"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD , "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.... I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you," declares the LORD , "and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile."
 - Jeremiah 29:11,14
 

	Aliyah Report: Ayal in Jerusalem
	An American Immigrant to Israel Speaks Out: Do Not Pity the Pioneers
	To Ponder: To Merit Israel is to Marry the Land

 
ALIYAH REPORT: AYAL IN JERUSALEM

"I did not hear God's audible voice, nor read his word, nor got a great call or vision, nor received a great revelation about his awesome plans and purposes concerning Israel. I was not aware of his plans to bring our people from the 4 corners of the diaspora back to Israel, for physical restoration. I was not fully aware of our biblical inheritance regarding Israel nor was I convinced that Israel is the only true homeland for all Jewish people. 

I am a Zionist and as a Zionist, I made the decision to visit Israel in 1983. When I landed at Ben Gurion Airport in Lod near Tel Aviv I was in awe. I traveled on to Jerusalem and for one week I roamed her beautiful streets, listened to the beautiful Hebrew language, look at street signs in Hebrew, became most interested in all the new sites, sounds and fragrances of this most complex land and people, Israel. Essentially, I fell in love with my people, Israel. I was truly home and felt at home!

Just months after my arrival, I subsequently fell in love again, and this time it was with the God of Israel. It was then that I heard God's voice as I read His word and recognized that our physical restoration to our land of Israel, is one part of His greater plan for our spiritual restoration or reconciliation with the God of our forefathers. Twenty years have gone by, I am married to a beautiful Sabra Israeli and we have two lovely Sabra children.

 Life is hard in Israel - but God is with us and He has blessed us in our perseverance. It is a great privilege to live and serve the God of Israel in the actual land given to our forefathers as a promise forever. We are participating in the making of history and in the unfolding of God's continued plans, purposes and promises for our people, which will culminate in the return of the Messiah to Zion". 

- Ayal - Jerusalem

The Western immigrant living here faces a myriad of challenges in his absorption adventure: the culture gap, the language gap, the employment shuffle, sticker shock (especially on new cars!), the rudeness factor. Not to mention semi-regular strikes, power outages, and traffic snarls, as well as the ever-popular disappearing-shekel trick.

Add to this list the "phone call from home." You know the one I mean: family or friends calling - with true desperation in their voices - trying to cajole, convince, or coerce us to give up this "madness" and return "home." There, they trumpet, we will reclaim our well-paying jobs, embrace lovesick relatives, raise our children in safety and security, and lead the normal lives human beings were meant to lead.

In times of stress or crisis, these calls take on an exaggerated urgency. Some callers dangle the carrot, offering to set us up in business, or even to buy us a home if we come back. Others prefer to wield the stick, skewering us with guilt for driving them mad with worry, or expressing anger at us for having deserted family or community, endangering ourselves and our unsuspecting children. One parent I know went so far as to threaten to cut his children out of his will unless they returned "his" grandchildren to the bosom of American life and leisure.

To be sure, much of this concern is well-intentioned and quite understandable. After all, our family loves us and wants the best for us, and genuinely fears for our safety. And considering that the US and Europe gets much of its news of the Middle East from CNN and its ilk, who wouldn't be a basket case? These malicious media manipulators - willing to accept  lies at face value and feed them whole to the public - delight in portraying Israel and the Jews in the worst possible light, magnifying the situation and making it seem as if the entire country is under siege; that we cannot walk out of our homes for fear of being brutally murdered.

More than once, I have been awakened in the middle of the night by a hysterical call from abroad asking if we are OK, the caller scared half to death by something he had just seen on the news. More often than not, that is the first I've heard of the event.

The truth, of course, is that a Jew in Israel is home: If history has proven anything, it is that the Jewish life in the Diaspora is unnatural, and unalterably doomed to failure, sooner or later.

But I bristle at another, more subtle assumption of the "midnight caller." It suggests that we Jews living here are the black sheep of the family, pioneering but poor souls under the gun, who are to be pitied by those "more fortunate" Jews living in the West. In this mind-set, we are the "sad sisters" across the ocean, in need of constant succor and support, driven by some unfathomable idealism to lead lives of hardship in a hardscrabble land.

And, apparently, it is the God-given duty of every caring Jew to ease our lot by trying to save us from our fate.

So let's clear this up once and for all: We are neither misguided, misinformed nor masochistic; we know exactly what we are doing. We are the ones in the forefront of Jewish history, no one else; We are the culmination of all the struggles and wanderings of a people destined to one day reclaim a land and a destiny. We who live here fulfill the Torah with a fullness unattainable in the Diaspora - a fact accentuated in this Shmita year.

Our sons who serve in the IDF - particularly those religious boys who carry the sword as well as the sefer - are the righteous elite of the generation. We have nothing to apologize for , nor to be ashamed of.

Quite the opposite: We walk tall, with a merit that should be worn like the shiniest medal; for we have been blessed to realize the impossible dream that fueled our nation's survival throughout the millennia: A Jewish people on Jewish soil living a Jewish way of life.

So, dear friends, accept these words, which reflect no recrimination or rancor. Call us, visit us, care about us - please. But do not patronize or pity us; do not deprecate our life choice, or cast aspersions on our sagacity or savvy. Rather, encourage us and help us in our determination to wage our noble struggle. For, in the final analysis, we do not stand alone; we represent you, and every Jew who lives, or has ever lived.

- Stewart Weiss, Director of the Jewish Outreach Center of Ra'anana, The Jerusalem Post, November 2000

TO PONDER:  TO MERIT ISRAEL IS TO MARRY THE LAND

Marriage and the merit of living in the Land of Israel have a lot in common. After the death of Sara, Avraham buys a part of the land of Israel which includes the cave of Machpela with the purpose of burying her. Speaking to the owner (Efron) Avraham says:

I will give you the price of the field...and I will bury my dead therein. [Genesis 23:13]

Efrom takes the money, and Avraham becomes the official owner of this field and, hence, the legal landlord of a part of Israel...

One does not buy a piece of the Land of Israel like one buys a piece of land anywhere else in the world.
In the case of the Holy Land, one marries the Land! The Land becomes a loving partner and one's love for this Land is of a completely different nature from buying a piece of land or living anywhere else! Jews treat the Land of Israel as a living personality with whom one has a deep and emotional affiliation. They do not relate to it as a possession to use...It is not the love for a country of which the average native speaks. Like a marriage, it is a covenant, and a covenant is built on the basis of duties and not of rights. It is a pledge, and one does not betray a pledge....

The many laws related to the Land show that one needs to care for the land nearly like one attends to the needs of one's wife. The Jewish relationship with the Land is a love story and that is the reason why Jews were not able to divorce themselves from this Land even when they found themselves for thousands of years in exile. One does not abandon one's wife! For other nations this may be difficult to fathom, for the Jew it is the air he breathes.

- Rabbi Dr. Natan Lopes Cardozo, 2003, E-mail: nlc@internet-zahav.net