The Return of the Jewish Population from Israel

Abstract

“....and he stays on for another year or two, or three, or four. He admires American energy and creativeness; but he also acquires a taste for American salaries and the American standard of living (about four times Israel’s).”¹ Emigration from Israel presents a new feature in the history of Jewish migrations: the absence of anti-Semitism as an expulsive force. For the first time emigration by Israelis issues from a country where Jews are a sovereign majority to countries where they are a non-sovereign minority group. Thus, the Israeli emigrant is not unlike other, mainly young, people who leave their country: for purposes of study, economic improvement or personal reasons. His conflict emanates from the unique image his homeland has created both in himself (“I am urgently needed”) and, even more, in the eyes of Jews abroad, who regard him as an emissary — perhaps compensating in their expectations their own guilt feelings for having preferred “the fleshpots.”