Climbing Jacob’s Ladder of Success in Israel

For the first time since King Solomon was leader of Israel, the very reason a Jew has to live in exile is exactly the reason why he should live here.

My Only in Israel Moment

It’s Rosh HaShana. Time for an accounting.

I spent the last year working on an online project of my own while freelancing to make ends meet. Today, I am working for an amazing hi-tech company in Israel doing all it can to let the English-speaking world know how amazing the people I work for are, and what a disruptive piece of innovation they have unleashed on the world.

Five years ago, I was broke. I had skills that could get me something in New York, where I moved from, but did nothing for me in Israel. In desperation, I did what a Jew does when he sees nothing but an endless abyss beneath his feet.

I prayed.

In the deepest, most powerful moment of a heartfelt prayer, Hashem put an idea in my head. It wasn’t anything I could conjure up on my own, and certainly not something I would be thinking of while begging the King of the Universe to feed my family. Hashem answered my prayers. His message was simple:

Learn HTML.

Just like a line of Talmud, the face value only serves to guide you to the real answers. HTML was a start, but you have to know CSS to make a decent website. Then you need to know SEO so people can find you, and how to develop stellar content so people will stay on your site. From there you need a good social media strategy, a buyer journey, email marketing, and of course, some JavaScript and back end programming so you can receive information from your users, and accept their money in return for giving them something of greater value.

After learning all of this, I became addicted.

Hashem took me out of the abyss not with miracles, but by teaching me that anyone can live a full and satisfying life in Israel. I can learn Torah and pray three times every day, guard the Shabbat and Holy Days, keep Kosher, make lots of amazing friends, go hiking, camping, have a barbeque in every park throughout the country, and have an amazing career and a budding side business that can, G-d Willing, turn my rent contract into a full fledged mortgage.

If You Can Make It Here. . . Why Go Anywhere Else?

That’s everything I dreamed of having when I was in America. Now it’s within reach in Israel. Everything I have ever wanted in life is for the taking here, and it’s of better quality.

• Israel has the 9th longest life expectancy in the world, but that takes into consideration both Jewish and Arab Israelis. When you factor out the Arab population, the average life span for a Jew living in Israel is the longest on earth.
• Israel spends more money in education than almost every other country.
• Israel has the 9th best health care system in the world.
• Our economy has been experiencing above average growth for the past 20 years. Hi-tech is still in its infancy — AI (artificial intelligence), IoT (the Internet of Things), and mobile are going to make PCs and the desktop internet look like Lego’s — our biggest levels of growth are yet to come.

• We have discovered huge oil and gas reserves that are estimated to bring in $50 billion to government coffers over the next 20 years. Those estimates keep going up, and it is believed that we have more oil than Saudi Arabia deep inside the rocks of the Negev, we just need to advance the technology that extracts it to a cost-effective level. No need to worry. 30 years ago, it cost $100,000 to store a gigabyte of data. Today is cost $.10.

What happens when our hi-tech and oil industries propel us to a trillion-dollar economy? Or Multi-trillion?

Saudi Arabian citizens pay no taxes, no education costs, and have free health care. This is based on the paltry piece of oil revenue the monarchy lets drip down to their citizens. We know for sure that the government of Israel will give a much higher proportion of income to the people.

Already, the government has opened a bank account for every Israeli child. They put in money every month until they turn 18 or 21, then they get it all. College tuition for people completing their army and national service is becoming so heavily subsidized by the State, tuition is virtually free.

My Goal is to Prove it to You

For the first time since King Solomon, all the reasons we choose exile over Israel are now the exact reasons we should return home.

That’s my goal: To amass more assets in Israel than I ever had in America. To prove that success is possible for both newcomers and natives, and the ladder of success scales higher in the Land of Life.

David Ben Horin writes for the website 1,001 Reasons to Love Israel. I developed www.abetterlifeinisrael.com, a 5-hour, 20-video series on how to have successful career and enjoy a happy life in Israel. It’s available for $99.