representative of his overall economic relationship or attitude towards the Frankish Jews, and certainly not his earlier relationship with them, which evolved over his life. His personal physician, for example, was Jewish,[105] and he employed one Jew, Isaac, who was his personal representative to the Muslim caliphate of Baghdad.[106] Letters have been credited to him that invited Jews to settle in his kingdom.[107][108][109]nvited MANY Jews to live in his kingdom.

The King of Poland, Casimir the Great for example invited many Jews to live in Poland, had many wives and mistresses but his favorite mistress who was the only one who bore him a son was a Jewess. He also emancipated Jews and punished Whites that desecrated Jewish graves.

Germans and Slavs saw how good business men Jews were and that's why we ended up there. Now they hate us for doing what they brought us there for. And blame us for all their problems.

Most of the Jews I know are mourning for humanity. Like always you are just hearing about those who succeeded.

Nonetheless, there are some things in the Jewish culture that if one both preserves and perseveres (and that's really the main idea here) he could benefit from them:

1. Education-
   1. from very early age Jews had to learn the Hebrew ABC for religious reasons. It is holy language and they were needed to read the bible and prayers which are written in… Hebrew.
   2. Apart from that education plays big role in Jewish families like Iraq and Europe.
2. Culture- One prominent motive in Judaism is argument, which mean asking questions, challenging perception, and shake old thoughts. Hence 2 Jews 3 opinions, hence the Talmud (which is basically a book of arguments of what to do in case of X, and several opinions, each one with its reasons), hence 20 parties in one tiny country, hence innovation and patents.
3. Limited options-
   1. being Jewish even 100 years ago was a difficult task. For a great amount of times, in places that aren't America, Canada or India Jews were limited in doing most of the professions. When Christians only allow you to trade and engage in finance- you better excel in that, cause you don't have other options.
   2. If they had any property or material they could be easily get robbed (and raped and killed also cause why not?) You know what they can't take from you? Knowledge. The studies that you did, the information you have acquired - this things can't be stolen from you.
4. Fighting against the wall- that is more about the Israeli Jews than the rest. When you survive the Holocaust and the Brits send your ship back to die in Europe, when you succeeded to infiltrate to a desert and you have to grow your crops during the day and to defend them at night, when you just survived the Holocaust and one day after the UN resolution you are being ganged up by 6 different Arab countries who wish to finish what Hitler started, when tens of Terrorist group devouting to slice your throat - than you don't much have a choice now do you? So you are making 8200, drones, TAVOR, develop modern doctrines, building Iron Dome, training Mossad agents etc…

That's all I guess.

You won't find here religious reasons (The chosen ones) nor biological (Jews genius genes). We are just doing what we have done always: