This is a lot like my own story…I was raised Lutheran, was an atheist for many years, and became Catholic. I attended, at various times in my youth, mainly LCMS churches (the conservative denomination), a WELS one (very conservative), and an ELCA one (liberal/mainline). I don’t remember hearing one word about Israel or Jews…and the parts of the country I lived in were not places with a large Jewish community. I have some part-Jewish cousins and I knew they got presents for 8 days at Hannukah, and I knew Tommy from the Rugrats was Jewish because of the Passover/Exodus episode. That’s about it…so the continued status of the Jews in relation to God or of the modern State of Israel was just not something that we were taught about or that I thought about. Left Behind was circulating a lot at the time and I read some of that but I don’t remember seeing the significance of the people as part of it…more the place (Megiddo, etc.). Most of my interest in this stuff came indirectly – from being in a place with more Jewish folks and from reading the OT more.
