New Immigrants Ponder a Future in Jewish State

By Joshua Runyan 
August 8, 2018
http://jewishexponent.com

In many ways, Daniel and Hana Lowenstein and their four boys, 
ages 7, 6, 4 and 2, are the newest poster family for 
North American aliyah.

Deeply committed to the Jewish community — she works for the 
Orthodox Union's Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus, 
while he's a rabbi and psychiatrist — they decided to move 
to Israel because there was never a question about making 
their permanent home anywhere else.

"We've been working towards this" for a while, she said 
late last month from her seat on the first of two El Al flights 
chartered this summer by Nefesh B'Nefesh, the nonprofit 
organization that has taken charge of coordinating and 
facilitating Israeli immigration from English-speaking 
countries. "Even when we were dating, we knew we always 
wanted to make aliyah."

Lowenstein's father, former Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman, 
confirmed his daughter's account, taking a break from the 
departure ceremony at John F. Kennedy International Airport 
in New York to speak with reporters.

Even as a high school student at a Jewish day school outside 
Washington, D.C., Lieberman said, Hana Lowenstein "wanted to 
make aliyah. ... When she was dating, on the first date, 
she would ask the guy, 'Do you want to make aliyah?'"

Like most of the 34 sets of parents and 18 single adults on 
the flight to Ben Gurion International Airport, Lowenstein's 
commitment was rooted in a sense of belonging and an expression 
of Jewish pride — more the product of a positive choice to 
embrace a potential reality than to flee revealed danger, 
as has tended to characterize recent waves of Israeli immigration 
from places in Europe.

In a handful of cases, families were even heading to areas 
the rest of the world might consider explicitly dangerous.

Take the Hollingers, for instance. The former Mennonite family 
of 11 — they converted to Judaism more than a year ago — 
left Allentown for Ofakim, a small city in Israel's south 
well within the range of rockets and flaming kites launched 
by Palestinians in Gaza. They chose the area for its low cost 
of living and economic potential.

"That doesn't bother me," the patriarch, Jonathan Hollinger, 
said of the security situation near Gaza, according to the 
Jerusalem Post. "If you look at it statistically, if you look 
at the murder rate in Allentown … my chances of getting killed 
in Allentown are way, way higher than actually living in a 
conflict zone."

That such families were so determined that they decided to 
take 127 children — Nefesh B'Nefesh's largest airlift of 
minors since the project began in 2002 — from their schools, 
friends and families to embark on a new life is a testament 
to their fortitude.

"We are inspired to see so many children making aliyah," 
Rabbi Yehoshua Fass, Nefesh B'Nefesh's co-founder and 
executive director, said at the July 25 welcoming ceremony 
inside a giant hangar in a corner of Ben Gurion typically 
used by the Israeli military. "As Israel recently celebrated 
its 70th birthday, the country is now looking ahead to 
its future — an era that will be shaped by the ingenuity 
and passion of courageous and pioneering olim who are 
starting their lives anew in the Jewish state."

But while the relative youth of the passengers aboard 
Flight 3004 garnered headlines in Israel last week, 
the fact is smaller families and more singles are moving 
from the United States with each passing year. This year, 
"we have 1,200 to 1,300 people who are single making aliyah," 
Fass revealed during a post-flight briefing at the 
organization's headquarters in Jerusalem's Givat Shaul 
neighborhood. "Now, 70 percent of my families call themselves 
Orthodox, but even their families are shrinking."

The latter observation tracks anecdotal evidence that the 
rising cost of Jewish day school education is putting downward 
pressure on the family planning decisions of couples committed 
to sending their children to such schools. But the increase 
in those either just out of high school or out of college 
choosing to establish themselves in the Jewish state is 
reflective of what Fass contends is a greater 
"concept of identity."

"Their personhood was connected on Birthright," he explained, 
referring to the hugely successful program that has sent more 
than 650,000 Jewish young adults on free 10-day trips to Israel. 
"That's very beautiful, but very odd, because it's just 10 days. 
[The other] expression we're seeing is they were defending Israel 
staunchly on campus against" the boycott, divestment and sanctions 
(BDS) movement.

Israel's emergence as a leader in the high-tech sector has 
also had an effect.

"These people are also looking for opportunity," said Fass, 
whose organization partners with Israel's Ministry of Aliyah 
and Integration, the Jewish Agency for Israel, Keren Kayemeth 
Le'Israel and JNF-USA to facilitate immigration through group 
flights and aid packages, and since 2017 has been encouraging 
settlement in peripheral communities in Israel's north and south. 
"Israel is the next Silicon Valley."

Perhaps emblematic of that appeal to those who have yet to 
establish their families is the phenomenon of 18-year-olds 
heading to the Jewish state for an immediate future of serving 
in the Israel Defense Forces. Shahar Bezherano was one of these 
future "lone soldiers" — IDF personnel without the benefit of 
immediate family in Israel — on last week's flight. 
When asked why she was leaving her parents behind in suburban 
Washington, D.C., Bezherano said simply that she "felt like 
this was something I needed to do."

Perhaps indicative of her youthful exuberance, Bezherano expressed 
zero apprehension about the move. If anything, recent events and 
the increased threat of violence from Palestinians in Gaza 
has caused her to "want it more."

While they shared Bezherano's enthusiasm, several of the parents 
juggling juice cups, headphones and books from their seats 
40,000 feet in the air grudgingly admitted that they do have 
one worry: How will their children fare as new immigrants?

"We're throwing our kids into the fire," said Jordan Krizman, 
a father of two girls, ages 9 and 6, from Phoenix. "They know Hebrew, 
but they're not fluent."

"It's like a huge reality change," echoed his wife, Rina Krizman, 
whose parents are actually Israeli citizens.

Like the Krizmans, the Lowensteins were "most apprehensive about 
[the] children fitting in, learning the language, adjusting," 
said Hana Lowenstein, who will be living near Jerusalem. 
But, "we had some support — we had someone speaking Hebrew 
with them this year. So, I think everything will come together 
nicely in the end."

Speaking in Hebrew, Sofa Landver, Israel's minister of aliyah 
and integration, pledged her country's assistance to the new 
arrivals during the welcoming ceremony. The ministry offers 
a basket of benefits to new immigrants, including financial 
payments, language instruction and tax breaks.

"Thirty-nine years ago, I was also an immigrant," said Landver, 
looking out at a crowd of more than 1,000 people, including 
soldiers, who had gathered to welcome the flight. "No one 
accepted us then."

For Hana Lowenstein, it was an easy choice.

"My parents are very much about living a meaningful life," 
she said. "I'm a very patriotic American. I care about America. 
But at the same time, for me, it's wonderful to have a choice 
[where to live]. On my mother's side, they were Holocaust 
survivors. ... Aside from all the tears, all the loss, 
I wanted to help build that next generation. For me, 
[living in Israel] is the next step."