A better approach to aliyah

Daniel Tauber's heart is in the right place. His opinion piece "Keep aliyah on the agenda" (Haaretz English Edition, January 13) reveals a deep commitment to the cardinal value of aliyah. Unfortunately, Tauber channeled this well-meaning concern into a diatribe against the Jewish Agency, suggesting we have betrayed Zionism and our own "primary and historical purpose" of fostering aliyah.

Tauber's case is simple: With the Agency's announcement last year of a bold new plan to connect young Jews to Israel and to one another, it has allegedly "redefined its mission" away from aliyah. The only problem with this diagnosis is that the facts point in the exact opposite direction.

For one thing, aliyah from the United States, whose Jewish community makes up perhaps 75 percent of the Diaspora, remains very low. Of an estimated 5.5 million American Jews, just 3,800, or less than one-tenth of 1 percent, made aliyah last year. While I'm happy to report a double-digit rise in aliyah globally during the past two years, even this rise doesn't change the overwhelming fact that Western, largely English-speaking Jews are not moving to Israel in significant numbers.

This key fact is integral to the Jewish Agency's strategic reorientation, initiated by its chairman, Natan Sharansky. This new plan comes from the realization that while a robust absorption basket is crucial for the success of those who have already chosen to make the move to Israel, it is not raising the numbers of those making that choice. That's why we have worked with the government in recent years to increase its share, and decrease ours, in the funding of long-term absorption programs for new immigrants. This is enabling us to focus on a new mission: bringing ever-larger circles of young Jews to visit and experience Israel.

This should not be understood as abandoning aliyah. Rather, we will encourage aliyah in ways that are far more relevant and effective for today's generation.

It seems that even Daniel Tauber unintentionally acknowledges that we may be succeeding. He suggests, "There are also thousands of American Jews coming to Israel for an entire year after high school, studying in yeshivas (among many other programs for post-high school and post-college students ), where many of them receive a steady dose of Zionism." He just neglects to mention that those year-long programs are all part of the Agency's own MASA project, where Zionism is part of the core curriculum. It is more than amusing that Tauber cites the significant increase in aliyah among graduates of MASA as a way to buttress his argument.

But let's not stop at circumstantial evidence when the hard evidence is also on our side. All major studies on this issue have shown that experiencing Israel makes one far more likely to make aliyah. Perhaps that's why MASA is one of the very few - and certainly the largest - of Jewish-identity programs that can boast a 20 percent rate of aliyah among its alumni.

I should note that one of the most gratifying aspects of our work is the discovery through empirical research that these same Israel programs are forging a cadre of tens of thousands of young Jews who return home to become leaders in their communities around the world. A recent major study led by Prof. Jack Wertheimer and sponsored by the Avi Chai Foundation ("Generation of Change: How Leaders in their Twenties and Thirties are Reshaping American Jewish Life" ) found that 56 percent of Jewish leaders under 40 have been to Israel on long-term programs, more than double the rate for Jewish leaders over 40. This suggests that, thanks to MASA, Israel is becoming an ever more significant part of the young Jewish leader's experience, identity and worldview. Tomorrow's Jewish leaders will be even more connected and knowledgeable about both Israel and their Jewish heritage as a result.

That's why instead of just talking about the challenges of low aliyah numbers, growing assimilation and "distancing," we have been investing massively in providing responses. In 2011, we brought 10,500 young Jews to Israel for 10-month MASA programs (that's more than 10 percent of the number of children born in the Diaspora in the same year ), invested in Taglit-Birthright Israel, and sent hundreds of young shlihim (emissaries ) to communities all over the world. We oversaw an increase in aliyah (in Jewish calendar year 5771 ) of 19 percent over the previous year, including thousands of young professionals and families from throughout the Jewish world and from every Jewish denomination.

The Jewish Agency's new directions provide concrete answers to some of the Jewish people's seminal challenges, positively affecting Jewish identity, attachment to Israel and aliyah, and even a cursory look at the numbers seems to bear this out. We believe it is long past time to move beyond empty sloganeering and focus on the hard work of bringing Jews closer to Israel by, simply enough, bringing them to Israel.

Alan Hoffmann is director-general of the Jewish Agency for Israel. He is the first immigrant to hold the position and has been an advocate of aliyah and Zionist education for over 40 years.