The Blogs: A New Level of Becoming Israeli

Becoming Israeli is the greatest thing I’ve ever done – I literally wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.

Shortly after my wife and I made aliyah in 2004 I started blogging about our experience of radically changing our lives and moving across the world to the world’s one Jewish state. I wrote about the almost daily only-in-Israel moments, the funny mistakes I made in Hebrew and the pride I felt hearing our kids speak Hebrew with a Hebrew accent.

I eventually published a book, “Becoming Israeli”, sharing my stories and those of other olim that together give an inside look at the inspiring, emotional, funny and challenging aspects of making aliyah and acclimating to life in Israel.

But this week, 23 years into my aliyah, a whole new chapter of being Israeli started.

Our oldest son enlisted in the IDF as a combat soldier.

In the days leading up to this moment and in the days since, I have felt feelings I’ve never experienced before – a unique combination of great difficulty and incredible pride.

Knowing most Israeli parents experience this exact same thing doesn’t help.

Seeing my own nieces and nephews go in doesn’t help.

Watching dozens of kids in our community grow older and eventually enlist doesn’t help.

The experience of dropping our son off at Tel HaShomer, watch him walk through the gates and disappear into the crowd and then walk away, drive home and know that he’s now a soldier in the army of the State of Israel – there’s nothing that could have prepared me for this moment.

When I was his age, my parents also dropped me off somewhere new and unfamiliar – college. They helped me make my bed with my new sheets and matching comforter. They helped me organize my CDs on the shelf and hang my posters on the wall. Then they took me out to a nice lunch before saying goodbye and leaving me to start a year of academic exploration together with lots of partying.

My son’s experience, obviously, will be very different.

He worked insanely hard to get into the unit he got into and now he’s going to be working even harder to train to become a fighter of Israel – a fighter for Israel.

I know that we’re gonna have to get used to, like all parents of soldiers, seeing him when the army lets, speaking to him when the army allows and not really knowing what he’s doing and what he’s going through in the hours and hours between our brief communications.

And as hard as it already is, and as hard as I know it will be, I am tremendously, tremendously proud of our son who, on my side of the family, is the first one in 2000 years to be a Jewish fighter defending the Jewish people in the Jewish homeland.

Not by chance, this week’s Torah portion opens with the words, “When you go out to war against your enemy…”

And in last week’s Torah portion we learned that before going to war we offer peace. And if our enemies don’t want peace, if they choose war, we’ll fight with all of our hearts, souls and strength – like Israel has done since it’s creation, never having chosen war, always preferring peace, but ready and willing to fight our enemies who constantly choose war.

My son prayed like crazy the night before he went in that the Moshiach (Messiah) would come right now and there would be no more need for armies and wars.

But until that day comes, I know that he and all the other soldiers of the IDF will invest their everything into their training and into their defending of our people, our land, our place, our heritage and our future.

It was so hard to drop our son off at the enlistment center. Watching him walk in, I just stood there and cried. And I’ve cried many times since.

And at the same time I am so humbled and inspired by his passion, commitment and desire to do all he can to help his people and his nation.

This is an entirely new experience of making aliyah and a new level of becoming Israeli.

Blessings to all those going into the army this summer, those in the army already and the loving families supporting them all along the way.

May God protect all of the soldiers of the IDF.

Amen.