To Israelis Who Left: On October 27, Israel Needs You Back

A bit more than a year ago, I was ready to leave Israel. My son was registered into a French gan. My winter clothes had been shipped to France. My Israeli husband got his year-long visa. It was a done deal.

And yet today,  I am still here. In Israel. 

Why did I want to leave? Like many of my friends and colleagues – and more than 124,000 Israelis – who have left since January 2023, I had this suffocating sense of watching, powerless, the country I love slip away from everything I had spent my life working for. 

Yet, about two weeks before the move, I found myself unable to leave. I realized I had been wrong about one thing: I was not powerless.

I am extremely lucky to be surrounded – professionally and personally – by changemakers and doers. By people who believe a different reality is possible and work incredibly hard to build it: social entrepreneurs, scientists, philanthropists, academics, innovators, civil-society leaders, business people.

I was convinced that, together, we could still change Israel’s course. 

So I stayed. 

Leading an advisory company specialized in humanitarian affairs and resilience, I have the privilege of working, every day, with people who turn grief, fear, and exhaustion into organizations, programs, technologies, and partnerships: 

• With an Israeli NGO that, after October 7, could have stopped at replacing destroyed tractors, but instead asked how this crisis can become the starting point for strengthening Israeli agriculture.
• With another Israeli NGO building – against extraordinary political odds – regional humanitarian partnerships to tackle humanitarian challenges across the region. 
• With an academic platform developing research partnerships across the Middle East at a moment when Israeli universities are facing profound international isolation.
• With organizations giving mental-health professionals, teachers, parents, and children practical tools to deal with the psychological consequences of prolonged crises. 
• With donors looking beyond emergency relief and asking how their giving can help build stronger societies in Israel, across the region, and beyond. 

The list is much longer.

A growing part of my work is now focused on building strategic cooperation between Israeli civil society and partners across the Middle East.

And what I see gives me hope.  

Across borders, despite everything that has happened, there remains an appetite for meaningful cooperation around health, food and water security, humanitarian response, research, innovation, resilience, and more.

For Israel, this matters enormously.

Because our future will also depend on whether our neighbors and our international partners see value in working with us. Whether we can again be known for what we build, discover, solve, and contribute. 

I can see an extraordinary landscape of opportunities at our doorstep.

And at the same time, I see a country holding its breath.

Partnerships are waiting. So are major philanthropic decisions, regional conversations, and projects that are ready to grow. There is an enormous amount of energy ready to be released.

But Israel is at a decisive crossroads, and what happens on October 27th will shape the country we become. 

In one way or another, Israel will change after this election. We will either begin a long and much needed process of moral, social, and physical reconstruction. Or, we will watch Israel inexorably slip into the abyss of history, as more and more of the people who have sustained its progress decide they can no longer do it here. 

Around a quarter of Jewish Israelis already say they are considering moving abroad. A majority of Israelis see the growing number of people leaving as a danger to Israel’s future. 

And that brings me to you.

The Israelis who already left.

On October 27, many of you will have work. Children. School. Meetings. Flights that are expensive and inconvenient. A whole life.

I get it.

But even if your life is now somewhere else, Israel is still part of it. 

It is in the Hebrew your children understand. It is in the family WhatsApp group you still check. It is in the news you still open first thing in the morning. It is in the anger you still feel when something happens here. It is in the arguments you still have about this place.

And for many of you, it is still the place you call home even when you no longer live here.

So imagine. 

Imagine an Israel where our children would not want or be able to return to.

Imagine watching another generation of scientists, doctors, founders, academics, artists, and young families conclude that their future is somewhere else. 

Imagine the universities where you studied becoming steadily more isolated.

Imagine having invested so much in this country – having fought, demonstrated, volunteered, served, built companies, treated patients, taught students, raised families, and paid taxes – and then watching from abroad as the possibility of changing dissipates.

Imagine one day realizing that you did not just leave Israel “temporarily.” 

And now imagine something else. 

Imagine an Israel people begin returning to. An Israel where scientists want to conduct their research. Where entrepreneurs want to build. Where universities are connected to the world’s leading institutions. Where Israeli expertise contributes to solving problems beyond our borders. Where cooperation with our neighbors is built through practical relationships between doctors, researchers, humanitarian workers, entrepreneurs, businesses, and communities. Where disagreement does not require us to abandon the idea of a shared home.

I can see that Israel.

Because parts of it still exist.

I work with them every day.

But I also do not know how long we can keep fighting. How long we can continue believing that something can actually change, especially if too many of us have already disengaged. 

So this is my plea to you, Israelis abroad.

If Israel still occupies space in your heart, in your anger, in your conversations, in your fears, in your hopes, then it is still part of your life.

On October 27, Israel needs you here.