Former marine, future soldiers fight nerves for journey ‘home to Israel’

Leaving his home, moving over 7,500 miles from his family and friends, and starting a new life for himself in a country he has only visited once doesn’t scare Steven Rich.

Waiting at JFK international airport for his “aliyah” flight to Israel, the only thing that made this burly, heavily tattooed ex-US marine jittery was the journey.

“I can’t say I’m nervous about anything in Israel,” Rich told The Times of Israel on Monday morning before takeoff. “But I really don’t like flying so much.”

Having completed two tours in Afghanistan after joining the US Marine Corps in 2010, 24-year-old Rich has had to endure hundreds of airplane rides — some spent sleeping on the floor at the back of a cargo jet — but none quite like Monday’s flight from New York to Tel Aviv.

Joining Rich were 217 other North Americans immigrating to Israel on a jet specially chartered by the nonprofit organization Nefesh B’Nefesh. On board were 29 families, including 103 children and five separate sets of twins.

The flight was one of several flown each year by Nefesh B’Nefesh in cooperation with the Ministry of Immigrant Absorption, the Jewish Agency, KKL and JNF-USA, bringing thousands of immigrants to Israel.

‘I think it was four days into the Birthright trip that I told my friend: Man, I think I’m gonna move here’

Founded in 2002 by Rabbi Yehoshua Fass and American businessman Tony Gelbart, Nefesh B’Nefesh aims to encourage Western immigration to Israel by easing the process for American and British Jews. According to Nefesh B’Nefesh, it has so far brought almost 50,000 immigrants to Israel.

The latest group of immigrants hails from Arizona, California, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Ontario, Pennsylvania, Quebec, Texas, Virginia, Washington state, Washington, DC, and Wisconsin.

For some on board, like 71-year old Tatyana Yassenov, the oldest of Tuesday’s new immigrants, the decision to move to Israel came after years of consideration.

“I always wanted to make aliyah and I’m so excited to be joining my brother and niece in the north of Israel,” said Yassenov, one 31 new immigrants moving to the Negev or Galilee regions as part of Nefesh B’Nefesh’s “Go North” and “Go South” campaigns.

The ceremony at JFK before takeoff was just as much a recruitment effort for friends and family in attendance as it was a sendoff for those making the journey.

Gelbart told the new immigrants-in-waiting that their families would soon “follow in your footsteps.” Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, praised the decision to move to Israel as the best response to efforts to delegitimize the country.

“What you are doing today is the real answer to those people who criticize Israel. It is the answer to those who support BDS [the Boycott Divest and Sanction movement against Israel]. Making aliyah is the real answer to all the enemies of the state of Israel,” Danon said to applause from the soon-to-be Israelis.

‘Feeling like you belong’

Having been discharged from the marines just 14 months ago, the idea of moving to Israel came about quickly for Steven Rich.

“I think it was four days into the Birthright trip that I told my friend, ‘Man, I think I’m gonna move here,'” Rich said of his first time in Israel, exactly one year before Monday’s flight.

“Before I came to Israel I had never imagined I would move here at all. When I was out of the Marine Corps I was only thinking about going to school and staying in the States. I never once dreamed that a year from then I would be moving,” he said.

Growing up in a “normal Jewish household” in Los Angeles, California, Rich says he was never religious but “always felt that Judaism was my culture.”

In Rich’s pocket for the duration of the journey was a tiny mezuza connected to the dog tags he wore as a marine. The silver pendant, traditionally holding passages from the Bible and placed on the doorpost of Jewish homes, was first worn by Rich’s grandfather as a combat medic during World War II.

But upon enlisting to the marines after finishing high school, Rich faced a “culture shock” as the only Jewish recruit in his 1,200-strong platoon, with some of his comrades having never met another Jew.

“In Afghanistan, my unit consisted of over 1,200 marines and my call sign on the radio was simply ‘Jew’ because I was the only one,” he said. “It was never offensive. It just comes with the territory.”

When Rich left the army, he was again faced with feeling like an outsider. Only in Israel, he said, where people understood him both as a Jew and an ex-soldier, did he really feel understood.

“In the States when you come back from the military like 1 percent of the nation actually knows what you went through. It was hard adjusting. It’s just different going to Israel and actually feeling like you belong there,” he said.

‘Something in return’

Among the some of the younger new immigrants were eight 18- to 27-year-olds who will be immediately enlisting into the IDF as part of the Garin Tzabar program, which places them in army units.

‘I think [serving in the army] will give me a feeling of belonging and deserving to belong. Hopefully I can feel like i’m accomplishing something’

Coming to Israel without family, these recruits are known as “lone soldiers” and will receive additional support from both the army and Nefesh B’Nefesh.

Mayan Hazon, 19, from California, traveled from Ben Gurion airport to Kibbutz Kissufim in the north of the country, where she will be living.

“I want to give something in return,” said Hazon about her decision to join the IDF. “I think it will give me a feeling of belonging and deserving to belong. Hopefully I can feel like i’m accomplishing something.”

On Sunday, Sgt. Shlomo Rindenow, a lone soldier who made aliyah with Nefesh B’Nefesh from New Jersey in 2014, was killed by an exploding grenade alongside fellow IDF soldier Hussam Tafesh. The army is still investigating the circumstances.

Asked if the incident made him hesitant to join, 19-year-old Indiana native Aviad Karmazyn, who plans to join a combat unit, said that though it was scary, he believed it was part and parcel of being in the army.

“Once you enlist, that’s part of the deal.” Karmazyn said. “I hope I can bring some motivation. Maybe an Israeli having a hard time might think to himself, ‘There’s this guy over here who came all the way from the US just to be here so if he can do it, I can too.'”

Singing, dancing, waving flags

The feelings of belonging hoped for by Steven Rich, of completion expressed by Tatyana Yassenov, and of giving that the new recruits described were summed up during the festive ceremony that greeted the new arrivals in Israel.

Speaking to the 1,500 people who had turned up to welcome the flight with singing, dancing and flag-waving, Immigration and Absorption Minister Sofa Landver said she could identify with the teary-eyed new Israelis.

“Thirty-three years ago I came off the plane and felt the same feeling that you are feeling. Thank god for the state of Israel,” she said of her own aliyah from the Soviet Union. “Welcome! You are not alone! We are with you!”

Chair of the Knesset Committee for Aliyah Avraham Neguise, who came from Ethiopia at the age of 27, also spoke of his own experience.

“I was in your situation 31 years ago when I landed to Israel as an immigrant and I tell you that you too can and will be the next members of Knesset and ministers of this country,” he said from the podium.

Outside, still standing on the tarmac in the heavy central Israel heat, Steven Rich exuded both exhaustion and joy.

“I feel like I came home to Israel,” choked the usually tough ex-marine.

Asked if the traveling had been OK, he said he had forgotten about his fear of flying during the journey.

Raoul Wootliff, along with other members of the press, was flown to New York and back to Israel by Nefesh B’Nefesh. Nefesh B’Nefesh made no requests from The Times of Israel regarding coverage of the flight.