Israel today has the largest Jewish community in the world. We’re fast approaching six million souls and we’re fast approaching a point where the majority of the Jews will live in the land of Israel. That has not happened since the days of the Second Temple. That is, in one sense, good news and it will happen very shortly, but in another sense, it reflects not merely the growth and the development of Israel – the absorption of millions of immigrants from all over the world including over a million from the Former Soviet Union – and the naturally high growth rate of the Israeli population – very high – I think it’s the highest or among the highest in the developed countries, in developed economies – and that is a reflection of an inner – by the way – secular and religious alike – religious more, secular very high, very high, compared to say our counterparts in Western Europe – very, very high. And there is a natural life force in the Jewish people in response, I think, to the Holocaust – an enduring, lingering response to the Holocaust and to the wars of Israel and to our natural impetus to ensure that the Jewish people survive beyond the personal calculation and consideration that every family makes. So that is the good side and the robust nature of the Israeli economy, the development of the Israeli state, the Israeli society, the Israeli economy, Israeli technology – the capacity not merely to increase our numbers but to increase our productivity well beyond our numbers – to increase our economy, our GDP per capita well beyond the growth rate of our numbers – this is all good news.
The bad news is that we have steadily eroded as a people. The commitment of our young people – the Jewish people – have frayed at the edges, but there was a concomitant development which I think was important, and that is a concentration – a consolidation at the vibrant center including the Diaspora that says we should reverse this. And the most important thing which has happened in the last decade has been the conscious effort of the Diaspora first, and then Israel second, joining it pretty early on, to try to reverse the forces of the loss of identity through such programs as Masa and Taglit and the fostering of Jewish education, the study of Hebrew. These are conscious efforts to arrest the tide of loss of identity and we should continue them – we should increase them. We – I mean as a partnership between the Jewish people outside of Israel and the Jewish State of Israel, between the Jewish Agency and the Government of Israel and any other organization that seeks to support this important effort. We’re committed to this.
