Perhaps even the ominously dark cloud of anti-Semitism in today’s Europe has a silver lining: according to recent statistics, a growing number of Jews are coming on aliyah. 

Other than for the small number of pioneers, the link between the persecution of Jews and their coming to Eretz Yisrael is as old as Zionism. From the impact of the Dreyfus trial on Herzl, as he observed it as a journalist in Paris, to the tragedy of the Holocaust that some five decades later moved the United Nations to endorse a Jewish state, the persecution of Jews has been a strong factor in the creation of Israel.

Not that the Jews’ perennial yearning for Zion was contingent on anti-Judaism, but had they been allowed to enjoy European emancipation as originally envisaged, they would have continued to turn piously to Jerusalem in prayer but not come to live there.

The current surge of anti-Semitism in Europe seems to have been very much on Natan Sharansky’s mind when earlier this summer he gave an exclusive interview to the London Jewish Chronicle about the future of European Jewry.  

Sharansky is the chairman of the Jewish Agency, which seeks to bring Jews to Israel. It has just increased its budget to meet what it hopes to be the new demand from Europe. His ostensibly sober analysis may, therefore, also be motivated by institutional interests.

Its basis is the growing Muslim presence in Europe. Ironically, right-wing extremists who thrive on anti-Semitism have made common cause with radical Muslims and their rabidly anti-Israel agenda. Though neo-Nazis hate Muslims no less than Jews, they’re now colluding in their joint effort to eliminate, or at least diminish, the Jewish presence in Europe. Jews are under attack both from those who hate them and from those who want Israel destroyed. 

Sharansky urges European Jewry to take the consequences and move to Israel. According to him, only the ultra-Orthodox and those committed to total assimilation will stay. All who want to remain true to their European Jewish roots should come to Israel because Israel has become the bastion of European values. The headline of the interview reads, “European idea will die here and survive in Israel.”

The chairman of the Jewish Agency, committed to the integration of all Jews, admits that Israel must try harder to foster religious pluralism. He has been advocating it in the past whether on its intrinsic merits or as a way of appealing to non-Orthodox Jews.

Not everybody agrees. Some feel that modern Israel is being shaped more by America than by Europe. Others see no reason to urge Jews to pack their bags.

Among the latter is Barbara Spectre, an American-born Israeli who now lives in Stockholm, where she founded and directs Paideia, which, in partisan fashion, she describes as “Europe’s premier institute for adult Jewish education and activism.” 

In an open letter to Sharansky, also published in the Jewish Chronicle, Spectre argues that European Jewry is there to stay and to thrive. She supports her claim by largely anecdotal evidence from Paideia alumni. 

 I recently spent time in Britain, where I lived for more than a quarter-of-a-century before coming to Canada, and in Sweden, where I grew up. Though the worry about the growth of anti-Semitism is widespread and is reflected both in statements by politicians and in reports in the non-Jewish media, the Jews I spoke to didn’t seem to have been personally affected. Despite Jewish Agency statistics, I saw no evidence of people packing their bags.

Critics have observed that, like in the 1930s, Europe’s Jews are again burying their heads in the sand instead of facing facts and leaving. Perhaps it’s because they know that then Jews had nowhere to go even if they wanted to. Now they’ll always be welcome in Israel because it’s the state of the Jewish people. Aliyah, therefore, can wait, at least for a while.