War in Gaza Leads to Emigration of Some Israelis: NPR

Shlomy Green, 37, and his wife Inbal Green, 40, pack up their home in Rishon Letsiyon, Israel, on July 11. The couple decided to leave Israel and move to Thailand with their 4-year-old daughter Riley.

Maya Levin for NPR

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Maya Levin for NPR

TEL AVIV, Israel — Piles of clothes, books and children’s toys took over the Green household this summer when Inbal Green, 40, and her husband Shlomy Green, 37, packed up their lives. Along with their dog, cat and 4-year-old daughter Riley, the Israeli couple left life in the suburbs outside Tel Aviv for Thailand. Since the war in Gaza began last October, they’ve felt too unsafe to stay.

Shlomy opened a kitchen cupboard filled to the brim with piles of canned food, cereal, and tea bags.

“Now we have to search the whole house and just decide what we want to take,” he said. “That’s why the house is a complete mess.”

The Greens, born and raised in Israel, are among a growing number of Jewish Israelis seeking work abroad who have left since October 7 last year. Israeli media reported figures from Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics showing a spike in the number of Israelis – more than 12,000 – who left the country in October last year and had not returned by June.

The war in Gaza, which has killed more than 41,000 Palestinians according to health officials, was sparked when Hamas-led militants attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 250 hostage.

The Green family packs up their home on July 11.

Maya Levin for NPR

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The vast majority of Jewish Israelis support the defeat of Hamas as essential to the country’s future security. But the toll of this war — on both Israelis and Palestinians — is also driving some Jewish Israelis to leave the country. Some, like the Greens, say they are leaving for good.

The Greens said that given the volatile political and security situation in their country, they had previously toyed with the idea of ​​leaving. But after the Hamas-led attack last October, they simply did not feel safe in Israel, Shlomy said. They believed the Israeli government was not doing — or would not do — enough to protect them from future attacks.

“The point is, we want to feel safe and secure in our home,” he said. “And we’re not willing to compromise on that.”

A temporary departure is followed by a decision to leave permanently

The Greens said they were woken up in the early morning of October 7 by air raid sirens warning residents of incoming rockets from Hamas or Hezbollah. Most homes in Israel have a safe room where people can hide when the sirens go off.

All three ran to their safe room and there they began receiving text messages from family and friends with news of the Hamas-led attacks in the south.

Inbal said they were beginning to worry that the attacks would spread further into Israel. Tel Aviv is only about 40 miles from the Gaza Strip. So they packed up some essentials and headed to the airport, where they boarded one of the last flights to Cyprus at noon that day.

“We felt like we were on the run,” Shlomy said. “We were just grateful that we left on time.”

The view from the Greens’ balcony in Rishon Letsiyon, Israel.

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The Greens spent two months abroad, but had to return to Israel for practical reasons: their Israeli health insurance stopped paying their medical bills because they were abroad, Shlomy broke his leg and his employer wanted him back to Israel.

But by then, Inbal said, leaving Israel for good had become their shared goal. Shlomy, a software developer, applied for jobs around the world and got one in Thailand. He said they had done their research and figured they could live comfortably there.

“There are very low or non-existent anti-Semitism rates there at the moment,” he explained. “Almost no pro-Palestinian protests, life is peaceful there, and that is what we were looking for.”

Shlomy said he used to believe that peace with the Palestinians was possible, but after the Hamas attack he is no longer so sure.

Israeli immigration lawyer sees spike in work visa, relocation cases

Labor and corporate immigration attorney Liam Schwartz works at one of Israel’s largest law firms. From a conference room in his office, you have a beautiful view of Tel Aviv, the sea on one side, skyscrapers on the other.

Schwartz helps Israeli companies relocate their employees to parent companies in the U.S. and works with families who want to move there. He normally sees hundreds of cases a year, but said his workload has increased by at least 40 percent in recent months. What makes this year unique is Oct. 7, he said.

“I’ve never been busier in my career,” Shwartz said. “This is beyond all expectations.”

Liam Schwartz, a relocation attorney, says he’s busier than ever this year.

Maya Levin for NPR

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Schwartz said Israeli companies are concerned about the possibility of an all-out war in northern Israel with Hezbollah. The two sides have been trading fire across the Israel-Lebanon border since the Gaza conflict began, causing companies, especially those in high tech, to relocate entire teams to the United States.

He also sees Israeli workers pressuring their companies to sponsor them for U.S. work visas. Many of these workers simply no longer feel safe or comfortable in Israel, he said.

“Companies don’t want to lose talent, so a lot of them just say yes,” Schwartz said.

Schwartz acknowledged that these are privileged Israelis. Many others do not have the luxury of applying for a work visa or even a regular visa because they are unskilled or lack the resources. “For the woman who sweeps the floor where I work, there is basically nothing,” he said, because she is unskilled and her employer would most likely not sponsor her.

“As if I were a stranger in my own country”

Some Israelis say they want to leave because they are disappointed with their government’s handling of the war in Gaza. The families of the hostages taken from Israel on Oct. 7 are protesting, along with thousands of other Israelis, to pressure Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept the peace deal that President Biden presented in May.

During a weekly anti-government protest in Tel Aviv in May, Hadar Behrendt held a sign reading “Nine months already,” referring to the length of the war in Gaza at the time and the fact that there were still hostages.

She said she doesn’t want to be ashamed of what Israel has become. She’d rather go somewhere else.

“It’s like I’m a stranger in my own country,” Behrendt said. “We’re being kidnapped by this government.”

Behrendt, who said her family fled Germany in 1936, said she will use her German passport to move to Greece with her husband.

“It’s very difficult for us,” she said. “Our whole family is here, but I can’t be a part of it.”

Inbal Green, who packed her bags before her own family left, said she grew up in a Zionist family, believing she had a duty to protect and serve Israel. She served as a reservist for 14 years, volunteering with the Israel Police and the Israeli National Emergency Medical Service.

“And then it’s October 7th again, and I still have to pack my things,” she said.

The Green family’s belongings are sorted in preparation for their move from Israel to Thailand on July 11.

Maya Levin for NPR

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Her grandmother survived the Holocaust and settled in Israel, she said. But she doesn’t want what she calls the instability and chaos of today’s Israel to become her daughter’s responsibility.

“The country is suffering from PTSD. I don’t want her to have to carry that on her small shoulders,” Inbal said.

She admitted that she is also tired of bearing the burden of uncertainty and insecurity about the future in her own country.

“I don’t want to carry that anymore,” she said. “I think it’s okay to say … I want to breathe.”

Inbal insisted that she was certain she never wanted to return to live in Israel. There was only one thing that would bring her back: if her daughter chose to serve in the Israeli army.

“I still think it’s important,” Inbal said of Israel’s mandatory military service. “It’s a character builder.”

Itay Stern reported from Tel Aviv.