Aliyah revolution

Vallley woman moves to Jewish homeland

KELLY HARTOG

Former Phoenix resident Rebecca Wolf, left, and Karen Karaqoulla from Florida arrive in Tel Aviv, Israel, as part of Nefesh B' Nefesh, an organization that brings planeloads of American and Canadian Jews to their homeland. Photo courtesy of Rebecca Wolf

It's 4 p.m. "Erev Christmas" and 45-year-old Howard Posner, an Orthodox convert and divorcĒ, is racing the Shabbat clock. He's attempting to speak to me on his cell phone while driving from his home in the Beverly/Fairfax area in Los Angeles to the Pico/Robertson area, to spend his final Shabbat with friends before he makes his way to New York's JFK airport on Dec. 28, to board a flight to his new home - Israel.

But this is no ordinary plane trip. This is a specially chartered El Al flight through an organization called "Nefesh B'Nefesh" (Jewish Souls United). It is in fact the organization's eighth flight in three years, bringing planeloads of American and Canadian Jews into the bosom of their homeland.

Nefesh B'Nefesh (NBN) started out as a blip on American Jewry's radar screens back in 2002. Co-founders Rabbi Yehoshua Fass, a dynamic, vibrant redhead from Florida who made aliyah three years ago, and fellow Floridian Tony Gelbart, president and CEO of CPM Worldwide Group investment company, set out with a grand vision: to boost American and Canadian aliyah. Their method? Providing financial, professional, logistical and social aid to potential immigrants, including grants of anywhere from $3,000 to $30,000, and bringing along officials from Israel's Interior Ministry to process the new immigrants on the specially chartered El Al flights. All this with the backing and support of the Israeli government and the Jewish Agency.

In the summer of 2002, NBN flew its first planeload of new North American immigrants - 519 of them - to their new home in the Holy Land. Another 1,000 followed in the summer of 2003, with an additional 1,500 in the summer of 2004. And, on Dec. 28, 2004, another 250 olim boarded NBN's first-ever winter flight.

According to NBN statistics, of the 1,520 newcomers who made aliyah through the organization in 2002-03, 99 percent have remained in the country, with 93 percent of families having one or both spouses employed, 95 babies being born and 18 weddings having taken place.

Posner will be added to those statistics when he arrives at his new home in Nahlaot, Jerusalem on Dec. 29. But for now, this is hardly uppermost in his mind.

"I'm feeling a combination of tremendous excitement, exaltation and panic," Posner says breathlessly. "I have this sense of a million things being left undone." Then, more philosophically, he talks about the "leap into the void of starting my new life."

That "starting a new life" is something many of the new immigrants talk about. With a background in film, Posner saw his Hollywood dreams fall apart during the last seven years when he lived in Los Angeles, and instead found himself becoming a paralegal. Now, with his new life ahead, he hopes to return to his film roots and "use the tools Hashem gave me as a filmmaker and writer." His dream is to make documentary videos about how Israelis are living out their lives in their homeland.

Four days later, I spy Posner at JFK dressed in black pants and black hat with the requisite "tzitit out" look. He's already checked in, but his hand luggage appears to consist of several cases, and he's pushing his cart aimlessly round the terminal. He appears dazed and confused, explaining that he caught the red-eye from LAX and arrived at JFK at 5:30 a.m. The NBN flight isn't until 4:30 p.m., but Posner says he simply "didn't have an opportunity" to leave earlier and break his trip with a couple of days rest and relaxation in New York. "There was just too much to do," he says, before wandering off to find a quiet place in the "red carpet" area where, later, representatives of the Israeli Consul General in New York, El Al, the Jewish Agency and NBN itself will speak directly to the new immigrants.

That area has been set aside with a huge cake, refreshments and a seating area for the new Israelis to rest their weary limbs. Small children run around shrieking with delight, clasping the blue and white balloons provided by NBN that proclaim, "I'm making aliyah." The NBN staff is stationed in one corner, handing out plane tickets, bottled water and cookies to the departees, and dealing with the dozens of media inquiries as representatives from various outlets mill around.

It's a motley crew of immigrants, with young families like the Jaspers from Pikesville, Md., who are uprooting their entire family - including five children ranging from a few months to 7 years - to Chicagoans Myron and Marilyn Weintraub, in their 50s, who are making aliyah with their 3-year-old-cat, Ben. There are also several single people - more so than on previous flights - including 28-year-old Conservative convert Nick Sporek, from Edmonton, Canada, a massage therapist and martial arts teacher, and 23-year-old teacher Esther Enright from Milwaukee, who confesses she's going to miss "real Mexican food."

At the tiny podium, Charley Levine, director of Ruder Finn, Israel, who has been handling the public relations for NBN since its inception, calls the immigrants to order. A hush falls over the area as Levine tells them they are "250 Stars of David moving from the sidelines of Jewish history to center stage."

Yet the real buzz at the terminal is over two women who miss the entire red carpet address: 97 year-old Irma Haas and her 94-year-old sister Hilde Meyer, Holocaust survivors and New Yorkers and the oldest ever NBN'ers, who are finally realizing their aliyah dream. They almost don't make it; they went to Newark airport by mistake, and finally roll into JFK in their wheelchairs with just minutes to spare before the plane boards. In doing so, they add yet another honor to their name - that of making a New York Times reporter and photographer wait several hours to interview them. Their celebrity eclipses several octogenarians aboard the flight, as well as two dogs, two cats and a parrot.

As families bid tearful farewell to loved ones, and make their way to the departure gate, two young women sit in a corner by the elevators strumming their guitars. They appear relaxed and confident, sporting "Aliyah Revolution" T-shirts and pro-Israel badges. One of them, it turns out, is there to bid her friend farewell. The other is 25-year-old former Phoenix resident and youth advocate Rebecca Wolf.

With a degree in psychology and public health from Brandeis University, Wolf says she first heard about NBN while spending a year in Israel on an organized program.

Not one to cool her heels, Wolf is a go-getter with an attitude and maturity that belies her youth. She graced the pages of this newspaper back in October, following her involvement with Project Namuwongo Zone B in Uganda (PNZB). She became highly instrumental in a program called the Bare Feet Shoe Collection that sent shoes to poor children in Zone B.

Wolf followed up that program this summer by personally visiting Uganda in June, and subsequently establishing an organization called "Helping Hands" - a humanitarian effort that will eventually see Israeli doctors going to Uganda to help out.

Now she's on her way to make Israel her home and hopes to undertake a master's degree in public health at The Hebrew University, Jerusalem, and continue with her own projects in sustainable development. But first she'll undergo a five-month intensive ulpan (Hebrew language program) at Ulpan Etzion in Baka, Jerusalem.

Having been on many trips to Israel with her parents over the years, Wolf says she first became hooked on Israel back in 1996 when she participated in a teen program with USY. "It was the first time I really got to know Israeli society," she says. Today, making aliyah with NBN, she simply says, "This feels like a wonderful opportunity. This is an amazing time to be alive and I feel so connected to my Jewish history. This is a gift, and I want to be involved."

Her dreams appear to run in the family, as she speaks of her father, who is a lawyer, becoming a "big Zionist" after he first visited Israel in 1984 and fell in love with the country. He then went on to become involved in a project called the Israel Coalition for the Rescue of Jews in Yemen. "My dad is proud that I'm following in his footsteps," she says.

And, she adds, growing up in Phoenix she was only one of three or four Jewish kids in her high school. "My parents were always very persistent about us getting a Jewish education. They wanted us to have a strong Jewish identity."

Now, Wolf is realizing her dream by moving to Israel. "I feel so connected to the land," she says. "I'm excited. I'm really happy and relieved. I feel like I've been waiting for this a long time.

"Daily life in Israel just feels richer," she says, attempting to explain her reasons for moving. "People appreciate life there more, you treasure each moment."
It's a sentiment echoed by 22-year-old Dvora Nir, who is moving to Tsfat. "Jews in America talk about wanting to have their bodies shipped to Israel when they die," she explains, "and I say, 'Why come to Israel just to be buried, when you can live here?'"

Why indeed? It is perhaps the most eloquent summation of the energy, fervor and commitment that all of these former North Americans have to their new home in Israel. They all acknowledge the financial and economic hardships that await them but refuse to let that dampen their spirits. They all have a philosophical attitude toward terrorism, mentioning the incidents of drugs, shootings, rapes and murders in America, the Western media's over hyping of the matzav (the situation) in Israel, and the need to just "live their lives" and hope they will be safe in Israel. But most of all they acknowledge they couldn't have done it without both the financial and emotional support provided by Nefesh B'Nefesh.

That support becomes tangible as, following the 10-hour flight from JFK, the immigrants descend onto the tarmac at Ben Gurion airport with their NBN caps (literally) in hand, to the cheers and waves of the Israeli army, government representatives, media officials, and average Israelis who have come to welcome them. Blue and white flags flap in the wind, a shofar is blown, and the locals and the new arrivals meld into a seething mass of dancing, singing and all-around jubilation.

And that is why, in spite of jet-lag and sheer exhaustion, when Rabbi Yehoshua Fass ascends the podium at the hangar at Ben Gurion airport and tells everyone to phone home immediately and tell their friends, family and loved ones that it is "a precious gift to live in artzenu (our homeland) and you should all consider coming, because we'll have the planes ready," a deafening roar goes up from this latest group of "Jewish souls" who now call Israel home.

Kelly Hartog is a journalist who made aliyah 11 years ago and is currently based in Los Angeles.