The Islamic terrorist attack at Bondi Beach is a stark reminder that there is zero difference between anti-Zionism and antisemitism.
The horrific shooting attack on the Chanukah party has generated a variety of responses and recommendations, from tolerance education and self-defense to increasing synagogue attendance as a show of defiance by holding larger public Chanukah celebrations.
Remarkably, however, one of the most obvious possible responses to antisemitic violence has been almost completely absent from the post-shooting dialogue: aliyah.
Immigration by Jews to Israel has never been more than a trickle. For example, from the United States, typically 2,000 to 3,500 annually, less than one-fourth of one percent of the American Jewish community, before October 7. In 2024, the United States and Canada (combined) saw 3,340 Jews make aliyah
But that’s not surprising, because there has never been an instance throughout history when there was a substantial aliyah from a Jewish community that was comfortable and prosperous, and believed that it was physically safe. It goes against human nature. People vote with their feet. When they like a place, they stay there.
Perhaps that’s part of the reason that there is so little discussion in America about aliyah. It seems so utterly unrealistic to expect many American Jews to ever take the idea seriously.
Another reason it’s not widely discussed is that the very question makes many people uncomfortable. Zionists tell themselves that they are needed here in order to promote Israel’s cause. Many Orthodox Jews may tell themselves that while living in Israel is Jewishly desirable, it is justified to remain in the United States in order to earn a living. And while those reasons may be valid on some level, they are nonetheless unsettling.
And yet there is now another dimension to this issue that simply cannot be avoided.
Even before October 7, pundits, community leaders, and organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League have been reporting that antisemitism has been increasing very significantly. They all vehemently agree that it is reaching crisis proportions. The more dramatic among these commentators have begun warning that “it” could happen in America after all.
Well, if that is the case—and if the terrorist shooting attack on Bondi Beach illustrates—then shouldn’t we at least be talking about the option that Jews in imminent danger have always considered and often undertaken: emigration to Israel?
Have American Jews forgotten about the deadly shooting attacks on the synagogues in Pittsburgh and Poway, California?
During the 1930s, as the dark storm clouds gathered on the Jewish horizon, the legendary Zionist leader Ze’ev Jabotinsky (1880-1940) crisscrossed Eastern Europe, pleading with the Jewish masses, “Liquidate the Exile before it liquidates you.”
The Jews of Germany and Poland tried to get to Eretz Yisrael on the eve of the Holocaust, but the British government — first under Neville Chamberlain’s leadership and later under Winston Churchill — enforced the infamous White Paper of 1939 that tragically kept them out.
America, as we head into 2026, is not comparable to Germany in 1939. Terrorists attacking a Chanukah event in Australia is not the same as an entire government—in fact, virtually an entire nation—waging a deadly war of extermination against Jews. No one is proposing that the American Jews should be selling their houses and buying plane tickets this week.
What I am saying is that we should at least be talking about aliyah. We should be discussing the positive reasons for moving to Israel. We should be frank about the reasons we give our children for why we love Israel but live here. We should have a serious discussion about what traditional Jewish sources have to say about the subject. We should consider the implications of Bondi Beach, the Tree of Life, and Poway. It’s time for aliyah to be a real part of the conversation.
Moshe Phillips is the national chairman of Americans For A Safe Israel (www.AFSI.org), a leading pro-Israel advocacy and education organization.
The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Israel365.
