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Why a liberal Zionist rabbi isn’t taking to the streets over Israel’s judicial reform plan
(JTA) — Israel’s 75th anniversary was supposed to be a blowout birthday party for its supporters, but that was before the country was convulsed by street protests over the right-wing government’s proposal to overhaul its judiciary. Critics call it an unprecedented threat to Israel’s democracy, and supporters of Israel found themselves conflicted. In synagogues across North America, rabbis found themselves giving “yes, but” sermons: Yes, Israel’s existence is a miracle, but its democracy is fragile and in danger.
One of those sermons was given a week ago Saturday by Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch of Manhattan’s Stephen Wise Free Synagogue, expressing his “dismay” over the government’s actions. Hirsch is the former head of ARZA, the Reform movement’s Zionist organization, and the founder of a new organization, Amplify Israel, meant to promote Zionism among Reform Jews. He is often quoted as an example of a mainstream non-Orthodox rabbi who not only criticizes anti-Zionism on the far left but who insists that his liberal colleagues are not doing enough to defend the Jewish state from its critics.
Many on the Jewish left, meanwhile, say Jewish establishment figures, even liberals like Hirsch, have been too reluctant to call out Israel on, for example, its treatment of the Palestinians — thereby enabling the country’s extremists.
In March, however, he warned that the “Israeli government is tearing Israeli society apart and bringing world Jewry along for the dangerous ride.” That is uncharacteristically strong language from a rabbi whose forthcoming book, “The Lilac Tree: A Rabbi’s Reflections on Love, Courage, and History,” includes a number of essays on the limits of criticizing Israel. When does such criticism give “comfort to left-wing hatred of Israel,” as he writes in his book, and when does failure to criticize Israel appear to condone extremism?
Although the book includes essays on God, Torah, history and antisemitism, in a recent interview we focused on the Israel-Diaspora divide, the role of Israel in the lives of Diaspora Jews and why the synagogue remains the “central Jewish institution.”
The interview was edited for length and clarity.
Jewish Telegraphic Agency: You gave a sermon earlier this month about the 75th anniversary of Israel’s founding, which is usually a time of celebration in American synagogues, but you also said you were “dismayed” by the “political extremism” and “religious fundamentalism” of the current government. Was that difficult as a pulpit rabbi?
Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch: The approach is more difficult now with the election of the new government than it has been in all the years of the past. Because we can’t sanitize supremacism, elitism, extremism, fundamentalism, and we’re not going to. Israel is in what’s probably the most serious domestic crisis in the 75-year history of the state. And what happens in Israel affects American Jewry directly. It’s Israeli citizens who elect their representatives, but that’s not the end of the discussion neither for Israelis or for American Jews. At the insistence of both parties, both parties say the relationship is fundamental and critical and it not only entitles but requires Israelis and world Jews to be involved in each other’s affairs.
For American Jewry, in its relationship with Israel, our broadest objective is to sustain that relationship, deepen that relationship, and encourage people to be involved in the affairs in Israel and to go to Israel, spend time in Israel and so forth, and that’s a difficult thing to do and at the same time be critical.
American Jews have been demonstrating here in solidarity with the Israelis who have been protesting the recent judicial overhaul proposals in Israel. Is that a place for liberal American Jews to make their voices heard on what happens in Israel?
I would like to believe that if I were living in Israel, I would be at every single one of those demonstrations on Saturday night, but I don’t participate in demonstrations here because the context of our world and how we operate is different from in Israel when an Israeli citizen goes out and marches on Kaplan Street in Tel Aviv. It’s presumed that they’re Zionists and they’re speaking to their own government. I’m not critical of other people who reach a different perspective in the United States, but for me, our context is different. Even if we say the identical words in Tel Aviv or on West 68th Street, they’re perceived in a different way and they operate in a different context.
What then is the appropriate way for American Jews to express themselves if they are critical of an action by the Israeli government?
My strongest guidance is don’t disengage, don’t turn your back, double down, be more supportive of those who support your worldview and are fighting for it in Israel. Polls seem to suggest that the large majority of Israelis are opposed to these reforms being proposed. Double down on those who are supportive of our worldview.
You lament in your book that the connections to Israel are weakening among world Jewry, especially among Jewish liberals.
The liberal part of the Jewish world is where I am and where the people I serve are by and large, and where at least 80% of American Jewry resides. It’s a difficult process because we’re operating here in a context of weakening relationship: a rapidly increasing emphasis on universal values, what we sometimes call tikkun olam [social justice], and not as a reflection of Jewish particularism, but often at the expense of Jewish particularism.
There is a counter-argument, however, which you describe in your book: “some left-wing Jewish activists contend that alienation from Israel, especially among the younger generations, is a result of the failures of the American Jewish establishment” — that is, by not doing more to express their concerns about the dangers of Jewish settlement in the West Bank, for example, the establishment alienated young liberal Jews. You’re skeptical of that argument. Tell me why.
Fundamentally I believe that identification with Israel is a reflection of identity. If you have a strong Jewish identity, the tendency is to have a strong connection with the state of Israel and to believe that the Jewish state is an important component of your Jewish identity. I think that surveys bear that out. No doubt the Palestinian question will have an impact on the relationship between American Jews in Israel as long as it’s not resolved, it will be an outstanding irritant because it raises moral dilemmas that should disturb every thinking and caring Jew. And I’ve been active in trying to oppose ultra-Orthodox coercion in Israel. But fundamentally, while these certainly are components putting pressure on the relationship between Israel and Diaspora Jewry, in particular among the elites of the American Jewish leadership, for the majority of American Jews, the relationship with Israel is a reflection of their relationship with Judaism. And if that relationship is weak and weakening, as day follows night, the relationship with Israel will weaken as well.
But what about the criticism that has come from, let’s say, deep within the tent? I am thinking of the American rabbinical students who in 2021 issued a public letter accusing Israel of apartheid and calling on American Jewish communities to hold Israel accountable for the “violent suppression of human rights.” They were certainly engaged Jews, and they might say that they were warning the establishment about the kinds of right-wing tendencies in Israel that you and others in the establishment are criticizing now.
Almost every time I speak about Israel and those who are critical of Israel, I hold that the concept of criticism is central to Jewish tradition. Judaism unfolds through an ongoing process of disputation, disagreement, argumentation, and debate. I’m a pluralist, both politically as well as intellectually.
In response to your question, I would say two things. First of all, I distinguish between those who are Zionist, pro-Israel, active Jews with a strong Jewish identity who criticize this or that policy of the Israeli government, and between those who are anti-Zionists, because anti-Zionism asserts that the Jewish people has no right to a Jewish state, at least in that part of the world. And that inevitably leads to anti-Jewish feelings and very often to antisemitism.
When it came to the students, I didn’t respond at all because I was a student once too, and there are views that I hold today that I didn’t hold when I was a student. Their original article was published in the Forward, if I’m not mistaken, and it generated some debate in all the liberal seminaries. I didn’t respond at all until it became a huge, multi-thousand word piece in The New York Times. Once it left the internal Jewish scene, it seemed to me that I had an obligation to respond. Not that I believe that they’re anti-Zionist — I do not. I didn’t put them in the BDS camp [of those who support the boycott of Israel]. I just simply criticized them.
Hundreds of Jews protest the proposed Israeli court reform outside the Israeli consulate in New York City on Feb. 21, 2023. (Gili Getz)
You signed a letter with other rabbis noting that the students’ petition came during Israel’s war with Hamas that May, writing that “those who aspire to be future leaders of the Jewish people must possess and model empathy for their brothers and sisters in Israel, especially when they are attacked by a terrorist organization whose stated goal is to kill Jews and destroy the Jewish State.”
My main point was that the essence of the Jewish condition is that all Jews feel responsible one for the another — Kol yisrael arevim zeh bazeh. And that relationship starts with emotions. It starts with a feeling of belongingness to the Jewish people, and a feeling of concern for our people who are attacked in the Jewish state. My criticism was based, in the middle of a war, on expressing compassion, support for our people who are under indiscriminate and terrorist assault. I uphold that and even especially in retrospect two years later, why anyone would consider that to be offensive in any way is still beyond me.
You were executive director of ARZA, the Reform Zionist organization, and you write in your book that Israel “is the primary source of our people’s collective energy — the engine for the recreation and restoration of the national home and the national spirit of the Jewish people.” A number of your essays put Israel at the center of the present-day Jewish story. You are a rabbi in New York City. So what’s the role or function of the Diaspora?
Our existence in the Diaspora needs no justification. For practically all of the last 2,000 years, Jewish life has existed in the Diaspora. It’s only for the last 75 years and if you count the beginning of the Zionist movement, the last 125 years or so that Jews have begun en masse to live in the land of Israel. Much of the values of what we call now Judaism was developed in the Diaspora. Moreover, the American Jewish community is the strongest, most influential, most glorious of all the Jewish Diasporas in Jewish history.
And yet, the only place in the Jewish world where the Jewish community is growing is in Israel. More Jewish children now live in Israel than all the other places in the world combined. The central value that powers the sustainability, viability and continuity of the Jewish people is peoplehood. It’s not the values that have sustained the Jewish people in the Diaspora and over the last 2,000 years, which was Torah or God, what we would call religion. I’m a rabbi. I believe in the centrality of God, Torah and religion to sustain Jewish identity. But in the 21st century, Israel is the most eloquent concept of the value of Jewish peoplehood. And therefore, I do not believe that there is enough energy, enough power, enough sustainability in the classical concept of Judaism to sustain continuity in the Diaspora. The concept of Jewish peoplehood is the most powerful way that we can sustain Jewish continuity in the 21st century.
But doesn’t that negate the importance of American Jewry?
In my view, it augments the sustainability of American Jewry. If American Jews disengage from Israel, and from the concept of Jewish peoplehood, and also don’t consider religion to be at the center of their existence, then what’s left? Now there’s a lot of activity, for example, on tikkun olam, which is a part of Jewish tradition. But tikkun olam in Judaism always was a blend between Jewish particularism and universalism — concern for humanity at large but rooted in the concept of Jewish peoplehood. But very often now, tikkun olam in the Diaspora is practiced not as a part of the concept of Jewish particularism but, as I said before, at the expense of Jewish particularism. That will not be enough to sustain Jewish communities going into the 21st century.
I want to ask about the health of the American synagogue as an institution. Considering your concern about the waning centrality of Torah and God in people’s lives — especially among the non-Orthodox — do you feel optimistic about it as an institution? Does it have to change?
I’ve believed since the beginning of my career that there’s no substitute in the Diaspora for the synagogue as the central Jewish institution. We harm ourselves when we underemphasize the central role of the synagogue. Any issue that is being done by one of the hundreds of Jewish agencies that we’ve created rests on our ability as a community to produce Jews into the next generation. And what are those institutions that produce that are most responsible for the production of Jewish continuity? Synagogues, day schools and summer camps, and of the three synagogues are by far the most important for the following reasons: First, we’re the only institution that defines ourselves as and whose purpose is what we call cradle to grave. Second, for most American Jews, if they end up in any institution at all it will be a synagogue. Far fewer American Jews will receive a day school education and or go to Jewish summer camps. That should have ramifications across the board for American Jewish policy, including how we budget Jewish institutions. We should be focusing many, many more resources on these three institutions, and at the core of that is the institution of the synagogue.
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Minnesota’s Democratic nominee is an Israel critic – but she is not El-Sayed 2.0
(JTA) — Peggy Flanagan, the likely next senator from Minnesota, defeated a moderate pro-Israel congresswoman, accuses Israel of genocide and says she would oppose offensive weapons sales to Israel.
If the victory Tuesday of the state’s lieutenant governor over Rep. Angie Craig sounds like an echo of last week’s election in another midwestern state, Michigan, listen a little closer: Flanagan differs from Abdul El-Sayed in critical if subtle ways when it comes to Israel and Jews.
Flanagan has not joined El-Sayed and a number of left-wing challengers for Congress in saying that she would oppose U.S. funding for defensive weapons like the Iron Dome missile program.
Her platform says she would have joined the two incumbent Minnesota senators, Amy Klobuchar – who is running for governor, and whom she hopes to replace – and Tina Smith “in voting to halt offensive weapons sales to Israel.” That places her within the current Democratic mainstream: 40 out of 47 senators who caucus with the Democrats voted in April for the bill banning offensive weapons when it came up.
Her platform also calls for “a two-state solution which allows for a secure Israel and Palestinian self-determination.” El-Sayed will not commit to recognizing Israel’s existence as a Jewish state, or to a two-state solution.
The crisis moment in El-Sayed’s relationship with his state’s Jewish community came when he appeared to equivocate in condemning a violent attack on a Detroit area synagogue in March when pre-school was in session.
Flanagan was unequivocal: “Our Jewish communities are facing unprecedented levels of violence and threats,” she wrote then on social media. “It is on all of us to call anti-semitism out when we see and hear it, and to make sure that all of our faith communities are treated with respect. Hate brings no one more safety, more dignity, or more peace.”
She is equally as adamant when the threat is closer to home. In 2025, on the anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023 attack, a different synagogue called Temple Israel in Minneapolis was vandalized with graffiti in the shape of two inverted triangles — a symbol associated with Hamas — and reading “Al-Aqsa Flood,” Hamas’ name for its attack on Israel.
“Last night, Temple Israel in Minneapolis was defaced with anti-Semitic hate,” Flanagan wrote. “My heart is with the congregants of Temple Israel and our entire Jewish community. Hate has no home in Minnesota, and every house of worship should be a safe place to pray.”
There are things that Flanagan has done and said that nonetheless unsettled the pro-Israel community.
Some Jewish Democrats voiced concern to the Minnesota Star Tribune that Flanagan played into antisemitic tropes by singling out the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in her campaign against Craig – a page out of El-Sayed’s playbook in defeating AIPAC-backed Rep. Haley Stevens, and the playbook of a number of progressive congressional candidates this year. During the lead-up to the primary, Flanagan was vocal about her opponent Craig’s support from the pro-Israel lobby, calling her “AIPAC’s candidate.”
A Flanagan spokesperson told the paper that she has “consistently condemned antisemitism and will continue standing with Jewish Minnesotans against hate.” Flanagan’s campaign did not return a request for comment.
Flanagan had the support of Israel-critical progressives, including Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont senator who authored the proposed ban on the sale of offensive weapons, and Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota. Like them – and unlike Smith and Klobuchar – she has accused Israel of genocide.
She also drew the endorsement of progressive Jewish organization Bend the Arc.
“She is a close friend of the Twin Cities Jewish community and a trusted ally in the fight against antisemitism,” wrote Bend the Arc’s CEO, Jamie Beran. “She understands that Jewish safety is bound up with the safety and freedom of all our neighbors.”
Now, Flanagan will take on Republican nominee Michele Tafoya, a former NFL sideline reporter who has expressed support for Israel and its war with the U.S. in Iran. Minnesota has not elected a Republican U.S. Senator since 2002. Flanagan is favored to win in a state which has trended increasingly blue in recent years.
Flanagan also says she will not support New York’s Chuck Schumer if he chooses to seek another term as party leader in the Senate. Schumer is a pro-Israel stalwart.
Republicans, who control the Senate, have unanimously voted against Sanders’ resolutions, rendering them essentially symbolic tools for Democrats to voice disapproval of the Israeli government. If progressive Israel critics like El-Sayed and Troy Jackson in Maine win in November and help flip the Senate — and especially if Schumer gives up leadership — the pathway to blocking weapons sales to Israel would become clearer than ever.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Minnesota’s Democratic nominee is an Israel critic – but she is not El-Sayed 2.0 appeared first on The Forward.
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‘History cannot be erased’: ‘Hostages Square’ in Tel Aviv is formalized in official name change
(JTA) — The plaza that became the center of Israel’s campaign to bring home the 251 captives Hamas seized on Oct.7, 2023 is now formally called “Hostages Square,” establishing a permanent reminder of the more than two-year struggle that ended with the return of the final hostage in January.
Mayor Ron Huldai unveiled new signage at the plaza outside the Tel Aviv Museum of Art on Wednesday, formally adopting the name Israelis had used for the site for close to three years.
Hostage families and their supporters gathered at the square for mass rallies, weekly Shabbat gatherings, vigils and public events demanding the release of those held in Gaza. The plaza was also filled with crowds celebrating as hostages returned home.
“History cannot be erased, and we must not allow it to be forgotten,” Huldai said at the unveiling. “The decision to name this place ‘Hostages Square’ is intended to ensure that this chapter in the history of the State of Israel, from October 7, 2023 until the return of the final hostage, Ran Gvili, on January 26, 2026, will be remembered for generations.”
The formal designation settles a debate over whether or not the site’s role in one of the more significant events in Israel history should be remembered or erased.
After a deal was announced in October 2025 to free the remaining living hostages, Dani Miran, whose son Omri spent 738 days in Hamas captivity, personally urged Huldai to rename the plaza “Returnees Square.” Other proposals included “Heroes Square” and names emphasizing unity, while relatives of hostages whose bodies were still being held in Gaza argued that the existing name should remain until everyone was returned.
The last hostage, police officer Ran Gvili, was returned to Israel on Jan. 26 after his remains were recovered in Gaza. The following day, the clock in Hostages Square that had counted the time since Oct. 7 was stopped after 844 days.
The site still carries a political charge: In July, protesters met at the square to call for an official inquiry into the lapses that facilitated the Oct. 7 attacks, something Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has fiercely resisted. The alleged failures of the day have become an issue ahead of Oct. 27 elections.
Rebecca Geller, who handled international communications for the Hostages and Missing Families Forum and spent much of the war alongside hostage families at the square, said she was glad the name was being formally preserved.
“Whatever the space will be in the future, it will be important to honour” what it meant during the war, she said. “It gave the families a place to come to feel the support of the community, to get out of the house and to be nourished through the worst times of their lives, body and soul.”
By July, Tel Aviv’s municipal naming committee had backed Huldai’s proposal to make “Hostages Square” the plaza’s official name, saying it had become a national symbol of solidarity and the campaign to return the captives. Until then, the site was officially known as the plaza outside the Tel Aviv Museum of Art despite “Hostages Square” becoming its universally recognized name.
“This was the site of a courageous and determined struggle led by families who did everything they could to bring their loved ones home,” Huldai said. “Tel Aviv-Yafo had the privilege of being their home, and together with residents of the city and people from across Israel, this square became a center of solidarity, mutual responsibility and an unwavering demand: bring them all home.”
“This square will remain a testament to the families, to their struggle and to the commitment never to give up on anyone. We will not allow this story to be forgotten.”
The square may now be permanent, but Google has yet to get the memo: as of Thursday, its Maps listing marked Hostages Square as “permanently closed.”
Geller said the square remains a difficult place to visit.
“I struggle to return there – even when I’m just going to the art museum – because it always brings up the emotion that was held there,” she said. “For me, it will always be Hostages Square.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post ‘History cannot be erased’: ‘Hostages Square’ in Tel Aviv is formalized in official name change appeared first on The Forward.
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War and uncertainty drives Israelis seeking quiet abroad
(JTA) — When Iris Meiri-Snir moved from Israel to northern Italy last month, she gave up a job she loved, proximity to her children and grandchildren, and the social and professional ties she had built over a lifetime.
She and her husband, Hagai Agmon-Snir, left for their home in Mevaseret Zion, an explicitly ideological choice that places them among a growing number of Israelis building their lives elsewhere.
Meiri-Snir was vice principal at a leading Jerusalem high school, while Agmon-Snir, a neuroscientist, spent decades working on coexistence initiatives involving Palestinians, Haredim, LGBTQ Israelis and other communities. As the country pushed right-ward, they found themselves increasingly on the fringe.
“Leaving is our way of expressing our opposition,” he said, adding that he would encourage others who felt the same way to do likewise.
For years, the couple belonged to the optimistic camp that believed Israeli society could still return to the liberal values they upheld. By the time they decided to move to Arona, a town on Lake Maggiore in northern Italy, that conviction had disappeared. Despite their comfortable lives in Israel, they no longer felt they could justify staying.
They have been public about their journey out of their homeland, speaking with JTA and Israel’s Channel 11. “If I ignore all the political and social crap happening around me, what do I have to complain about here?” he told the Kan public broadcaster in an interview filmed before the couple left Israel. “We’ve got it pretty good.”
“But it’s no longer possible to be part of what’s happening here,” he added, arguing that a “fascist current” in Israel had moved into the mainstream.
The Snirs are not alone. A Tel Aviv University study showed that Israeli immigration has remained at record levels, with an estimated 40,000 and 50,000 citizens exiting for at least a year in each of the past three years, a record run of emigration that began amid the political upheaval of 2023. Itcontinued through the wars that followed the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack that year.
The authors of the study said the current numbers do not yet pose a significant economic or security risk, but warned that could change if emigration continues to rise. They pointed to what they called a “dangerous” increase in the so-called brain drain, or the departure of highly educated, high-earning Israelis. A separate Israel Tax Authority study found that emigrants’ incomes before leaving were about 50% higher than the national average, with doctors and engineers disproportionately represented.
The movement, however, is not all in one direction. More than 22,500 new immigrants arrived in Israel in 2025, including about 8,500 from Western countries such as the United States, France, Britain and Canada. Overall aliyah fell by about a third, largely because of a steep decline in arrivals from Russia, but immigration from several Western countries rose: French aliyah more than tripled between 2023 and 2025, while North American immigration also increased.
For some of those newcomers, the same wars and upheaval that have helped drive Israelis abroad have instead strengthened their desire to live in Israel, where they seek solidarity with a people under siege. More than 2,300 North American Jews were planning to move to Israel this summer, about 15% more than in recent years, according to Nefesh B’Nefesh, which facilitates aliyah.
Across social media, dozens of groups cater to Israelis considering emigration, a move known as yerida — the inverse of aliyah — though native-born Israelis more commonly use the English loanword “relocation.” In one English-speaking Facebook group, members cited security fears, repeated wars, financial instability, the high cost of living and dissatisfaction with the education system.
For new arrivals to Israel some of the pressures are particular to life as an immigrant. People in the group described struggling with the language, the absence of family nearby and, particularly among Europeans, frustration with a welfare system they felt offered far less help than their native countries during illness, unemployment or other crises.
One woman posting said she had become disillusioned with the aliyah dream she felt had been sold to her by the Zionist Federation, but later softened that criticism, telling JTA in a private message that the organization had done “so much good” for her family and that she had written the post while angry about the war.
Ishai, originally from San Francisco and now exploring a move to Prague, said the cost of living and “endless and pointless wars” were part of why he wanted to leave. His disillusionment with Israel’s treatment of Palestinians began during his military service in the West Bank and intensified after Oct. 7. Like Agmon-Snir, he used the word “fascist” to describe what he sees taking hold in Israeli society. Most Israelis, he said, have “zero ambition for a better place in any meaningful way.”
“They either worship Bibi or think he’s the source of all the problems,” he said, referring to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by his nickname.
With elections approaching, Ishai, who asked to be identified only by his first name because “this kind of talk could get me killed or at least fired,” said he saw little prospect of change at the ballot box.
“They all proclaim the exact same policies,” he said. Yair Golan, the former deputy IDF chief who leads the left-wing Democrats party, was the only major politician saying anything “even remotely towards peace,” Ishai said, though in his view Golan still advocated ruling Palestinians “with an iron fist.”
Anna Lukatsky, a Jaffa-based stylist and content creator, is moving to the Greek island of Paros for seven months after the High Holidays. The political climate played a role in the decision, she said, but was far from the determining factor, and she deliberately chooses not to dwell on it. “I have nothing to say politically beyond what has already been said.”
Oct. 7 did, however, reinforce a feeling that she should stop putting off the life she wanted. “There is never a good time to fulfill a dream. When things are good, it’s not a good time, and when things are bad, you can’t,” she said. “Anything can happen. Now is the time to live.”
She is going with her two daughters, 15 and 16, and their father — her longtime partner — whom she married only two weeks ago in an online Utah ceremony, mainly to help secure a European visa. Practical questions such as schooling and what comes next do not appear to trouble her much. Her daughters, both musicians, are not enrolled in school in Greece but will continue music lessons over Zoom. She seemed equally unfazed by what would happen to the belongings they leave behind.
“Who cares about a sofa or a plate when I’m moving to Paros?”
Beyond Paros, she has no fixed plans for what the family will do next — and where — only “plenty of dreams still to fulfill.”
While Israeli communities have formed in other Greek destinations such as Thessaloniki, Lukatsky said she was not seeking one out in Paros.
“I see myself by the sea in Greece, financially secure, writing my book, with time for my family,” she said.
Several weeks after moving to Arona, Meiri-Snir said life had become “very busy,” much of it socially. She and Agmon-Snir are part of a local circle of Israelis who meet regularly for dinners and other gatherings, while also spending time with a wider group of mostly European expats who meet each week for lunch. So far, she said, they have no regrets about the move.
Meiri-Snir described the reception from locals as uniformly warm, and said the couple were already recognized at local establishments.
“We don’t hide that we’re from Israel,” she told JTA over WhatsApp. People sometimes greet them with “shalom” or tell them they hope things will be all right in Israel.
“We haven’t felt any antisemitism at all,” she said.
Meiri-Snir was careful not to generalize from their experience. “I’m not trying to erase other people’s experiences of antisemitism,” she said, adding that she expected the atmosphere could be different in larger cities such as Milan or Bologna.
“Here it’s an area of small towns and villages, and the atmosphere is different,” she said. “
People are mostly concerned with their own affairs, and the attitude toward us here has been very pleasant and positive. That might surprise Israelis.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post War and uncertainty drives Israelis seeking quiet abroad appeared first on The Forward.
