Re: The only person who needs a clue in this exchange is you......you are very close to becoming another Emile.
LOL... but you're even closer to becoming another Yaacov/average Joe/Nicole Wollerstein/Carolyn/lorne/...
Re: If things are so great in Iran, why are they leaving:
Well, I guess they're leaving for the very same reasons Jews have left Israel... I still remember the catch phrase Citibank used in its TV ads (15 years ago): "For Americans don't want to survive, they want to succeed!" Likewise, todays' Iranian Jews don't want to get by, they want to succeed....
ncsj.org
Excerpt:
Reuven Margulis doesn't think Israel is the place for every Russian Jew.
"It depends," he muses. "As a Zionist, who believes Israel needs more Jews, I look at it through Israeli eyes. But the age that can help Israel is not old people who can only take from the system. There are those who send grandma off to Israel for a better pension, and they stay behind. This is what we are trying to avoid."
He feels strongly, however, that there is no Jewish future in Russia for young Jews.
"I say, go now, don't wait until you're 50. Don't think it will 'get better some day.' "
As the communication and transportation channels between Israel and the former Soviet Union have become more fluid, attitudes toward the Jewish homeland have become more casual, more familiar.
Jews of the former Soviet Union now feel comfortable joking about aliyah, without worrying, as many did 10 years ago, that they might come across as not sufficiently pro-Zionist.
One restaurant owner in Cherkassy, a gray Ukrainian industrial city two hours outside Kiev with about 300,000 residents and 4,000-5,000 Jews, says his parents live in Beersheba.
He visits them twice a year, but laughs at the suggestion that he might consider moving to Israel himself.
"I was just there for a month, and it was more than enough," he chuckles, waving his hand at the absurdity of the idea. "We have a saying: If you're a bricklayer, you'll do better in Israel. But if you want to build a business, you'd better stay here."
This article is part of a series of pieces on Jewish life in the former Soviet Union. This series was made possible, in part, by support from the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation, the Joseph and Harvey Meyerhoff Family Charitable Funds and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. |
