Prof. Paul Eidelberg
A distinguished American rabbi deplored the fact that only a small percentage of American Jews ever visit Israel. Yet many of these Jews vacation in Protestant England, Catholic Spain, Islamic Turkey, Hinduist India, or Shintoist Japan.
How are we to explain the indifference of these Jews to Israel--the one and only Jewish homeland? Is it not passing strange--this failure of theirs to see Jerusalem, that city of world-historical significance which countless Christian tourists regard as the most beautiful and awe-inspiring city on earth?
Some say that these assimilated Jews do not want to be reminded of Judaism, let alone of Jewish nationhood. No doubt there is truth in this assessment. Yet there are many assimilated or non-observant Jews in Israel who would live nowhere else but in this land of visible miracles. These Israelis seem to harbor no pathetic need to obscure their Jewish identity. However secular their lifestyle, they feel infinitely more comfortable and at home in Israel--among Jews of every description--than in America or Europe.
Others say that many American Jews fail to visit Israel out of fear of Arab terrorism. No doubt there is some truth in this, but fear of Arab terrorism has not deterred hundreds of thousands non-Americans from going so far as to make Israel their permanent home even during the first intifada, which erupted in December 1987. Hence it is difficult to comprehend why so many AmericHomeward Bound
By Prof. Paul Eidelberg
A distinguished American rabbi deplored the fact that only a small percentage of American Jews ever visit Israel. Yet many of these Jews vacation in Protestant England, Catholic Spain, Islamic Turkey, Hinduist India, or Shintoist Japan.
How are we to explain the indifference of these Jews to Israel--the one and only Jewish homeland? Is it not passing strange--this failure of theirs to see Jerusalem, that city of world-historical significance which countless Christian tourists regard as the most beautiful and awe-inspiring city on earth?
Some say that these assimilated Jews do not want to be reminded of Judaism, let alone of Jewish nationhood. No doubt there is truth in this assessment. Yet there are many assimilated or non-observant Jews in Israel who would live nowhere else but in this land of visible miracles. These Israelis seem to harbor no pathetic need to obscure their Jewish identity. However secular their lifestyle, they feel infinitely more comfortable and at home in Israel--among Jews of every description--than in America or Europe.
Others say that many American Jews fail to visit Israel out of fear of Arab terrorism. No doubt there is some truth in this, but fear of Arab terrorism has not deterred hundreds of thousands non-Americans from going so far as to make Israel their permanent home even during the first intifada, which erupted in December 1987. Hence it is difficult to comprehend why so many Americvan Jews avoid Israel. Indeed, many prefer to visit anti-Semitic France or even a still Jew-hating Germany, than the land of their own people.
Is it a Jewish death-wish? True, some self-hating American Jews virtually support Arafat’s Palestinian Authority—actually thugs and terrorists dedicated to Israel's destruction. But one can find such Jews even in Israel's Knesset. Even self-hating Jews reside in Israel!
But if assimilation and fear and self-hatred do not entirely explain why American Jews refrain from visiting Israel, what else prevents them from vacationing—I do not settling--in the land of milk and honey?
Perhaps a clue to our problem will be found in the immigration of 400,000 Jews from the former Soviet Union to Israel between 1989 and 1991. The vast majority of these Jews had no desire to come to Israel. To the contrary, they would have preferred to live in the United States, and would have done so had not the State Department severely limited immigration from the USSR. But as we know, the disintegration of the Soviet Empire and the collapse of Communism released the scourge of Russian anti-Semitism. It was less Zionism than fear of pogroms that motivated this aliya.
Notice, however, that no one predicted the sudden demise of the Soviet Union, the greatest military empire in world history. As for Washington's decision to limit the Soviet immigration quota, no one saw how this decision, coupled to the flare-up of Jew-hatred in Russia would produce a tremendous aliya of Russian Jews--even during the Gulf War!
I am suggesting that neither political science nor psychology nor any secular discipline can adequately explain this extraordinary concatenation of events. But as we read in Isaiah: "My ways are not your ways." And more to the point in Deuteronomy: "The Lord your God ... will gather you from among all the nations where He scattered you. Even if any of yours that are dispersed be in the uttermost parts of heaven ... the Lord your God will bring you back to the land which your fathers possessed."
Consistent with biblical prophecy, unwilling as well as willing Jews have been and will yet be gathered and brought back to the Land of Israel--ultimately to become the light of the nations and thereby sanctify God's Name.