I made Aliyah from a place of ideological Zionism. In the few years before I moved to Israel, Zionism became the essence of my identity.
In Der Judenstaat, Theodor Herzl argued that Jews in the diaspora cannot escape being defined—by themselves or by others—primarily as Jews. When I read it in my final year living in the diaspora, I couldn’t help but relate. My identity was defined by my Jewishness: my Zionism, defensive and headstrong. It felt both intense and necessary.
Shocked by a world that boasted tolerance but proved otherwise, I felt my time had come. To leave the country I was born and raised in, move to Israel, and serve in its army. I haven’t looked back. But after five years here, I can see how much that certainty has shifted.
And this wasn’t just Herzl. Ahad Ha’am argued that life in the diaspora was a kind of historical pause from Jewish national life. He believed that without a cultural and spiritual center in the Land of Israel, Jewish life was disconnected from its full historical expression. Diaspora existence, in this view, was not the active unfolding of Jewish history, but something suspended, even stagnant. Making Aliyah, by contrast, was stepping into the Jewish national story in its fullest form.
David Ben-Gurion went even further, emphasizing that “only in Israel do Jews live a full, normal historical life.” That implies that the diaspora is something less—almost outside of “real” history.
Reading these thinkers played a major role in shaping my belief that life as a Jew could not be wholly lived anywhere but Israel. And I internalized that belief deeply. I looked down on those who didn’t make the same move, as if they weren’t ascending to something higher—the literal meaning of the word “Aliyah.”
In my experience, the Jews around me in the U.S. either assimilated completely or lived in isolated Jewish bubbles—summer camps, synagogues, or the Jewish Greek life I saw in college. I saw Jews thriving only within those bubbles—which, to me, wasn’t really thriving.
(Similarly, Daniel Gordis writes that the purpose of Israel is not just Jewish survival—something the U.S., for all its safety and opportunity, seemed already to provide—but the flourishing of the Jewish people.)
Growing up, these Jewish bubbles bothered me. When we had standardized tests in school, my quiet rebellion was to bubble in “Atheist” instead of “Jewish” for religion. (And even though I marked “White” for ethnicity—because I wasn’t Black, Hispanic, or Asian—something about labeling my Jewish Yemenite ancestry that way felt intrinsically wrong.)
That sense of division was reinforced in everyday life. Kids at school told me I wasn’t Jewish because I didn’t fast on Yom Kippur. The girl next to me in third grade refused a birthday cupcake because it wasn’t Glatt kosher. I was confused, so she explained that Jews eat a certain way, and I figured that if I was Jewish, I couldn’t eat it either. So I passed on the cupcake—until I asked my mom that night, and she told me I could still be Jewish and eat whatever I wanted.
Because of experiences like these, I came to see Judaism as an unnecessary division—a wall between “us” and the rest of the world. I saw a plethora of rules that felt arbitrary, an identity that seemed to create distance, isolation and detachment—rather than connection. It felt like an active avoidance of what was right in front of us—the non-Jewish world, which I was sure I wanted to be part of. To me, it was an “otherness” that didn’t look appealing—and didn’t seem to serve any real purpose.
And yet, when I stepped outside of it, I found joy in non-Jewish spaces—in extracurriculars, in friendships, in college life… until. (There was always an “until.” Always something that broke the illusion.)
So the choice felt clear: what seemed like a partial life there, or a full life here, in Israel.
That’s the mindset I arrived with.
Now I’m here, and I have a full, healthy identity—interests that have nothing to do with my nationality.
And for my first four years here, I was completely immersed in Israeli news. I felt I had to catch up for my time not living here: my first 21 years. I worked constantly on my Hebrew and on my understanding of Israeli politics and culture. I wanted to take an active role in this country, to be a full member of society—someone who understood references in conversation and on the news.
Perhaps it came from a place of insecurity (I envied the born-and-raised Israelis, their Hebrew fluency and the ease with which they played with the language, dancing with words in ways I could only dream of), but it also came from a genuine belief that this is how a responsible citizen behaves. A responsible citizen should know his country, understand its language, stay up-to-date on its news, believe in its future, and work towards its improvement.
And following Oct. 7, this belief became a compulsion. I began watching the news obsessively. I simply had to hear the story of every fallen soldier. It felt like a national responsibility—if you died protecting us, I had to at least know your name, look into your eyes—from the photo your loved ones chose—hear a part of your eulogy, learn about your passions and aspirations, and comment on how young you were… or how handsome… or how you were just about to propose to your girlfriend. Even though it didn’t matter what your life had looked like—it was always a tragedy.
But over time, something shifted. We’re now nearing three years of almost constant war—and I’ve stopped watching the news. And I have trouble saying it, but it feels… great.
It feels amazing not to know about every missile, every death. (I hear the sirens warning of the missiles coming right at me—isn’t that enough?) Not to follow every attack—here and abroad—every threat, every vow to destroy us… before even getting to our internal turmoil.
I no longer carry every story, every headline, every detail.
It means I am, in some sense, living in a bubble—menuteket (Hebrew for disconnected, isolated, or detached). And it stands in direct contrast to everything I once believed a responsible citizen should be. But I can’t deny the relief that comes with protecting my own consciousness, at the cost of being the antithesis of what I had strived to be.
So when the war began, and I found myself in Mitzpe Ramon—the quietest place in the country, suddenly an oasis—I felt the contrast sharply. For two weeks, I was surrounded by desert, by its stillness and the beauty of its vastness. By a kind of spiritual calm shared by artists, religious families, and small communities who chose to live in this haven, with its slower pace and refuge from the chaos of the city—and now specifically from the noise and stress of the war.
And there, the question of national responsibility became unavoidable for me.
As I enjoyed this unexpected break from reality along with other Israelis who had come there seeking refuge from the war, I couldn’t help but wonder—should I feel guilty? Had I become what I once judged? Was it enough to know we were at war, or did I have to know everything? I knew we were at war with Iran, but did I have to also know if Hezbollah and the Houthis joined in?
This tension isn’t just personal—it’s everywhere. A friend in the film industry told me about a film set for release in October 2023 that was postponed after Oct. 7, like most things—with an abruptness only catastrophe can bring. It would have been inappropriate, even tactless, to release it as planned.
Life here moves with a national rhythm, where grief and memory shape what is acceptable. Abroad, he argued, this wouldn’t be the case—life is more individualistic. But here, living with a national calendar—Memorial Day, Holocaust Remembrance Day, now also Oct. 7—there is no shortage of days shaped by grief.
And that rhythm seeps into everyday language. We don’t just “celebrate” birthdays anymore—we “mark” them. We don’t wish each other a happy holiday, but a quiet one. Joy is supposed to be tempered, reframed through the reality we’re living in.
The question of guilt followed me. I was enjoying myself—meeting people, spending time in nature, allowing myself moments of peace. And I kept thinking about something we discussed in a class on emotional history during my MA at TAU in Jewish History: that societies don’t just shape what we do, but what we feel we are allowed to feel.
Maybe we don’t need a formal authority to be policed emotionally. Maybe we internalize it. Maybe we believe we are supposed to feel existentially anxious, alert, and consumed right now. But is that a choice? And if it is, do we have the right to choose differently while still belonging to the collective we identify with?
Maybe I don’t have to constantly catch up on the news and politics, trying to become Israeli. Maybe I can just be—with Israelis, in Israel. Learn the land through its people, through conversations, through hikes in nature. Through its rocks and trees. Could that, too, be a kind of wartime contribution?
These thoughts kept circling: when you take a break from Jewish history—from that constant engagement—do you also step away from the world? A friend who works in the Israeli news once told me that when he needs to disconnect from our reality, he watches news from other countries. I found that almost impossible to relate to. Nothing feels farther from me right now than what’s happening elsewhere. It feels like it’s either what’s happening here—or complete hitnatkut, disengagement.
And yet, there really is a whole world out there. It’s just easy to forget.
So did I go from looking down on those who took a break from Jewish history… to taking a break from it here—from history altogether?
Can you be a responsible citizen and still choose not to carry everything?
