French Jews looking to make aliyah

From Religion News Service:

By any standard, David Tibi is a French success story.

The 44-year-old dentist and father of five has a thriving practice and a house in the affluent Paris suburb of Vincennes. His wife is a doctor and he is a leading member of the Jewish community and holds a senior post in its Central Consistory of Paris.

But in early July, the Tibi family will pack their bags and join the thousands of Jews now leaving France. The house has been sold. A colleague will be handling the dental practice. The family is leaving on a one-way ticket to Israel.

“If my children are to live their full Jewish identity, their future is in Israel and not in France,” Tibi said during an interview at his office in northeastern Paris, an area packed with kosher stores and restaurants. “Many Jews feel this way. There’s a massive desire to leave.”

Worldwide, immigration to Israel has stagnated and even declined. But French Jews are bucking the trend. Last year, a record 3,270 French Jews made aliyah — or immigration to Israel — a 63 percent hike from 2012. The Jewish Agency, which promotes aliyah internationally, estimates that figure could spike to 5,000 as early as this year, dramatically changing the face of Israeli immigration as well as France’s own Jewish community, the largest in Western Europe.

...[R]ising anti-Semitism may be the strongest driver, manifest not only through rhetoric but also action. In 2012, a radical Islamist gunned down four people at a Jewish school in Toulouse.

More recently, two of Tibi’s children were taunted on a tram. Tibi filled out immigration papers three weeks ago, making good on a project he had contemplated for years.

“My son is always asking me why there are police in front of his Jewish school, why we need to be searched each time we go to the synagogue,” he said. “We are raising our children to live with this fear.”

What troubles Tibi most is the lack of response on the part of the French.

“Once we had one million French on the streets against anti-Semitism. Now we have three million on Facebook and Twitter who are supporting Dieudonne,” he said, referring to a controversial French comic who is known for his anti-Jewish discourse.


...Tibi, who is president of the Paris-area Jewish community, is watching the departures and listening to the talk. “It’s a snowball effect,” he said, predicting the exodus may reach 8,000 Jews a year.

The fallout is already evident, he added. Students are leaving Jewish schools. The community is searching for new leaders and reconsidering costly construction projects.

Tibi is feeling the loss in other ways. “I was born in France. I did my studies in France. I am extremely sad to leave a country that gave me a lot,” he said. “But sometimes even when you love, you have to leave.”