Aliyah: Is It the Answer?
Max deciphers whether making Aliyah is the answer to rising antisemitism, and what young Jews might lose, as well as gain, by choosing Israel as home.
For quite some time, the levels of antisemitism in Britain have been deeply perturbing. In 5786 alone, we have seen fatal and, BH, non-fatal stabbings, arson attacks on synagogues and charities, as well as a political system too scared to call a spade a spade and uproot the world's oldest hatred.
This has left me wondering, once I graduate, is London really where I want to settle down and raise a family? Should I move to America? Or should I make Aliyah?
On a deeper level, am I asking these questions because of antisemitism, or am I using it as a mask for my lack of optimism about the future of the British economy? These are the important distinctions to make if Aliyah really is the answer, especially as most of its benefits seem to be tax ones.
Being part of FZY, you might think the answer is simple, especially considering I have just spent the past three weeks leading a group of forty 16-year-olds on Tour, adventuring to Israel's northern, eastern, southern and westernmost points. I have always been a strong Zionist with a deep connection to the land and its people, and yet I cannot seem to rationalise the decision to make Aliyah once I graduate. This is not to say I do not want to live in Israel after university, but rather that I see it as a short stay rather than a long-term move. For a young Jew with limited responsibilities, Israel is, I believe, the best place in the world to live, just not forever. After all, if you move there permanently, you lose the one place you would otherwise spend every summer and holiday coming back to.
In many diaspora households, the idea of Aliyah is routinely floated, whether casually in passing during the Seder or in a full-blown discussion around the table at FND. It is also a frequent topic among my friends and me, as we naïvely try to work out what the future holds, especially life after university and, sadly, with that, FZY.
Perhaps this reluctance says less about Israel and more about human psychology. On Tour, on a gap year, on the bogrim trip, or simply visiting family and friends, any time you go to Israel, you know there is a return flight looming at some point in the near future. It is this, especially for me, that makes Israel feel special: knowing it is where the heart longs to be, where home feels like home, but not necessarily where it will ever permanently be. Right now, Israel lives as a utopian fantasy in my head, a place where I feel safe and at home, and a place that always feels like a holiday rather than somewhere I concern myself with tax returns. The closest I get to the latter is the VAT refund desk at Ben-Gurion departures, receipts fanned out like a winning poker hand, determined not to leave a single shekel behind.
Once a place becomes somewhere you live, the charm wears off. The stress of finding a flat share in Tel Aviv, of hunting for a job, and of realising that rockets are not an added bit of spice to a holiday but a real threat changes how the country feels. It is not that Israel becomes less remarkable, but that our sense of time changes how we experience it. When time is limited, it becomes even more special. On Tour, you have twenty-two days to change a person's relationship with Israel, and each day becomes a new chance to stoke that fire in someone. Move there indefinitely and the fire is still burning, but there is so much going on around it that you rarely get the chance to stop and look at how far you have come. When your time there is unlimited, the beauty of the country settles into routine. Suddenly, walks along the tayelet are no longer picturesque and ‘Gram-worthy’, and that spot next to the shuk in Machane Yehuda is just a tourist trap. Yet, these were the very things that once drew you close and gave you that special feeling inside.
As Taylor Hughes puts it, we are brilliant at filling our calendars and hopeless at leaving room for wonder. Aliyah too soon, and you risk becoming too busy living there to appreciate how remarkable Israel is and how much it has to offer.
Having spent so long weighing this on an individual level, the question morphs once you zoom out to a diaspora-wide scale. When I landed at Heathrow on the flight back from Tour, while waiting for my suitcase at baggage reclaim, I got talking to a mother who had made Aliyah and had just flown to London with her born and bred Israeli son to see the "English family." Once the pleasantries had run their course and they understood what the FZY Tour was, the son asked the question every Israeli seems to ask: "When are you going to make Aliyah?" I replied that I wasn't sure it was the right answer, because if we all make Aliyah, what happens to Jewish life in the diaspora? In truth, if we all pack our bags and go back to Israel, what would happen to Jewish communities across the rest of the world? Would they disappear without a trace, or do we really expect our culture to be preserved by the very people who made us feel we had to abandon it?
Right now, although it is difficult at times, there are thriving communities in every corner of the planet, from Sydney to San Francisco, and Buenos Aires to Budapest. Every one of these cities has its own history of antisemitism, and yet we remain, and we do not let hatred define us. Instead, we let it bring us closer together, forging stronger relationships with Judaism and with Israel. If we were all to make Aliyah, would that not be letting antisemitism win? Would those responsible for making us feel pushed out not be vindicated by the result? Jewish pride and Jewish history have never been about letting the antisemite win. Rather, whatever form or severity the hatred takes, Am Yisrael has always come out the other side, together and stronger.
Maybe, then, what I am protecting by resisting full-time Aliyah is not Israel itself, but the version I hold in my head, one I am scared to see ruined by the ordinariness of daily life. This is the tussle facing young Jews today: not simply whether to go, but how much of the wonder you're willing to trade for the reality of living there.
The answer? Yours.
