In the heart of secular Tel Aviv, something has shifted. On Thursday nights—traditionally the busiest night out for Israeli youth before the Friday Sabbath—synagogues are now packed with teenagers, their phones put away, prayer books open. High school students are voluntarily rising before dawn during the school week to attend early morning prayers. Young soldiers returning from Gaza are making Kiddush on Friday nights for the first time in their lives. And across Israel’s most cosmopolitan city, a question is emerging from an entire generation: If I was willing to die for the Jewish people, shouldn’t I also live for them?
The transformation became undeniable last September, just before the Jewish New Year, when Tel Aviv cultural researcher Sigalit Banai appeared on national television to describe a phenomenon that left her both puzzled and moved. Her 16-year-old daughter, a public high school art student from the core of secular Tel Aviv, had begun attending nightly Selichot prayers—special penitential services held in the weeks leading up to the High Holidays.
“She told me, ‘Mom, we’re a generation of thirsty souls,'” Banai recalled during the interview. The phrase came from a popular Israeli song that captures something her generation never experienced: young Israelis embracing Jewish practice in unconventional, personal ways—attending synagogue one day, living secular the next, picking and choosing traditions without formal religious commitment.
When Banai joined her daughter at their neighborhood synagogue one Thursday night, she found the building filled with 15- and 16-year-olds singing with unmistakable devotion. In the women’s section, girls she had known since childhood sat with books open, phones silent, following every word of the service without distraction or conversation. “This isn’t teshuvah in the way we knew it from our generation,” Banai said, using the Hebrew word for repentance or return to Judaism. “It’s something new—something I don’t yet fully understand.”
Rabbi Asaf Tabatznik understands it. As rabbi of Rosh Yehudi, a Tel Aviv outreach center founded 25 years ago to serve young Jewish professionals exploring deeper Jewish identity, he has witnessed the shift firsthand. “Over the past two years we’ve seen a major change,” he said. “There’s a new kind of spiritual awakening, completely different from what we used to see. People are coming back from the war in Gaza as different people than when they went in.”
The numbers tell part of the story. Israel’s enlistment rates during the war reached extraordinary levels as young Israelis volunteered to defend their nation. But Rabbi Asaf sees a deeper narrative in what happened when those same young people returned home. “When they came back to Tel Aviv, many asked themselves, ‘I was ready to risk my life for the Jewish people—so what does that mean for me now?'” he explained. “Many had been far from Judaism for years—some traveling the world, some disconnected—but the war awakened something deep inside them, a powerful connection to the Jewish people. Now that they’re home and things have quieted down, they’re beginning a serious inner search.”
The search takes different forms. Some young men have started wearing tzitzit daily, even without a kippah, after experiencing spiritual transformation during their service in Gaza. Others have joined Rosh Yehudi’s Kabbalat Shabbat gatherings, which have grown dramatically since the war began. Still others make Kiddush on Friday nights—reciting the traditional blessing over wine to sanctify the Sabbath, a practice they once associated only with their grandparents’ generation.
“It’s clear to them at a deep level,” Rabbi Asaf said, “but they can’t yet put it into words. We’re seeing far more people joining classes, prayers, and Shabbat meals. The demand has skyrocketed.”
The movement isn’t limited to adults. Secular high school students across Tel Aviv are now putting on tefillin, attending youth programs at synagogues and yeshivas, and filling Selichot services. Rabbi Asaf meets young people regularly who tell him openly that the war led them to seek God. “Each one finds their own way—one keeps Shabbat at home, another turns off their phone for 24 hours, another starts praying once a week. Everyone’s moving upward in some way.”
The spiritual energy reached its peak this past Yom Kippur when 1,500 people joined Rosh Yehudi’s prayers in Tel Aviv’s Meir Park. “The crowd was enormous,” Rabbi Asaf recalled. “Many said they could feel it—that when we were divided, war broke out, and now that we’ve returned to prayer, the hostages are returning.”
That intuition—that national unity and spiritual return are connected to national redemption—has become a recurring theme in Tel Aviv’s transformation. It reflects an ancient Jewish understanding that the fate of the Jewish people depends not only on military strength but on spiritual unity.
Rosh Yehudi, founded by Yisrael and Moriah Zeira, has been preparing for this moment for a quarter century. The organization offers lectures, classes, workshops, and one-on-one learning opportunities focusing on Jewish thought, the teachings of Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, spiritual growth, and Zionism. Operating in an urban, often secular environment, Rosh Yehudi has built a reputation as a warm, family-like community where questioning is welcomed and Jewish renewal is encouraged.
Now the organization is expanding to meet surging demand. “Almost everyone I meet says they started their spiritual journey online—watching Torah lessons on YouTube—but eventually realized they needed real people to learn with,” Rabbi Asaf explained. The organization is opening new training programs across Israel to prepare more teachers and mentors who can meet this growing hunger for authentic Jewish learning.
Rabbi Asaf sees the expansion as responding to a fundamental human need that technology alone cannot satisfy. “People are embarrassed to ask, and we’re embarrassed to offer. That’s a shame,” he said. “Abraham our father went door to door, inviting people in to eat and bless God. We’re his descendants—we’re meant to carry on his mission. Not to wait for people to come to us, but to go out to them. They’re yearning, just hesitant.”
For now, Tel Aviv’s transformation continues. In the city long known as Israel’s secular cultural capital, teenagers rise early for prayers, soldiers search for meaning beyond military service, and young professionals discover traditions their parents abandoned. The phenomenon defies easy categorization. It’s not the teshuvah movement of previous generations, with its clear boundaries and conventional patterns. Instead, it’s something organic, diverse, and deeply rooted in the trauma and unity of war.
“Tel Aviv, the first Hebrew city, is undergoing an unprecedented spiritual transformation,” Rabbi Asaf said. Whether this moment represents a temporary response to crisis or a lasting shift in Israeli society remains to be seen. But for thousands of young Israelis, the question has already been answered: A generation that fought for the survival of the Jewish people has decided it’s also time to live for it.
This article is based in part on an essay by Yosef Arinfeld, “Not the Same Tel Aviv Anymore,” Olam Katan, Vayera 5786, #1020 (Hebrew).
