Technological advances and globalization have solved the material problems of leaving the country. You don't have to go all the way down to the green kiosk the Village to buy an Israeli newspaper. New songs? A recommended TV show? A book? Everything is available in a second on streaming services. In every self-respecting metropolis in the world, there is a grocery store that sells Bamba or Bisli or a decent pita that you can use to mop up hummus (even at $15 a plate). But unlike the decline of the 1970s, today there is no material decline. It is a decline in values. A mental-value spotlight must be shone on in it.
A kippah is placed on the head only after the security check at the synagogue. Hebrew is not spoken in areas that are inhospitable for the language.
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Living abroad has been difficult for Israelis since October 7
(Photo: Thilo Schmuelgen/Reuters)
Not that it wasn't wonderful to be an Israeli or a Jew abroad even before October 7, but the Hamas massacre has turned life abroad into a military operation. In the past year, our house has been vandalized,with two swastikas, graffiti for Gaza and against Israel spray painted on its walls. We removed the mezuzah long ago, as well as the "Made in Israel" sticker that has been with me for 20 or so years.
My son Noam, 12, tells me that if he is walking in the evening and hears people speaking Arabic behind him, he goes into a store until they pass. After a girl in his class, named ISIS, walked in uninvited to his room during a school trip, he asked to sign up for a Krav Maga club. The thread between the word and the deed has become extremely thin, almost invisible. He understands it.
There are those here who celebrate October 7, seeing it as a breakthrough, proof that it is indeed possible to, from the river to the sea, free Palestine from German guilt
The terrorism against Jewish-Israelis has not let up for a second in the last 15 months. Demonstrations, terrible chants, violence. Far-right terrorism has always been here, now it already enjoys the support of a fifth of the population. Muslim immigration has consolidated its terrorism and awakened the left from its timidity or shame about exposing antisemitism. There are those here who celebrate October 7, seeing it as a breakthrough, proof that it is indeed possible to, from the river to the sea, free Palestine from German guilt. There are parties here whose art video is an endless loop of Hamas clips about the October 7 massacre.
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Those who leave Israel will have a rough landing. It's a different language and culture and people and neighborhood and weather, and you have to get used to all the places, and know where to do what and where it's best to buy or eat. After that comes the gentleness of getting used to it - day-to-day life, life as a reflex, and then there's news and missile alerts on the Internet, and in the evening you can watch television in bed, and get used to it, and the alienation.
Until reality sinks in, which, like a newborn baby, is not going anywhere, is here to stay, to be a part of your life, a part of you, a part of what you will pass on to your children. Not that you are foreigners, not the longing for the homeland you abandoned in anger, but that you are a marginalized people.