Proud to be Israeli

The traffic jams on the way to nursery school and elementary school, the traffic on the way to work, the traffic on the way home, the oppressive heat eight months out of the year, the security situation, the humidity, the lack of manners, the shouting, the prices at the supermarket, the crowds, the cost of housing, the taxes, the societal divisions, the clapping when the plane lands. True, it's not easy to live here. Sometimes it's not easy at all. But despite that, there's nowhere else.

Fifteen years ago I left a huge, beautiful country in a pretty nice place on the globe, one that was surrounded by friendly nations (except when it came to soccer, of course), with wonderful food and delightful people, and made aliyah to Israel, heading toward the unknown, with just two suitcases. So did millions of other Jews from all over the world, who like me understood that their place was here and not anywhere else. Israel's population has grown tenfold in the past 68 years, which is an undoubted victory for Zionism.

When you make aliyah, as soon as you land at the airport, you go into the Immigrant Absorption Ministry office and receive an identity number. Nothing is more symbolic than that. That same moment, minutes after the plane lands, you become Israeli. The country takes you in, wants you, embraces you, and also takes care of you as you start off on your way. Only someone who has tried to emigrate to somewhere else understands that nothing can buy that. Because even if it's hard here -- and like I said, it's not easy -- this is home. I might not have been born here, but (as the traditional song says) this is where my children were born and this is where I built my home with my bare hands (and a giant mortgage.)

Even after 15 years here, people still sometimes ask me if I want to "go back home." For me, the answer is obvious. Because there is no other place. Because only here can we walk around in a T-shirt with Hebrew words on it, because only here do the supermarkets observe Passover, and this is the only place where Hebrew is spoken as the official language.

There is no lack of reasons to be proud here -- from Israeli hummus to high-tech, from the rule of law to the advanced health care system, from pluralism of thought to the secure borders, from the new roads to the absorption of new immigrants. Guys, take a close look -- the glass is more than half full. Let's be proud of that, at least one day of the year. After 15 years, I'm proud to be Israeli.

טעינו? נתקן! אם מצאתם טעות בכתבה, נשמח שתשתפו אותנו