Nathan Japhet responds to Rabbi Waxman on the Israel-Diaspora Divide

To the Editors:

I’m an avid reader of this publication and greatly enjoyed the Israel at 75 issue.

Responding to Rabbi Deborah Waxman’s article: If Israel is losing American Jews, where do the problem and the solution lie?

As an American Jew who made Aliyah 10 years ago at age 23, served and fought in the IDF, and made my life here, I genuinely understand and identify with many of the problems Rabbi Waxman points to in current Israeli society. But if demography is destiny, Israeli politicians, like all politicians everywhere, must pander to their base. While the rabbi can bemoan the issues, there is no incentive for government policy to change. Perhaps the real problem is, as the author candidly states, that most non-Orthodox American Jews have no plan on making Aliyah. American Jews have, on the whole, detached themselves from Jewish nationalism. And therefore, to put it bluntly: if you have no skin in the game, you have no say.

Or, in other words, has the time come for the American Jewish community to hold a genuine conversation about Aliyah?