MOSAIC
What Israel Gained from Its Russian Citizens
by Matti Friedman
November 30, 2020

It seems to me that the single event that brought the most good to Israel since its founding was the Russian wave of the 1990s. There are other competitors for that title, like victory in the Six-Day War and the reunification of Jerusalem in June 1967—but along with that military triumph came negative consequences that have damaged Israel’s internal cohesion and continue to pose moral dilemmas. If victory in the Six-Day War was a mixed blessing, the Russian aliyah was just a blessing. The million people who came here after the Soviet breakup have changed Israel for the better, and their absorption in the space of 30 years is a striking success for the immigrants and for the state. READ MORE

MOSAIC Natan Sharansky and Gil Troy: The End of the New Jew Unlike earlier waves of immigrants, the million East Europeans who made their way to the Jewish state in the 1990s managed to escape the cultural strip-mining that awaited them.