Since October 7, a Big Spike in Western Jews Moving to Israel

Affirming solidarity when it’s most needed.

Aliyah to a nation at war: Rediscovering Israel following October 7. (JNS.org)

The multifront war Israel has been fighting for more than 10 months has been one of its more trying times, but there are gleams of light. Among the most dramatic of these are hostage rescues—including the rescue of Farhan al-Qadi, a 52-year-old Bedouin Israeli who was kidnapped by Hamas on October 7 and held mostly in tunnels in pitch darkness, “surviving mostly on bread and not eating every day,” until Israeli forces extracted him from his nightmare on Tuesday, August 27.

I came upon another gleam of light that same day in the form of a report highlighting the fact that over 29,000 new immigrants have arrived in Israel—made aliyah—since the October 7 massacre.

Aliyah, listed as a valid English word in Merriam-Webster, means “ascent” in Hebrew—and can mean, specifically, the “ascent” involved in moving from the Diaspora to Israel.

That 29,000 Jews from the Diaspora, “including young families with children and young immigrants,” have made the ascent since October 7 is especially notable for three reasons.

First, that number, while lower than the totals for 2022 and 2023, is higher than the totals for some of the other recent years—in other words, a respectable figure even if times were normal. Second, the people who are coming know they’re relocating to a country not at all in a normal situation but, instead, in the midst of a prolonged war against enemies obsessed with destroying it—but coming here to lay down roots nonetheless.

Third—and most notably—the majority of these immigrants are arriving from Western countries. In preceding years, much higher totals of Jews—for quite understandable reasons—were making aliyah from Russia and Ukraine. But since October 7, Western aliyah appears to have taken the lead.

Although I’ve been living in Israel for close to 40 years and may not have the pulse of these Western Diaspora Jews, this post–October 7 surge in aliyah can presumably be attributed to two factors.

One is the very big post–October 7 surge in antisemitism in Western countries. Instead of spurring revulsion and repudiation, the horrific massacre actually sparked exultation among proportions of Muslims and leftists in those countries, with a major uptick in antisemitic utterance and activism that continues to this day.

And the second is a sense of heightened solidarity with a Jewish state under attack, and a realization that sometimes Jewish identity confers responsibility. I can talk more confidently about that response because I experienced it almost exactly 42 years ago, watching the First Lebanon War on TV in upstate New York and feeling that, if I was truly going to be myself, myself would have to be in Israel taking part in the effort to live, overcome, and thrive.

But not only have a lot of Jews arrived in Israel since October; “the data shows,” says the report, a substantial rise

in the opening of aliyah files…compared to the same period last year.

For example, there has been a growth of about 355% in the opening of aliyah files from France, with more than 5,500 opened since the outbreak of the war, compared to about 1,200 in the same period last year. 

In the United States, more than 6,000 aliyah files were opened, a 62% increase compared to the same period last year before the outbreak of the war. 

Canada also recorded an 87% jump in the number of aliyah file openers, with more than 800 Jews expressing their desire to immigrate to Israel. A similar number have been opened in the UK in recent months, with a 63% increase. 

Aliyah—whether from countries in distress or countries once thought comfortable, now becoming less so—has been Israel’s lifeblood and will continue to be. It’s a vote for the future.

Announcement from our publisher, God of the Desert Books:

We're very proud to announce that our first book, P. David Hornik's Israel Odyssey: Coming of Age and Finding Peace in the Middle East, is now available in ebook format.
Paperback will be available September 10th!

Find it at:

https://www.amazon.com/Israel-Odyssey-P-David-Hornik-ebook/dp/B0D2QG46RX