Fleeing Haifa and Tel Aviv: Reverse Migration Confuses the Hebrew State

Israelis have a close relationship with the sea. They crossed it on ships, some of which were dilapidated, and some sank before reaching the "Promised Land," which brought together the scattered Jews of the world after convincing them that they were children of "one homeland" and one ethnicity.
Today, the Israelis' relationship with the sea takes on a new dimension. Through it, they are escaping the Promised Land, with Tel Aviv, Haifa, and other cities now a daily target for Iranian missiles.
Iranian missiles, and before them, the missiles of Palestinian factions and the missiles of the Lebanese Hezbollah, even those that were intercepted or did not cause harm to Israel in vital areas or cause deaths, have spread terror in Israeli society, which once came to Palestine after promises that the time of feeling fear or danger was gone forever.


Go ahead... run away
“The wicked flees even when no one pursues him, but the righteous is like a young lion and is confident.” Hebrew proverb
After Donald Trump threatened Iran, urging Tehran residents to evacuate their city without specifying the nature of the threat, media outlets broadcast images of Iranians fleeing what they believed was a US threat to strike the capital.
But some 1,500 kilometers away, neither Israeli nor Western media reported a similar, and perhaps even more bizarre, scene. In the Mediterranean port of Herzliya, a number of Israelis stood begging boats, yachts, and the waves to carry them—not to leave the major cities for "less dangerous" ones, but to escape outside Israel.
The Israeli newspaper Haaretz noted that the Herzliya port has become a kind of temporary stopover. Starting at seven in the morning, Israelis begin arriving, laden with their luggage, searching for a yacht that will transport them to Cyprus and then on to a European city.
At the port, the travelers meet people who have started a profitable small business selling provisions to passengers. The expression on their faces is suspicious, and the travelers rarely say they are residents of the occupying state, simply stating that they were on vacation and returning "home." Few admit that they are, in fact, fleeing Iranian missiles, and even fewer are willing to talk to the media that has come to cover the waves of flight by sea.
The cost of escaping Israel by sea varies according to supply and demand, as well as the type of yacht, its speed, and the amenities available. Some yachts, for example, have private rooms, while others run on diesel and reach Cyprus in as little as eight hours. Some passengers have paid 2,500 shekels (about $700), while others have paid 6,500 shekels (about $1,700) for the same trip.

Bleeding..
The worst threat to Israel is the brain drain: scientists, engineers, and doctors looking elsewhere. This is not just an exodus of individuals, but a loss of the talents who build the state.
In Tel Aviv, a city Israel prides itself on being unaffected by war, there are plenty of cafes, restaurants, and residential areas. At the same time, there are plenty of red dots on electronic maps indicating the locations where Israelis flee when the alarm bells ring.
On television screens, military analysts compete to read maps of Gaza, talking about achieving military objectives that might cause collateral damage in the form of Palestinian blood.
Everyone, observers and analysts alike, knows that Netanyahu, who cares little about anything more than remaining in office, is true to his promise that Israel will forever bear its sword. But this sword comes at a price: the price of resistance and the missiles that are constantly pounding Israel's heart.
Last summer, Israeli Professor Aaron Ciechanover, a Nobel laureate in chemistry, joined a group of Israeli figures calling for an immediate ceasefire and a deal to release Israeli prisoners held by Hamas.
The professor's position stems from the conviction that failure to recover the hostages will lead to the collapse of the social contract upon which Israel is based, which will have disastrous consequences for the country. This is because Israel is experiencing increasing waves of brain drain, with many young people no longer seeing a future in Israel. Some have already left, while others are waiting to join their colleagues, a situation that undoubtedly threatens Israel's future.
While the flood was a shock to Israeli society and eroded Israelis' confidence in their security services and the supposedly invincible army, signs of a desire by skilled individuals to flee the occupying state actually appeared before the flood, due to demographic and political shifts that led many secularists to question the possibility of finding a place for themselves in Israel, which was rapidly moving toward religious fundamentalism.
The British newspaper, The Guardian, reported the story of Noam, the director of a public relations agency and medical cannabis pharmacy, and a father of three. He had wanted to live in Israel after the age of 40, but everything changed. He and his wife now spend their nights searching for a place to live and schools for their children.
Noam says that the reason he wants to leave Israel is not the absence of "peace," because even if peace is achieved, it will not change the fact that he no longer sees current Israeli society as a suitable place to raise his children.
Noam adds, "I fear that Israel's economy will be harmed by the increase in the number of Haredi youth who are unqualified for professional work because they do not study math or science and do not master English."
Socially, the rise of religious conservatives makes life difficult for secularists. If you want to understand where we're headed, look at the Iranian model, where religion plays a central role in daily life.
The numbers confirm Noam's fears. By 2015, the percentage of secular Jews had reached 45%, and by 2023, the percentage of children enrolled in secular schools had reached 40%. All of these percentages are in steady decline.
In addition to Noam's family, the Guardian report says that five or six families from his children's school left last year. October 7 precipitated this move, but it wasn't the real reason these families chose to leave. No secular family wants to throw their children into the army machine, which feeds on soldiers, while the Haredim refuse to serve, and the government has so far accepted their refusal out of courtesy of their significant influence in Israeli politics.
Some leftists find more moral reasons to leave the occupying state, such as the young Israeli woman Dror Sado, who said her decision to leave Israel stemmed from her shock at the popular support for the war, which led to the deaths of tens of thousands of Palestinians, most of them civilians. The desire to shed Palestinian blood is no longer limited to those described as "extremists," but has recently spread within the ranks of the Israeli left itself, which now speaks of a "just war."
Besides those who talk, plan, and express their desire to leave, there is a more dangerous group who leave silently, saying nothing until they have boarded the plane, like a well-known pediatrician who went on vacation, only to announce that she would extend her stay abroad for three years.

Where do they flee?
"Don't leave the country. This must not happen. Israel needs you. We cannot live without you."
The French newspaper Le Monde reported that the family of Aran Angioni, who lives in a kibbutz (settlement) in the north of the country, just 7 kilometers from the border with Lebanon, was affected by the flood due to rockets fired by the resistance and the Lebanese Hezbollah. They subsequently found themselves forced to move to another settlement in the center of occupied Palestine.
Within a year, this Israeli family had moved to more than five different locations before the obvious idea occurred to them: to move to the Greek island of Crete, not for vacation this time, but to settle down.
This is not the only family to have chosen to go to Greece, a European country with a climate similar to that experienced by the residents of the occupying state, and one that hosts many Israeli investments that increased after Operation Protective Edge.
These days, well-off Israelis are looking for a second home in a safe country that they can quickly escape to, says Kimon Zaks, a Greek lawyer who works with Israeli citizens.
The number of visas requested by Israelis to Greece has doubled, with some requesting work visas. Greece grants two-year residency to those with a monthly income of €3,500 or more, but the vast majority of those fleeing are forced to renew their visas every three months.
As the number of Israelis choosing Greece increases, Facebook groups have emerged to share information and facilitate daily life by posting rental advertisements and providing information on schools, safe areas, and Israeli nannies.
A study by the Institute for Jewish Studies and Policy, a UK-based research institution that studies Jewish communities in Europe and around the world, reveals the significant change that Jewish communities in European countries have begun to experience. The study states that Israelis who moved to Europe have significantly contributed to the revival of the continent's declining Jewish communities, both demographically and culturally, in a new version of a voluntary Jewish diaspora.
After the founding of Israel, early Zionists relied on Jewish communities to revive it. However, Dr. Daniel Staitsky, author of this study, says that Israel's founders did not anticipate that the opposite would one day happen, and that Jewish communities in Western societies would be the ones to thrive from immigration from Israel.
As Israeli immigrants bring their religious and social heritage and everyday culture to the countries they emigrate to or return to, the use of Hebrew and Jewish names for children has become more widespread in many European communities, and restaurants have begun serving dishes from what is known as "Israeli cuisine."
In the Netherlands, for example, Asher Waterman, strategic advisor to the National Social Welfare Authority for the Dutch Jewish Community, says that low-cost land has recently received many Israelis, which is changing the internal composition of the Jewish community, as Jews coming from Israel have a somewhat different identity and history than Dutch Jews.
In the same vein, Itay Garmi, a city councillor in Amsterdam born to an Israeli father, stated that the Israeli community in the capital is often more secular than the traditional Jewish community from Israel. He said, "Our relationship with Israel is based more on culture than religion. It's more about music, food, and the love of Israel as a second homeland for Jews than it is about religion."
Some Israeli immigrants experience a religious awakening upon leaving the occupying state. Some say they once felt Israeli, but immigration to another land has created a growing sense of Judaism as a religion and identity. This, of course, doesn't benefit Israel, as many of those leaving are highly educated, young, and have children.

A dream closer to a nightmare..
“There may be more outbound flights than inbound flights, and this is unique in Israel’s history.”
Immigration, Israel, Netanyahu, Ben-Gvir, Smotrich. With these keywords, we can try to access statements by the leaders of the current government through search engines to learn their views on reverse immigration and on Israelis fleeing occupied Palestine.
However, there have been no official statements from this trio addressing the phenomenon, and information about it is scarce, except for the announcement by Israeli Minister of Transportation Miri Regev that she is barring Israeli citizens from leaving the country via airports.
All statements about the word "migration" come in a completely different context: the displacement of the people of Gaza. However, the numbers of Gazans who were displaced despite the killing and starvation are striking when compared to the Israelis fleeing on luxury yachts less than a week after the missile strikes.
According to available data, in October 2023, the month the flood erupted, approximately 12,300 Israelis left the country and did not return until the end of June 2024. This is compared to 3,200 people who left the country during the same period the previous year. This means that emigration during this period increased significantly.
In the summer of 2023, that is, before October 7, and coinciding with the "judicial coup," emigration increased by 51% compared to the summer of 2022. Overall estimates for 2024 indicate that the number of emigrants reached approximately 76,000 Israelis, compared to 70,000 in 2023. Israel's Channel 12 also reported that approximately 30,000 Israelis left the country permanently between November 2023 and March 2024.
As for returnees, figures indicate that between October 2023 and May 2024, 19,000 Israelis returned, compared to 23,000 in the same period the previous year. This represents a 20% decrease and a continuous monthly decline since the outbreak of the war. This means that an increasing number of Israelis living abroad are postponing or canceling their return.
During our research, we found some other telling figures, including that Greece, a favorite destination for many settlers, is experiencing significant pressure on its visa department due to the extension of tourist visas for Israelis from 90 to 180 days, while the number of Greek Golden Visas, granted exclusively to investors, has increased by 70%.
On the other hand, Israel has witnessed a decline in immigration. Between October 2023 and the end of June 2024, the number of immigrants to Israel reached only 21,000, compared to 52,000 during the same period in 2022. However, Israeli analyses indicate that immigration may increase in the future due to the growing security concerns among Jews in other countries, and due to the alienation of some communities from Israelis due to events in Gaza.
As the war drags on, even if Israel ultimately achieves victory, its tight control over a region where all peoples are hostile to it despite the normalization of governments, and its conflicts with states and armed movements capable of targeting it escalate more than ever, means that there is no longer any safety for Israelis within the borders of occupied Palestine.

Source: Al Jazeera + websites