I’m not Jewish, but I love Israel — and I’m not ashamed to say it.

I wasn’t born in Israel. Hebrew isn’t my language. And yet, somewhere along the way, Israel became a part of me.

photo: Passages/Facebook

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This is a guest essay by Liv Layne, the Social Media Director for Passages, an organization that offers trips to Israel for Christian students.

You can also listen to the podcast version of this essay on Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music, YouTube, and Spotify.

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“Why do you love Israel so much?”

It’s a question I get all the time — from people of all backgrounds, even fellow Christians. You’d think I’d have the perfect answer by now, but the truth is, sometimes words just fail me.

I first visited Israel when I was 15 years old. Halfway through the trip, I got really sick. Our tour guide went out in the middle of the night to find anti-nausea medicine for me. He checked on me frequently, always asking if I needed anything. I sat in the back of the bus for most of the trip, trying my best not to vomit.

I’ll never forget one morning, sitting on the curb with my head in my hands, trying to keep my food down before we departed for the day. Our Arab Israeli bus driver, who didn’t speak any English, quietly handed me a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. No words, no fanfare, just kindness.

That was my first real experience of Israel — not just the land, but the people: the quiet strength, the unexpected kindness, and the way they show up for you, even when you’re a stranger.

I returned to Israel in 2021, years after that first trip, and realized just how little I actually knew. Back when I was 15, I suppose I had some glimpses of the holy sites and archeology and history, but on that trip I began to understand Israel on a different level.

I saw a modern, complex, beautiful country constantly misunderstood by the world. I met Israelis who had lived through wars, terror attacks, and profound heartbreak — but still held onto hope. I listened to Arab Israelis, Jewish Israelis, immigrants, and soldiers, and realized how much nuance never makes it into the headlines.

In 2022, I came back again. And this time, I ran into that tour guide who gave 15-year-old Liv anti-nausea medicine. He hugged me like family, because that’s what he’d been to me in my moment of weakness. And standing there nearly a decade later, healthy and older and more awake to what Israel is, I saw how that first act of quiet care wasn’t an exception. It is the heartbeat of Israel and the Jewish People.

Since 2022, I’ve been back to Israel more than 10 times. Every time I leave Israel, I leave a piece of my heart behind.

Loving Israel when you don’t have a passport, bloodline, or family tree that leads there feels, sometimes, like living with a phantom limb. You carry a sense of presence where there is, by all appearances, absence. And a part of you aches for a place that, on paper, you don’t technically belong to. But what can I say, love has rarely obeyed the laws of paperwork and formality.

I’m not Jewish. I wasn’t born in Israel. Hebrew isn’t my language. And yet, somewhere along the way, Israel became a part of me. I’ve spent enough time in Israel to know the rhythm of Shabbat, to know my way around the streets, to be comfortable in a land that is viewed as terrifying and dangerous by many of my peers.

October 7th fundamentally changed me as a human being. Again, people ask me what I mean when I say that, and I struggle to find words. Before, I was part of “the majority” as a white Christian woman living in the South of America. There wasn’t much that made me stand out from the people around me. October 7th changed that permanently. I found myself on what felt like the fringes of my generation. Friends who had known that I worked in the pro-Israel space (and had never cared to have a conversation about it before) started reaching out, not with concern but with accusatory questions, while I was still trying to figure out if some of my friends in Israel were even alive.

That phantom limb kicked in again, and a part of me just wanted to be in Israel. This is the paradox of loving Israel: When it’s scary, everything in you should want to run away, but somehow the opposite is true.

So, yes, I’ve been in Israel enough for it to feel like an old friend, and I’ve been away from Israel enough to know what it’s like to check on friends while they are in a bomb shelter, or to check casualty lists and pray for friends directly in the line of fire.

As a Christian, I care deeply about Israel — biblically, spiritually, and historically. But the truth is, I loved it first because of the people. Before I understood the theology, history, or politics of the region, I experienced the kindness, resiliency, and generosity.

When Israel launched the first airstrikes in Operation Rising Lion against Iran last summer, I told my mom that I should’ve booked my flight to Israel sooner. I should’ve stayed for the summer. I told her how I felt crazy for wanting to be there. As I tried to grasp for words to explain how I felt, there was a long silence. She gave me a sympathetic look: “You’re homesick.”

And as crazy as it sounds, she’s right.

This is why I don’t consider myself an “ally” of Israel. Allyship is conditional. It can be loud when it’s convenient and silent when it costs too much. I prefer the term “friend.”

I think that’s the point: Love is showing up when things are brutal and when they’re beautiful. To be a friend of Israel is to love in the midst of both. Love doesn’t leave when things get complicated, and it certainly doesn’t flinch in the face of hatred. Real love shows up for both the celebrations and the tragedies, and it’s one of the greatest honors of my life to have been there for both.

Every time I leave Israel, I leave a piece of my heart behind. For a long time, I thought I was leaving it in the land, on the beaches in Tel Aviv or maybe the Old City of Jerusalem, or up north in the quiet corners I’ve come to love. But I’ve realized that it’s not the places I’m leaving my heart with. It’s the people.

It’s theirs to keep. And it couldn’t be in better hands.

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