אוירא דארץ ישראל Avira DEretz Yisroel

Avraham Pollack, Immanuel

Ten years ago, when I was forty-five years old, we decided we’re just going to jump in and make the move. For many years, we knew that we were headed to live in Eretz Yisroel, but for practical reasons it just hadn’t happened. If we would have continued taking into consideration every one of the practicalities, we might have ended up staying in the US indefinitely. So, with just six thousand dollars in cash and without any work planned, we packed up our house and got ready to go. We received funding to transport a container of our goods and joined a Nefesh B’Nefesh charter flight.

I was already learning half-days with chavrusos, but in the small community of Charleston, South Carolina, which we lived in at the time, there was no kollel setup for those like me who would be interested in learning with a group. We looked into other communities that had such options, but we instead decided that if we were already going to move, what we really wanted was to be in Eretz Yisroel. My wife constantly said, “For two thousand years we have davened and cried for the ability to live in Eretz Yisroel, and now we can just get on a plane, and in a few hours’ time, we’ll be there — and even the ticket is paid for….” Though our two older children were teenagers already, they had grown up with the idea that Eretz Yisroel is the place for us to be.

As part of our preparations, I did my research and found a kollel in Yerushalayim that would be suitable for me. For the first seven years in Eretz Yisroel, I was learning in kollel full-time. Half of the funds we needed for our eight-thousand-shekel monthly budget (to cover all expenses including rent for our family of five), came in the form of financial support from abroad. During this time, people were coming to me in order to help sort out their conflicts, which I would do on a volunteer basis. I had experience in the field, as I was doing negotiations for my business when we had lived in the US. My wife suggested I study to become certified and turn this hobby into a parnassah. I am now practicing as a certified mediator, mostly working in the evenings.

We first lived in Cheftsiba, a neighborhood of Modi’in Illit near Kiryat Sefer, for about nine years. Though my wife is an engineer by training, she hadn’t worked in the field for many years. Originally from Switzerland but having lived in the US, she spoke both German and English. One day she saw an advertisement in one of the local bulletins looking for a German or English speaker for a kitchen-design company. She said, if they are looking for an English or German speaker, they really want a German speaker but will take someone who speaks English. That turned out to be the case. Now, for almost eight years B”H, my wife has been running a successful kitchen design business.

About two years ago we moved to the rapidly growing community of Immanuel. Today there are over a thousand families spanning all age groups, though most of the newcomers are young couples. They include Ashkenazim, Sephardim, and Teimanim — both those who identify as mainstream Chareidi as well as some Charda”l. The Ashkenazim in Immanuel are predominantly Chassidish, but there is a small and growing Litvish kehilla as well. A sizable percentage of the residents are English speakers. There is an acceptance committee under the auspices of the community rabbonim to assure that newcomers are suitable for the community and that the community is fitting for them.

Residents place tremendous emphasis on educating their children, and there are a number of different schools. Lately, there has been talk about opening a Litvish yeshiva ketana (high school), which would take advantage of the quieter small-town setting more conducive to learning. People here are constantly working on enhancing their spiritual growth, and they value a pure and idealistic life. The community is known for its warmth, for excelling in chessed, and for emunah.

City Hall works together with rabbonim from all the kehillos. There are special activities and chugim for the benefit of the children and all residents, as well as a community library and swimming pool. There is a small shopping center and many small home-run businesses.

Housing is affordable with prices starting at about 600,000 shekels for a 2-bedroom apartment and there are many other options available including private villas. There is considerable construction underway.

A little more than an hour drive to Yerushalayim and under an hour from Bnei Brak, we have here in Immanuel a city full of fresh air and breathtaking views. There is also a walkway surrounding the entire city with a beautiful view of the surrounding mountains and the neighboring communities nestled within them, the streams, waterfalls and the wildlife.

The future is here! Come join us!

Affordable Housing—with Yerushalayim Still Within Reach

There was no way you could have convinced me that we weren’t going to live in Yerushalayim, but after we went every day for the first two weeks there to look for apartments within our budget, we realized that it would be just impossible for us.

We had heard from an acquaintance that their daughter was living in Modi’in Illit and paying only 1400 shekels a month for rent. (Now ten years later, as Modi’in Illit has developed to a full-fledged and bustling city, rent has gone up almost threefold!) We figured we could do the same, and with the money saved on rent, we could buy a car, which would get me to kollel in Yerushalayim, about a half-hour commute. Now, from Immanuel, it’s just a bit over an hour drive (if I don’t want to stay and learn in Immanuel).

P.S. More information about Immanuel is available on the website I have put together at http://emanuelcity.home.blog.

Leib K., Yerushalayim

My parents had lived in Eretz Yisroel for a short time after they got married. They bought an apartment in the Matersdorf neighborhood of Yerushalayim as they apparently intended to stay here long-term. They went back to the U.S. to be with my grandparents for Yom Tov and ended up staying in America. My mother always told me, “This was the biggest mistake that I ever made.”

I grew up in Lakewood, New Jersey. As a child, I frequently heard my mother asking my father, “Can we move to Eretz Yisroel?” My father would respond that we could only realistically make such a move after the youngest child graduates from high school to avoid chinuch issues such a move would involve.

I came to Eretz Yisroel for summer vacation after tenth grade and stayed by my married sibling who was living in Yerushalayim. I traveled around the country touring and sightseeing. This was beneficial to me when I came back a year later for yeshiva — I was not distracted from my learning unlike many others to whom the country was new and exciting.

As a bochur, I had once heard a shiur by Rav Asher Zelig Rubinstein, zatza”l, in which he mentioned a statement made by the Chofetz Chaim about Eretz Yisroel being the safest place in the world. This had a profound impact on me and is part of what made me comfortable with living here.

Several years later, when I was a chosson, a family in the Sorotzkin neighborhood hosted me for the night of Shemini Atzeres. My host asked me if I was keeping one or two days of Yom Tov. I didn’t know what to answer as I hadn’t thought about it. My host mentioned that one of the biggest poskim, HaRav Yisroel Belsky, zatza”l, was staying by one of his children just downstairs and I could ask him for a p’sak. I found him sitting and learning in the sukkah. I told him that my kallah and I were planning to start out in Eretz Yisroel, but with no commitment for the future. I also mentioned that we did indeed want to live here as long as possible. He said that if my kallah would agree to me accepting a shteller (paid rabbinic position) here in Eretz Yisroel, then I should keep one day. I had no idea and no way of finding out, as my kallah was in America and it was Yom Tov, but when I did have a chance to ask afterward, she gave a positive response.

After getting married in the U.S., we came to Eretz Yisroel a short while before Pesach. Since we had just arrived, we stayed in Eretz Yisroel for Pesach. In retrospect, I wouldn’t advise newly married couples to make their own Pesach away from family. Life continued and it began to get difficult from a financial standpoint. After Pesach, we rethought the issue of settling in Eretz Yisroel. We believed it really wasn’t financially possible for us to stay here long-term. We asked HaRav Belsky, through a cousin who was learning in Torah Vo’daas at the time, if this would mean we should revert to keeping two days of Yom Tov. He answered in the affirmative, and that’s what we did for the following Yomim Tovim.

I think it is very hard for young couples to live here if the wife does not have a job. There is also a psychological difficulty for women who can earn dollars back in the U.S. and instead work here at a job that pays that same number—only in shekels! Though the alternative of staying at home is worse because it leads to homesickness, which is a sure way to get right back on the plane. I know of someone who came here as a newlywed without his wife having a job, and to make matters worse, he stayed in yeshiva during lunch break. Although he really wanted to stay, they didn’t last here too long.

The following Pesach we went back to the U.S. for Yom Tov. After coming back to Eretz Yisroel, we realized that we were much happier being in Eretz Yisroel. We felt that the level of simplicity and ruchniyus here really suited us more. After asking another shaylah, we were back to keeping one day of Yom Tov.

We first lived in Yerushalayim’s Romeima neighborhood, but I was looking for a neighborhood where there was a shul in which the rav would give the derashos in English. We now rent in an area where there are several such shuls nearby (Ramat Eshkol, Sanhedriya and Sanhedriya Murchevet). Though financial struggles are definitely not exclusive to avreichim in Eretz Yisroel—and I don’t think that finances here must entail being somech al haness any more than in chutz la’Aretz—I feel that at least here in Eretz Yisroel we have a big consolation that while we are emptying out our pockets and paying our rent, we have the added value of paying for our fulfillment of the mitzvah of yishuv Eretz Yisroel.

When my youngest sibling graduated from high school, my father was in extremely poor health. We did our research and found that all the advanced medical equipment and services he required were also available in Eretz Yisroel. This enabled my parents to move here, and my father was zoche for the last ten months of his life to live here in Eretz Yisroel and to be buried here. Our parents’ love for Eretz Yisroel definitely made an impression on us children, and most of my siblings now live here.

Children and Eretz Yisroel

My rebbi, R’ Yosef Stern, zatza”l, once told me that if I have a choice, it is better to raise children here in Eretz Yisroel, since they will need a lot less gashmiyus compared to what is needed for an average family in chutz la’Aretz.

I once asked my mashgiach why there were certain neighborhoods with a lot of kids from an American background “off the derech.” He said that in his opinion, in many instances, it was because the parents were bashing the same local chinuch system they were sending their children to. If you’re going to move here, you have to back the system you are going to send your children to.

An acquaintance moved here with teenage children. Although they had a tough time adjusting, having mentors from Yedidim—an organization which deals with such issues—significantly eased the transition.