Matthew Bronfman: Am I an Israeli?

Matthew Bronfman proposed on Wednesday at the Presidential Conference to update the concept of aliyah - immigrating to Israel. "It used to mean that people picked up their families and relocated to Israel," said the New York businessman who holds controlling shares of Israel Discount Bank, the Israeli Ikea franchise and the Supersol supermarket chain.

"I would like to broaden the definition of aliyah to spiritual, emotional and economical aliyah. For better or worse, I'm probably the largest Israeli taxpayer in the room... The vast majority of my personal wealth is invested here in Israel. I'm here about eight times a year. My children have all visited Israel on numerous occasions... Does that make me an Israeli? Does that mean I've made aliyah or I haven't made aliyah?"

He concluded his talk by saying that trying to get Jews to move to Israel was the wrong approach. "We have to ask ourselves how we get Jews to visit Israel, and the rest will follow."