G-d willing, this coming July, my wife and I (and our six oldest kids) will be able to celebrate 30 years since our Aliyah to Eretz Yisrael. The details are in my book and in this post (Tova Haaretz also see update HERE).
One feature of the story is that, before we committed, I asked advice from three Gedolim in Eretz Yisrael. One was HRHG Rav Chaim Kanievsky, ZTL, one was the Gerrer Rebbe, Shlita, and one was HRHG Rav Chaim Pinchus Sheinberg, ZTL. They all encouraged us to come. But I want to repeat the words of Rav Scheinberg, ZTL. He said (in English), “I am pro Eretz Yisrael. You can’t go wrong in Eretz Yisrael.”
We came in July 1997 and our first stop was Har Nof, Jerusalem. We’ve been here ever since. In the early stages, before we actually bought an apartment, we considered settling outside of Jerusalem. When one such option was serious enough for a decision, we went back to some of our previous Rabbinic advisors.
The first one was Rav Chaim Kanievsky. He said, “You’re not happy in Jerusalem?”. I responded that the conditions were a bit crowded for a large family. He told me that I should make peace with it. He added, “חבל לצאת מירושלים” – It would be a shame to leave Jerusalem. Rav Scheinberg agreed with that. And so, we stayed.
Thirty years of living not only in Eretz Yisrael, but in Yerushalayim, to boot. What a tremendous zechus!
Doubtless, it comes with it’s set of yisurim and challenges. I am still fighting with the municipality over my arnona bill and am currently facing hotzaah l’poel (execution of civil judgement). You can see the whole story HERE. The case is currently in District Court and we are anticipating a ruling by the end of the year. I hope to be able to give a full update (a favorable one, IYH) at that time. Yet, for the moment, my bank accounts and my Israeli credit are all frozen. It’s very hard to live this way (cash only), but at least for us, it’s the price of staying in Yerushalayim.
Needless to say, there are other olim who have paid way higher prices in terms of distress and anguish and they wouldn’t have it any other way.
So, guess what happened to me last week (I think it was the day after the US elections)?
I needed to go to the main post office on Yaffo street to pick up a package. I went over on the light rail and picked up the package and commenced walking down Yaffo to the upcoming train stop to go back home. I reached the next corner, I believe Shlomzion, and there were about four people gathered around and shmoozing. I glanced at them in passing and saw they were two couples. Of whom, one of the menfolk was none other than Jonathan Pollard in all his glory – white shirt and suspenders with his pot belly, wavy white beard and loose peyos on his bald pate crowned by his signature knit yarmulke. The real McCoy.
I have no personal connection to him but I didn’t want to just pass by without any kind of greeting. I smiled at him and said “How are you?” as if he is a fellow worshiper at my shul. He isn’t really, but he could be. He responded, “Fine, thank you.”
For some reason I had mistakenly thought that he was originally from Michigan so I made a comment about the election results there. He told me hasn’t been there and that was the end of our “meeting”. I checked up afterward to learn he is originally from Texas. Oops.
In any case, I thought it was a zechus to even just meet him and to speak two sentences to him. Aside from his being a fellow Anglo-Israeli Jew from my generation, he is a sincere Baal Teshuva. You know what Chazal tell us about where Baalei Teshuva stand. In addition, people like me consider him a hero who stood up to the US intelligence community for the sake of the Jewish nation and is still here to tell us about it.
Which brings me to the podcast that I came across just this past Sunday. The podcast is on a channel called Moral Edge and one of the moderators is a fellow names Michael Gerbitz. This episode was a one-on-one interview with Jonathan Pollard in which he finally “spills the beans”. The interview goes for almost two hours. I watched the entire interview (double-speed) and I was totally captivated.
I believe that every English-speaking Jewish person, no matter how “frum”, should watch this podcast. So I am writing this post to recommend it.
Just to summarize, although he was born in Texas to parents who were in the US for some time, many of his extended family were still living in Europe until the war. He tells about an uncle who he says was the only one from a large wealthy German Jewish family “that had enough brains to run when the Nazis took over.” This uncle made it to America and was a part of Jonathan’s upbringing.
He says about this uncle (7:40):
And he kept telling me growing up what it was like to sit on the stern of the ship with a packet of letters from his relatives, my relatives from New York. The packet had been thrown onto the ship as they departed trying to justify their reluctance to help him land. ‘You know, we're under scrutiny. You know, we don't want to be seen as, you know, wanting us in war, you know,’ whatever…But what he kept impressing on me was the need for me to be 101% loyal to the Jewish people and to the state of Israel, our true homeland. I grew up with that.
We can see where this took him to.
He goes on to describe a little bit of his career as a spy. I had always thought that he was not an official Israeli spy but rather a patriotic Jew who unilaterally volunteered to provide sensitive information to Israel. This is what Israel claimed over the first ten years after his arrest. But it seems that he, and his first wife, were actual paid spies of Israel. He said that he fully knew the risks and dangers and, when the ax dropped, he was not the least surprised. He was however, taken aback at how little aid he received from the state of Israel and from Bibi.
He discusses his arrest and ordeals of 30 years in the federal prison system. He talks about the askanim who fought for him, primarily HRHG Rav Mordechai Eliyahu, ZTL, Rabbi Pesach Lerner, and, most importantly, his second wife, Esther, A”H. He says he would not have survived it if not for her and that he was madly in love with her and remains so about four years after her death from the “machalah”.
Even though he endured 30 years of absolute Gehinnom, it brought him many gifts. It gave him a clarity of our situation in the world, it gave him a true connection to HKBH and it gave him his connection to his second wife who he was deeply in love with. None of this would have happened if he hadn’t been caught and mistreated.
But the amazing thing that everybody needs to hear are the closing three minutes. Here is what he says (1:49:29):
Michael Gerbitz:
[We] Only got through maybe 20% of the things that we wanted to cover, but I do have one final question. Um, and that is this. There are young, proud Jews watching who love Israel and want to help the Jewish people. What should their mission be?
Jonathan Pollard:
They have only one mission, and that's to have faith in God and come home. They're the same. G-d gave us this land, if need be, to fight for. You have to listen to Him. When God said to Avraham Avinu "Lech Lecha". Go home basically. Right now they have to listen to this admonition by God to Avraham to go home.
The galut, the diaspora, the exile is now ending. This version of it is ending. Don't wait till you're going to experience what our European brothers and sisters are experiencing now. Hashem has pulled the curtain back for you to understand what your future is going to be in uh the American diaspora and He's had you have the honor and privilege to come back to your homeland. Yes. And I will use that word, your homeland. It's the only homeland a Jew has.
Let me just leave you with an incident that happened with Esther.
When she was on her way out, I was invited up to Ramat HaGolan to see a sensitive facility there and she insisted on coming with me and I didn't know why. I had to basically carry her up there and she told me to walk, carry her up to the top of a hill.
We're right on the border of Syria and Lebanon. And uh the soldiers came up with this, you know, they're they don't want to lose me in this case.
So uh I put her down and she said looking north to Lebanon and Syria, but mostly Lebanon. She said, "What do you see?" I said, "Hezbollah." And she said, "Okay, look further. Look with your heart and look with your nephesh. Look with your soul as far as you can see. What do you see? I said, “More Hezbollah.” and she said, "No, what you see is Eretz HaZvi. And I won't have the opportunity to see that. But you and many people here now with us will have the zechut to see that happen.”
Well, if you want to see that happen, you better come home now. Standing up, [laughter] not rolling back, but standing up so you can see the might and power and glory of God.
Wow. Everybody needs to hear this.
Hence, I am providing a link to the interview and am embedding it into this post (may not be visible in the email version). Here it is:
‘I Survived 30 Years in Hell’ - Former Israeli Spy Jonathan Pollard BREAKS SILENCE
ויאמר העם אל שאול היונתן ימות אשר עשה הישועה הגדולה הזאת בישראל חלילה חי ה' אם יפל משערת ראשו ארצה כי עם אלקים עשה היום הזה ויפדו העם את יונתן ולא מת.
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