Transnational Ties During a Time Of Crisis: Israeli Emigration, 2000 To 2004

Abstract

Despite their impressive patterns of economic mobility and generally successful adaptation into Western host societies, Israeli emigrants frequently view their stay abroad through the perspective of Zionism. As such, they express ambivalence about their presence on foreign soil. They seldom describe themselves as host country nationals, commonly socialize with other Israelis, frequently describe their intentions to return home, and often do so. However, recent events may challenge this outlook. During the 1990s, Israel's significant demographic and economic growth, relatively peaceful relations with neighbouring countries and increasingly globalized economy had the effect of lessening the stigma on going abroad. Then, since the fall of 2000, Israel has been rocked by the Al Aksa Intifada, as well as a major recession. These events have made life more difficult for Israelis. Accordingly, conditions of the last several years can be seen as altering Israelis' motives for emigration and simultaneously shifting the probability of return among those already overseas. While a topic of interest in its own right, the experience of Israeli emigrants since late 2000 also offers a natural experiment for evaluating how theories about migrant transnationalism consider the consequences of specific events upon relations with citizens abroad. This paper relies on in-depth interviews and other data sources to explore Israeli emigrants' views about remaining in host societies versus returning to Israel since late 2000. In so doing, it considers how emigrants evaluate potential benefits, costs and feelings of identification associated with residence overseas versus Israel. The paper also seeks more general insights into how relations between migrants and the country of origin are altered when events affect political and economic conditions in the country of origin.

De-coupling or remaining closely coupled to ‘home’: educational strategies around identity-making and advantage of Israeli global middle-class families in London

“…4 immigration and emigration have been replaced in Israel by value laden terms having positive connotations from immigrants and negative one for emigrants" (Cohen, 1988: 909). Gold and Hart (2013) claim that Israeli migrants (the Israeli diaspora) tend to resist full integration into the host societies, viewing their stay abroad as a temporary venture due to Zionist ideology which demands that Jews should live in their historical homeland, the state of Israel. However, recent studies on Israeli emigration (Gold & Hart, 2013;Harris, 2015) have found increased migration of highly skilled and educated Israeli-born population, and argued that the rationales for migration are no longer purely financial but also display ideological motivations, specifically in relation to a disapproval of current right-wing governments' approach to managing the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and a lack of hope that it will ever be resolved.…”

Beyond Guilt and Stigma: Changing Attitudes among Israeli Migrants in Canada

“…Some point to the heavy toll that the Second Intifada, which began in 2000, had on Israeli society and the Israeli economy. In other words, they suggest that this hardship made leaving Israel more understandable, and indeed, there has been a dramatic rise in Israeli migration since the intifada began (Gold and Hart, 2009; Lustick, 2004; Statistics Canada, 2007b). The tough times of the Second Intifada, however, cannot alone explain a drop in the guilt and stigma of yerida .…”

Contextual and Family Determinants of Immigrant Women’s Self-Employment

“…To learn about the experience of Israeli immigrants, I worked in conjunction with five Hebrew-speaking women research assistants to collect several forms of data between June 1991 and July 2004 (Gold 2002; Gold and Hart 2009). A major source was 194 in-depth interviews (conducted in both Hebrew and English) with Israeli immigrants and others knowledgeable about their community in the Los Angeles area (87 women and 107 men, including both the wife and husband of twenty couples).…”

“…Such events reduced the quality of public life and made economic conditions for many worse. Finally, the Israeli government reduced various forms of social spending, improving circumstances for investors and entrepreneurs, but making services and advanced education more difficult to obtain for the less affluent (Gold and Hart 2009). Accordingly, even as Israel’s InfoTech sector blossomed, conditions for some factions of Israeli society have become austere, thus increasing the number living abroad (Cohen 2011; Gold and Hart 2009; Senor and Singer 2009).…”