Why Would Anyone Move to Israel, Especially Now?

FD and I are at Gate B14 to board a flight to Fort Lauderdale. 

No, it is not a vacation. This is the first stop. We are moving—intending to spend the rest of our lives in Israel. 

(I’m sorry, you know who you are, that I never had the chance to visit your farm). 

 

See, we're finally going. Not a vacation, not a Sabbatical. Not to visit the kids. 

We love America, the old America, the tolerant America. Not that we are leaving because the old America has changed, that melting pot, although it really has changed. And we're not leaving because of antisemitism, although that is not a bad reason to leave if one is a Jew. We get it. The Age of Jewish Enlightenment/tolerance is over. Hate has been in the air for decades and it reigns.

We'll be flying El Al, perhaps the only airline flying to Israel, the only armed airline. We leave tonight. 

 

Yes, we know that Iran vows retaliation for the assassination of a beloved leader, read murderer, a plotter and a planner of the destruction of the State of Israel and the annihilation of all Jews. That's the plan for all of us, everywhere, in the Palestinian-Hamas-Arab playbook.  

 

FD reminded me recently that there exists an entire generation of young people who know nothing about September 11, 2001. They weren't born or weren't cognizant of what happened here in New York. The deaths, the collapse of the Towers. This explains at least partly, why they might support the Palestinian people over the Jews. They don't get it that that other team, the one that isn't into Democracy, intends to come for them, too.

 

The culmination of this war is obviously in G-d’s hands, not President Biden's, although we appreciate his support, and it is not in Bini Netanyahu's. G-d seems to have empowered the Jewish people with intellect and talent and most important, a Torah that is true, and a Talmud, a compilation of books that include prophecies indicating that we will be, in the end, victorious. There will be blood, unfortunately, there will be pain and suffering and violations (read the book of Zachariah) but in the end the Jews will prevail. 

 

We believe this. That we belong there not here. This has been a lifelong dream beginning well before a massacre on October 7 that took thousands of Jewish lives and hundreds of hostages, many of whom are unfortunately gone, martyrs. The dream is inextinguishable in the Jewish soul, it is thousands of years old, precedes all pogroms and massacres. It precedes children and women and men young and old, brave soldiers and soon-to-be soldiers. Such cowards, these Palestinian/Hamas (they are one in the same, people, don't believe what you read) hoodlums honestly. Gangsters. Stealing babies. Mutilating babies, women, men. 

 

There are a few psalms, Tehillim, we say daily, psalms that literally mention Hamas by name. Take a look at Psalm 140. I’m not telling Jews anything they don’t know. 

Hamas is a word that means violence. They named themselves VIOLENCE. Wow.

Enough politics, let's talk about me. 

The response from the community to our move? Only heartfelt well wishes, so many of them, so much love, such an incredible atmosphere of hope and even, shall I say, jealousy because in the Jewish community Aliyah, becoming an Israeli citizen, is the goal. It is NOT a better you than me These are sincere people, people who truly wish that they could do this, too, that they could muster the finances (no small task, there's never enough). The decision not to move is also about family obligation. My demographic is a sandwich generation. How does one leave elderly parents, many with serious health problems, or children? HOW DO YOU LEAVE PRECIOUS GRANDCHILDREN? Most do not. 

 

But living in Israel is the ultimate commandment, the most important mitzvah. 

Many, maybe a third of the commandments of the Torah are about what one must do when living in the Holy Land. The land of Israel, let's just say it, not Palestine. Palestine is for Palestinians. Israel is for Yisraelim. Jews. 

 

Rabbi Cohen said it in one of many beautiful vorts (a vort is a short speech to the congregation, good luck with that). He said that many years ago, in line at Ikea, everyone looked up at a TV at the aftermath of an explosion, a bomb set off in Jerusalem, a pe-gu-ah, a terrorist attack in Jerusalem, perhaps on a bus or a packed downtown restaurant —Orthodox Jewish people searching for remains, bones and skin, heads, legs and arms, pieces of human beings, innocent civilians, blown to bits by a bomb.

 

What did Rabbi Cohen hear from the shoppers nearby? WHY WOULD ANYONE EVER WANT TO LIVE THERE?    

 

Well, because this is the land of milk and honey. This is the land that Heaven sent and this lovely land is mine. You land, you look around, and you marvel and don't stop.

It is in our blood, it is in our spirit, and many of us long, literally long for Jerusalem. You can’t buy this feeling, it is in our collective DNA or memory, ask a Jungian.

 

We become citizens of Israel soon after we land on Israeli soil, when an agency, perhaps the Israeli consulate, presents us with ID cards, assuming the office is still staffed. There’s this war going on, you know. 

FD's mother, 99, is coming with us. She is already an Israeli citizen but had to come back to the States for a few years, a terrible loss, my sister-in-law. How does one lose a child?  But now my mother-in-law is ready to come home, and so are we.

 

There isn't a person in the community I haven't hugged goodbye. If I missed you I’m sorry. I've been crying for three weeks, sadness, joy, a compote of emotions. This is crazy-making, and as you all know that's a DSM diagnosis.

 

I’ll post pictures next time.

 

As we say (as you chutzniks, ha ha) say, having not yet subscribed to this modifier of craziness quite yet. Next Year in Jerusalem. 

Come see me.

 

Blessings, 

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