Tuesday, October 09, 2007

Aliyah in Question

ARZA (Zionist branch of the Reform movement) recently asked me to prepare a short reflection on the issue of Aliyah as a person who has visited Israel many times but thus far decided not to move my life to Israel. I struggled with the prompt. I had a hard time coming up with the Jewish/Zionist/Israel inspiration to really present anything too profound. I tried.

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Questions, and the search for their answers shape liberal Jewish identity.

Some of the significant questions include, “How will I celebrate Shabbat? Will I celebrate the second day of Rosh Hashana or Sukkot? Will I wear a yarmulke? A Tallis? These decisions define Jewish observance and practice.

And then there are the big questions- on which ideas, lifestyle, and identity are founded. Did God write the Torah? What does God want from me? Why is there such suffering in the world? And after my first visit to Israel, a semester-long program at the age of 16, I began asking new questions- about Israel and Aliyah.

Should I make Aliyah? How can Israel be “home” if I reside abroad? How can I be a Zionist if I don’t agree with some of the actions of the Israeli government? Can I make Aliyah, and become truly “Israeli” without serving the required term in the army? Can I exist fully as a Jew living outside of Israel?

Experiences inform my grappling with the answers.

I delayed starting college for a year to spend a year experiencing Israel- learning the language, culture and country of the Jewish people. I attended the enormous memorial ceremony honoring Israel’s champion for peace, Yitzchak Rabin, in the Tel Aviv square now named after him. The songs and desperate cheers for peace poured forth from Israel’s youth. I too raised their banners demanding, “Peace Now!” I also attended an Orthodox Zionist youth movement retreat featuring an impassioned lecture by the famous “refusenik” Natan Sharansky. I grew to love my Druze roommates’ hospitality, personalities and delicious cooking. I prayed in Jerusalem, swam in Eilat, floated in the Dead Sea, perspired on the Kinneret, partied in Tel Aviv, and learned that in Haifa’s downtown market, if you don’t speak Hebrew fluently, English won’t help you, but Russian or Amharic will. My Israel-acquired high on Jewish life and learning carried into my first months in college and still remains. The possibility of Aliyah comes to mind often and occasionally provokes some online exploration of the logistics; a perusal of Aliyah resources on the Jewish Agency’s webpages.

Grounded in a constantly challenged and evolving identity as a Reform/Progressive Jew, my “Aliyah?” question looms large. For now, I remain at home in the US, longing still for home in Eretz Yisrael.

I identify with Yehuda HaLevi’s lamentation, “Libi B’Mizrach V’Anochi B’Sof HaMaarav.” I read author David Grossman’s eulogy for his son Uri, killed in battle during Israel’s war in Lebanon in 2006, and share in the grief of his family and his country, even from ocean’s away. I hear Naomi Shemer’s voice, “Hazarnu el borot Hamayim laShuk v’la kikar” and see Jerusalem’s splendid stones, bustling alley-ways and abundant street vendors. I listen on, “Shofar kore bhar habayit b’ir ha-atikah”, and hear simultaneously the shofar's blast from before the kotel and the imam’s to prayer from just beyond it. Israel captivates my soul.

I aspire to vacation on Israel’s beaches of the Mediterranean rather than on the popular party beaches of Cancun. Checking The New York Times morning headlines always follows a look through Haaretz or The Jerusalem Post online, or both. Emails about Israel speakers, events and advocacy flood my inbox. Israeli artists dominate my music collection. I’ve accumulated a modest and yet diverse library of Israeli literature, history and politics. Israel is part of my consciousness.

And still, I’m not sure I’m ready to serve in the army. I’m not sure I’m ready to leave my family so far behind and to make the inevitable adjustments. I’m not yet committed to building my life and future in Israel rather than in the states. But, perhaps someday sooner or later I will be. It certainly remains a question.