What They Don’t Teach You When You Move to Israel

One thing you do not “receive” when you move to the Jewish state are textbook lessons in what we might call: “Welcome to Israel, a sliver of land in the volatile, Jew-hating Middle East.”

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In 2013, at the age of 24, I moved from California to Israel — sort of “by accident.”

Or, at least, totally unexpectedly.

In January of that year, I was on a free 10-day trip to Israel, called Taglit-Birthright, which was my first time visiting the Jewish state, and my first real exposure to Israelis and Israeli culture, as well as the complex, deep-seated history of this region.

Truth be told, I was reluctant to take this trip because Israel was so low on my “Jewish priority list,” but after five years of my mother nagging me about going on it, I relented.

Halfway through the 10-day trip, I called my mother to inform her that I would not be coming back to California, and that I would be staying in Israel to become an Israeli citizen and build a new life here. Needless to say, I had a life-changing experience.

When you become a new Israeli citizen, you get all types of benefits, what is known in Hebrew as sal haklita, or literally “the absorption basket.” This includes six months’ worth of intensive Hebrew school, discounts on home appliances and shipping containers, more “friendly” bank loans, and tax breaks — all for a certain period of time, depending on the benefit.

But one thing you do not “receive” when you move to the Jewish state are textbook lessons in what we might call: “Welcome to Israel, a sliver of land in the volatile Middle East that is surrounded by hostile, Jew-hating enemies, even those with whom the Jewish state has ‘peace’ agreements.”

My first encounter with these “lessons” came in 2013, just a few weeks after the Taglit-Birthright trip. I had just moved into an apartment in the center of Tel Aviv on the popular Dizengoff Street — when, one morning, as I walked down from my apartment onto the street, there was a group of 50 or so people standing on the sidewalk, unable to proceed. I approached the crowd and asked what was happening, while I simultaneously noticed that the entire street had been blocked off by the police.

“Hefetz chashud,” someone said to me. That is Hebrew for: “suspicious object.” A few minutes later, we all heard a loud boom, meaning the bomb squad had blown up the object on the spot — and Dizengoff was quickly reopened for pedestrians and vehicles to come and go as we pleased, immediately back to “business as usual,” as if it was just another day in the city.

Welcome to Israel.

The next “lesson” came the following year, in 2014. Hamas terrorists managed to kidnap and kill three Israeli teenagers, prompting Israel’s “Operation Protective Edge” in which the IDF entered Gaza but was ultimately held back by then-U.S. President Barack Obama from dealing a lethal blow to Hamas.

During this roughly two-month mini war, I experienced rocket attacks and the subsequent blaring sirens for the first time. In Tel Aviv, we have about 90 seconds to find a bomb shelter upon hearing a siren, but in Gaza border towns, that time dwindles to 15 seconds.

The difference between 90 and 15 seconds is an eternity for Israelis, and therefore in places like Tel Aviv, we are relatively “privileged” and perceive these rocket attacks as more of a nuisance than a serious threat.

However, after this war, my brain was so used to hearing rocket sirens that any sound which appeared similar to them — such as ambulances, high-rev motorcycles, and police sirens — automatically made my entire body freeze and clam up.

As you can imagine, this is an unpleasant feeling — especially since ambulances, high-rev motorcycles, and police sirens are a daily occurrence in a bustling city like Tel Aviv — and it became so bothersome that I had to fly to Europe for some three weeks to rid myself of this trauma response. I soon realized that this “symptom” is incredibly common amongst Israelis.

Welcome to Israel.

There were many other such “lessons” that I have “learned” while living in Israel since then, but by far the most staggering one was on October 7th and thereafter.

It is difficult to begin to explain to anyone what I and millions of Israelis have experienced over the last eight or so months. The emotions are so fierce, so diametrically opposed, that they leave you confused and dumbstruck more than anything.

One moment you feel tremendous pride in being Israeli and remarkable unity within mainstream Israeli society — yet the very next moment you feel some combination of demoralized, helpless, dejected, furious, and hopeless.

Then, you remind yourself that you are not the only one who feels this way, and that you are surrounded by millions of others who feel precisely the same feelings, which brings you back to the tremendous pride in being Israeli and the remarkable unity within mainstream Israeli society. If you looked up “emotional rollercoaster” in the dictionary, the current “vibes” in Israel would be Exhibit A.

What’s more, I have noticed that many people who have never lived in Israel for a long period of time tend to “fantasize” and even “fetishize” about Israel as the Jewish state. They see the Jewish state as an unworldly miracle, they believe Israelis are effectively “super-humans,” and they sometimes act as if Israel is essentially perfect, void of any criticism or critique.

But I have learned, now living here for some 11 years, that Israel is actually an incredibly ordinary place. We have corruption, criminals, all socioeconomic levels of society, and the same rainbow of societal personas that every country has. Israel has amazing attributes and regrettable ones. In some ways it is a “miracle” and in others it is a shame.

This does not make me any less of a Zionist, but it does lead to overwhelming cognitive and emotional dissonance when it comes to Zionism — the practice of Jewish self-determination in our indigenous homeland, following some 2,000 years of experiencing horrific discrimination and abuse in many other places across the world, culminating in the Holocaust.

As a former Israeli security official turned educator, who is sociopolitically a centrist, once told me, “Yes, we want to do Bar Mitzvah’s and the Jewish holidays and keep the essence of the Jewish state, but we also need a country that functions on a day-to-day basis, healthcare that is efficient and effective, education that breeds productive and engaged citizens, and so forth.”

Albert Ein­stein, who was a proud Jew and involved in many Jewish causes including the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, expressed reserva­tions about Jews exer­cis­ing state pow­er, fear­ing that it would be cor­rupt­ing and a turn away from the spir­i­tu­al.

More specifically, Einstein believed in the historical Land of Israel as a modern-day Jewish homeland, but not as a separate state. He felt that Zionists, by asking for more, were taking an overwhelmingly stubborn approach, which would only “damage our cause.”¹

At the same time, Jews migrating to their indigenous homeland increasingly understood that the Arabs were not interested in living peacefully with them, so Einstein’s theory of state pow­er leading to corruption became a secondary concern to the more poignant one of mere Jewish survival — especially as antisemitism was climaxing in Europe and large parts of North Africa and the Middle East throughout the 1930s and 1940s.

The first three or four decades of the State of Israel’s existence was exactly that — a very literal, ongoing fight for its existence — but it seems that, around the 1980s, more or less, it became clear that Israel did not have great political leadership from all sides of the political spectrum. Indeed, there are no perfect politicians, and poor political leadership exists in every country, but we are talking about Israel right now.

In 1998, two years after Benjamin Netanyahu became the youngest prime minister elected in the State of Israel’s history, his father Benzion Netanyahu (a renowned historian) gave a wide-reaching interview about the state of Israel, saying in part:

“It is completely clear to me that in one area we have failed in Israel — in the area of ​​education. To think that maybe it is suitable for doing good business and maybe even for developing modern techniques, but it is not suitable for the historical task and the political situation we are in.”

“The people of the Left are certainly not suitable for this politically, but many of the people of the Right also do not properly understand the situation, the problems we are facing. And therefore they cannot properly distinguish between solutions and illusions, between the possible and the impossible.”

“That’s why my heart is truly full of anxiety. Sometimes I fear that a hundred years of Zionism might go down the drain because a large part of the current generation is not suitable for the historical role assigned to it.”

This is the reality of Israel — a deeply imperfect country, as all are, yet one that has been in a relatively unique position, for no other reason than it is the Jewish state, which means it is subject to immense double standards and the age-old hatred known as antisemitism (which has been better branded as “anti-Zionism”).

There will likely be no real, true, lasting peace with the Palestinians because there is no “cure” for antisemitism; there never has been and there never will be. There will always be groups and countries (today — Iran and Qatar, chiefly) that leverage antisemitism and/or “anti-Zionism” (same sh*t) as part of their geopolitical conduct, which includes funding groups like Hamas that brainwash the Palestinian population into thinking that the Jewish state is the reason for all their trials and tribulations, past and present.

Hence, according to Benzion Netanyahu, real peace in the Middle East “is a kind of superstition that we cultivate in order to deceive ourselves and to make it easier for the hostile world to mislead us. For the objective enemy will always be present. And the enemy will always wait for us. It will always look for the our weak points, it will wait for revelations of weakness on our part, and then attack.”

“The assumption that real peace is possible here, peace like the one between Switzerland to Italy or between France and Belgium, is an assumption that has nothing to rely on,” he added.

Meanwhile, to think that we Jews are somehow different than our ancestors who also experienced grotesque and unjustified antisemitism, is on our part fairy-tale thinking — which is completely disconnected from reality and history. The Jewish state and Jews in the West experienced some kind of a “grace period” after the Holocaust, but it appears that the window of this “grace period” is coming to an end.

Yet many Western Jews are at odds with Israel, because the Jewish state is not exactly a “Western” country. Certainly, Israel possesses many “Western” attributes such as democracy and great individual liberties. But it is also a profoundly tribal, traditional, and relatively conservative society — an interesting combination of lived experiences here in the Middle East during the last century or so, as well as a plethora of Jewish values.

Israeli society is unusual and unique. Since October 7th, Israelis realized that our government is, for whatever reasons, unable and/or unwilling to provide for our society. That is not a partisan critique, but a matter of fact.

In times of war, governments are obviously first and foremost focused on the actual war, but as time goes on — and we are approaching month number eight now — you would hope that a government develops a multifaceted wartime approach that goes beyond the literal front lines and provides certain services and benefits to struggling parts of society.

Sensing that the government has, for whatever reasons, not been stepping into places of much need, Israeli citizens from all parts of the countries, from all sociopolitical and religious persuasions, have been organizing to help each other out, in more ways than would fit into a 250-page book.

And yet, we Israelis are still floundering and processing the October seventh trauma — while studying, working, raising children, looking after elderly relatives, and taking care of plenty of other responsibilities like everyone else in the world.

Most of us Israelis know that our country is rather ordinary (and there is nothing wrong with that). We know that justice will, in all likelihood, not fully be served for Israel and Israelis in this war. And we know that our politicians from all sides of the spectrum are mostly corrupted, self-interested shmucks.

Yesterday, I asked my 34-year-old personal trainer, who is a born-and-bred Israeli, if he has thought about moving away from Israel following October 7th. His answer was blunt but ultimately telling of the mainstream Israeli psyche:

“You know, a lot of stuff in Israel is sh*t, no question about it. And it is fun to go abroad for a few weeks or even a few months at a time, but in the end you realize that there is no place like Israel, no people like Israelis, and that there is sh*t everywhere in the world. So yeah, a lot of Israel is sh*t — but at least it is our sh*t.”

Welcome to Israel.

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1. “Einstein on Zionism: He is for a Jewish Homeland, But Not a Separate State.” Shapell. January 21, 1946. https://www.shapell.org/manuscript/einstein-zionist-views-in-1946.