Organization and Tourism Division
The Untapped Potential
of the Israeli Diaspora
Photos from an event by the Israeli Business Club in London together with WIZO’s
ex-pat Israeli Rotem group, with guest speaker Dr Ines Verner, dermatologist,
immediate past President of the Israel Society for Dermatologic Surgery.
Ex-pat Israelis are becoming more involved with the Jewish
communities
Lisa Moss-Phillips
In recent years, the growth of the Israeli Diaspora has
garnered the attention of the State of Israel and the Jewish
world. An estimated 900,000 Israelis who are building a
communal life abroad are shaking the Jewish boat. The
State of Israel and Jewish communities increasingly realize
that the Israeli Diaspora can be a political, economic, social
and cultural asset. Moreover, Israelis living abroad present
an emerging opportunity for strengthening the relationship
between Israel and world Jewry. By leveraging their unique
hybrid identity, the Israeli Diaspora can act as a catalyst in
the changing state of Jewish Peoplehood.
The last decade has seen a tremendous growth in Israelis
moving to North America. An estimated 120,000 Israelis live
in the New York area which makes it home to the largest
Israeli community outside of Israel. In Toronto an estimated
50,000 Israeli immigrants comprise up to one-quarter of
the Jewish community. There are also significant numbers
in Australia and Europe with Berlin being home to a 20,000
strong Israeli expatriate community.
Cold shoulder
Traditionally, Israeli immigrants were given the cold
shoulder from both the Israeli government and Diaspora
Jewish communal organisations due to the inherent tension
between the phenomenon of Israeli immigration and
Zionism’s call for all Jews to settle in Israel. By leaving Israel,
they physically rejected and negated what the Jewish state
stood for - an ingathering of exiles. In 1976, Prime Minister
Yitzhak Rabin infamously described Israelis living overseas
as nefolet shel nemushot (a debris of weaklings). Rabin later
retracted his statement, but for a long time afterwards, this
stigmatization stuck in the collective consciousness of most
Israelis.
In recent years a changing paradigm has emerged in the
relations between Israel and the Jewish world, one that is
shaped by partnership and mutuality, with the notion of
Jewish Peoplehood taking centre stage. The idea of Jewish
Peoplehood emphasizes the role and importance of building
strong Jewish communities, as opposed to building the
State of Israel as the main mission of the Jewish people.
For decades, Israelis living abroad had been viewed as
displaced citizens who, for the sake of Israel, must be
nudged back home. But as the expat community grew
in wealth, influence and numbers, perceptions changed.
Gidi Grinstein, president and founder of the Reut Institute,
a Tel Aviv based non-profit organisation which works on
24 I SPRING/SUMMER 2014 I WIZO RE VIE W
strategic issues relating to Israeli society and Zionism,
including the connection between world Jewry and
the Jewish state, maintains there has been a transition
(maybe even a revolution) in the attitude of the State of
Israel towards the Israeli Diaspora. This new mind-set was
embraced by the Jewish Agency