Why? The question has been asked thousands of times to thousands of people. Why? Why did you move to Israel? Why leave the comforts of North America to come here? Why enter the financial questions that will arise? Why leave that great job in the center of Manhattan? Why leave your friends and family that you grew up with over the course of decades? Why enter into the hardships? The rudeness of seemingly everyone. The endless bureaucratic hassles that seem to be daily. And why move to a tiny little country surrounded by countless enemies whose dream is the end of said tiny little countries’ existence?
Perhaps the only thing more fascinating than this question is the wide range of answers you hear. “It is where G-d wants us to be.†“I am Jewish and want to live in a land where (almost) everyone else you encounter on a day to day basis is Jewish.†“I want to be near my parents/children.†“The atmosphere is much nicer.†“I came and ‘something’ just kept me here.â€
These are but a short list of some of the wide range of answers we hear. Some mundane, some fascinating, some mystical even.
As an Oleh from North America in the past decade I too have been asked this question many times and while my answer has, admittedly, varied over the past ten plus years, some time ago my official answer to this often asked question just sort of hit me and has gone unchanged since. My humble take on the question is as follows.
Israel is a miracle. Not just a miracle in the traditional sense i.e. the fact that the country even exists since the events of 1948. But also a miracle of circumstances that puzzles me to this day. The astonishments never cease. With so much catastrophe occurring around the globe, turn on CNN or any other major news source in the world on any given day and Israel will be front and center. How are the “negotiations†going? How is Israel “disproportionately†responding to today’s terror, er, sorry, I mean militant attack? How have the Palestinians been humiliated lately? What’s the latest UN resolution against Israel? The list goes on and on. With life and death disasters which, one would think, dwarf Israel’s in size and relevance, occurring universally on an hourly basis, Israel continues to dominate the news, usually painted in a negative light. One might suspect that this would be yet another deterrence for coming to live in the Holy Land, yet for me it has now become the clinching factor in my remaining here indefinitely.
The hate is illogical. The focus is disproportionate. Throughout time this continues to occur. With all going on in the world Jewry and Israel continue to dominate the headlines. To me, this can be no coincidence. How could this continue, without disruption, throughout time? Somebody is trying to tell us something. While not trying to get all mythical we have to admit that, whether by G-d (which I personally believe) or some other divine force, somebody is trying to tell us that Jewry/Israel/etc. is different. It is of supreme importance and uniqueness and always will be. This will never change. Times, fashions, cultures and technology all change but the one constant, as illogical as it may seem at the time of occurrence, has always been fascination/contempt/disproportionate focus on Jewry.
I want to be get on that train! While I was born Jewish, even our non-Jewish brethren, when thoroughly contemplated, would be amazed at this phenomenon. It’s just too illogical to ignore. I want to be a part of that. We need to look at this miracle and all the amazing circumstances surrounding it and not blow it off as coincidence. It’s just too big and, as has been proven throughout history, too important. While I too enjoy indulging in the pleasantries that this world has to offer I cannot ignore the message being told to us that the Jewry/Israel issue is one that has to be tackled. The disproportionate reaction to our existence is not by chance. It is a calling, in the most blatant terms, that this is an issue that, at worst, is at least as important as any issue facing man.
This is why I choose to live in Israel. Somebody is telling us something. This tiny land, smaller than Lake Michigan, is treated with more focus than the entire planet and galaxy combined. The Jewish people, a total world wide sum so relatively small so as to be considered statistically irrelevant if it were any other people, who have always been the most loyal citizens in any land they have inhabited, given to the most endless, unreasonable scrutiny at an outlandish amount of time and resources. The Muslim population, over 1 billion plus strong, considered the underdog. These are not reasonable calculations. Even the most indifferent among us would have to agree there is something else at work here. For me, what is at work here is a message. A message that says you/we are being told something. We are being told what and where is important. Do we listen? Do we answer the message? I have decided to and will continue and, while I am not suggesting that Aliyah and moving to Israel is for everyone, I am definitely suggesting that these amazing miracles of circumstance are questions that anybody alive might be anxious to address.
Ari Strauch
