Aliyah

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Immigrants of the second Aliyah, field near Migdal (1912)

The term Aliyah (ֽֽ Hebrew עֲלִיָּה ʿAlijjah , German 'ascent' , Plene עלייה; Plural ʿalijjot ) comes from the Bible and describes in Judaism since the Babylonian exile (586-539 BC) the return of Jews as individuals or groups to Eretz Israel . Participants in an aliyah are called Olim in Hebrew (singular: fem. Olah , masc . Oleh ).

Since the emergence of political Zionism in the 19th century, the term has generally meant “Jewish immigration” to Palestine and, since 1948, to Israel .

origin

In ancient Judaism, the Hebrew word Aliyah for "ascending, ascending" referred to a pilgrimage of believing Jews to the Jerusalem temple for one of the three annual pilgrimage festivals of Pesach , Shavuot and Sukkot . The ascent referred to the high mountains of Judea and especially to the approximately 800 m high Temple Mount , Zion .

After the Babylonians established the temple and the city of Jerusalem as the cultic center of Judaism at that time in 586 BC. Chr. And exiled its political and cultic elites, the term also referred to the hoped-for future "pulling up" of the exiled Jews to their homeland Israel. The edict of the Persian king Cyrus II of 539 BC According to biblical tradition, they allowed them to return with the words ( Esr 1,3  EU ; cf. 2nd book Chronicles 36,23):

“Everyone of you who belongs to his people - his God be with him - must go up to Jerusalem in Judah and build the house of the Lord, the God of Israel; for he is the God who lives in Jerusalem. "

Cyrus triggered an early wave of migrants back to Israel, as a result of which the temple and Jerusalem as the capital of Israel were rebuilt.

The early Aliyot

  • In the late 12th century, some Jews from North Africa arrived as a result of persecution.
  • Between 1210 and 1211, 300 French and English rabbis immigrated ( immigration of the three hundred rabbis ).
  • After the Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492, some Jews came to Palestine
  • In the 15th century, a group of Italian Jews arrived who had a great influence on the local Jewish community. Among them was Rabbi Elijah, who immigrated from Ferrara in 1483 .
  • After the Turkish conquest in 1516, there was a wave of immigration from the Orient, Sicily, Italy, France, Germany and North Africa. Other refugees from the expulsions from Spain and Portugal came with them. Some settled in Jerusalem, but most of them settled in Safed .
  • During the entire 16th century, the heyday of the Kabbalah in Safed attracted many immigrants from France, Germany, Italy and other European countries, but also from North Africa and the Orient.
Sir Moses Montefiore's windmill in 1858
  • 1579 120 new immigrants from Damascus
  • In the middle of the 17th century there was an important aliyah of Turkish Jews.
  • In 1700 a group of 1,500 European Jews settled in Jerusalem under the leadership of Rabbi Yehuda Hasid. They build the Hurva synagogue .
  • Immigration of Hasidim began at the end of the 18th century and into the early 19th century . The first organized Hasidic immigration took place in 1764 and was led by students of Ba'al Shem Tov , the founder of Hasidism. They settled in Tiberias, Safed, Hebron and Jerusalem and established the tradition of the four holy cities of Judaism.
  • In 1808 the Peruschim, the disciples of the Gaon of Vilna , an opponent of Hasidism, organized an aliyah and founded a community in Jerusalem.
  • In 1830 a wave of immigration from Germany, the Netherlands and Hungary began.
  • During the 19th century, thousands of Jews immigrated from oriental countries such as Turkey, North Africa, Iraq, Persia, Bukhara, Assyria , Afghanistan, the Caucasus and Yemen, which marked the arrival of the Messiah for the Jewish year 5600 (= 1840). expected. In 1840, Jews were the largest group in Jerusalem. The conquest of Syria by Muhammad Ali Pascha brought relief for the Jewish population. B. the permission to rebuild the buildings in Safed and Tiberias that were destroyed in an earthquake in 1837.
  • 1857: The Italian Jew Sir Moses Montefiore , who lived in London , had an eighteen-meter-high windmill with a small settlement of twenty houses built outside the city walls of Jerusalem, thus creating an important livelihood for the Jewish population.
  • 1860: About 12,000 Jews live in Palestine.

The modern alijot

The alijot of modern times are periodized differently in the literature, both in terms of duration and in terms of immigration numbers.

The first aliyah

The first aliyah lasted from 1882 to 1903. The area of ​​Palestine then belonged to the Ottoman Empire. With the first Aliyah, 20,000 to 30,000 immigrants came from Eastern Europe, Russia , Romania and Yemen.

The reasons for immigration can be traced back to three factors:

  • The ancient longing of the Jews for their historical homeland.
  • The ongoing pogroms in Russia.
  • The conviction that only a return to the historical homeland would be able to permanently and fundamentally solve the “Jewish problem”.

The first Aliyah was mainly influenced by the Chibbat Zion and Bilu movements. Bilu is an abbreviation for “ B eit J a'akov L ekhu V e-nelkha ”, “House Jacob, go, let's set out!” ( Isa 2,5  EU ). These movements also founded the first agricultural settlements, Moshavot , up to 1903 a total of 28, including in Judea: Rishon LeZion, Ekron, Gedera, Petach Tikva, Zichron Jaakov and in the Upper Galilee: Rosh Pina, Jesod Hama'alah. Be'er Tuvia was the southernmost and Metulla the northernmost settlement.

The first group of 14 people went ashore on July 6, 1882 in Jaffa ; the second group of 34 people came two years later. This group also included four women. Gedera is a Bilu foundation. On June 27, 1901, the Kibbutz Achim association was founded with the aim of helping those arriving at the first aliyah in their search for work and accommodation.

Also from 1882, Baron Edmond Rothschild , who lived in France, began to settle 12,000 Jews in sixteen model villages, who could support themselves. His vineyards on the southwest slope of Mount Carmel became particularly well known , for which he had French grape varieties imported.

There were two main waves of immigration: 1882 to 1884 and 1890 to 1891.

In addition to 28 new agricultural settlements with around 6,000 people, the urban settlements also grew. Around 3,000 new immigrants came to Haifa and Jaffa and around 1,000 to Jerusalem.

Hebrew became a language spoken in everyday life again and the first Hebrew elementary schools emerged. However, the pioneering spirit had exhausted itself and by 1903 had almost come to a standstill. In total, about 35,000 Jews came to Palestine during the first aliyah, but almost half of them left the country after a few years.

A well-known participant in the 1st Aliyah was Eliezer Ben-Jehuda .

The second aliyah

It took place from 1904 to 1914 and brought 35,000 to 40,000 immigrants, mostly from Russia and Poland , to the country of Palestine.

The first impetus for this was the bloody events in Kishinew in 1903. Further pogroms in Russia in 1904 and 1905 and the death of Theodor Herzl on July 3, 1904 led to a new pioneering spirit.

The participants were mostly young men and women with socialist ideas and a desire for a classless society and a religion of work. Not only were they guided by a national ideology, but they also wanted a community for proletarians in Palestine.

As a rule, they had already received agricultural training in their home countries. The first parties of the labor movement, the Poalei Tzion and the HaPoel HaZair, the predecessor organizations of the Mapai , were built up by immigrants from the second Aliyah .

The participants in the second aliyah worked as workers in the moshavot or in the cities. In 1909 they founded the first kibbutz Degania , the first modern Jewish city of Tel Aviv, and also in 1909 the military organization HaSchomer . They also created the basis for a new Hebrew press and literature, which greatly promoted the spread of the language, and for the Histadrut union .

Well-known participants in the second aliyah were: David Ben-Gurion , Jitzhak Ben Zwi , Berl Katznelson , Israel Shochat , Jitzchak Tabenkin and Joseph Trumpeldor .

The Second Aliyah ended with the outbreak of the First World War. In the same period, more than a million Jews from Eastern Europe emigrated to the United States.

The third aliyah

The third aliyah lasted from 1919 to 1923 and was in many ways a continuation of the second. It brought 35,000 immigrants into the country, 53 percent of whom were from Russia and 36 percent from Poland. The rest came from Lithuania, Romania and other Eastern European countries. Eight hundred immigrants came from Western and Central Europe. Many of the newcomers were members of the Hechalutz movement in Russia and Poland or of Hashomer Hatzair ("the young guardian") in Galicia , the oldest Jewish youth movement that describes itself as the "world organization of Zionist youth".

The causes of the wave of immigration lay in the consequences of the Russian October Revolution and the civil war , the pogroms in Ukraine in 1919 and 1920 with 150,000 murdered Jews, the disputes over national self-determination in Europe after the First World War , the Balfour Declaration and the British mandate administration of Palestine with the assurance of the establishment of a national Jewish home.

Immigration to the United States was still possible and often used, most of those who chose Palestine as a country of immigration came from Zionist beliefs.

These young pioneers brought a creative power that changed the character of the yishuv . Together with their predecessors from the Second Aliyah, they played an important role in his leadership. They founded the Histadrut , the national union federation of workers, the self-defense organization Hagana , provided workers for housing and road construction as well as the beginnings of industry and supported the development of Jewish agriculture. The Third Aliyah also increased the number of Jewish settlements through the establishment of many new kibbutzim (e.g. En Harod , Gewa , Tel Josef and Beit Alfa in the Jezreel plain , Kirjat Anavim near Jerusalem), the first moshavim (e.g. B. Nahalal , Kfar Yechezkel, Tel Adaschim and Balfouria) and started their kibbutz movement in 1927.

In 1922 around 85,000 Jews lived in Palestine: in the country's cities, mainly Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Tiberias, Haifa and Hebron and in 60 agricultural settlements.

During World War II, members of the Hashomer Hatzair, including Mordechaj Anielewicz , operated in Nazi-occupied Europe, especially in Poland, and were involved in ghetto uprisings. After the war they took part in Bricha companies. In 1946 the movement founded a political party which, together with Achdut Ha'Avoda , formed the Mapam workers' party in 1948 .

The fourth aliyah

The fourth aliyah from 1924 to 1927 differed in its social structure from the previous ones. It began in mid-1924 and was attended by 67,000 immigrants, half of them from Poland.

It is also known as the middle class aliyah because it consisted primarily of members of the middle class, business people and craftsmen. The immigration of pioneers practically came to a standstill because of the emigration restrictions of the Soviet Union.

The wave of immigration was the result of two developments: the economic crisis in Poland and the economic restrictions that were imposed on Polish Jews, hence the name Grabski Alija after the Polish Minister of Finance Władysław Grabski . Another reason was that with the Immigration Act of 1924 , the United States largely sealed off its borders for mass immigration.

Most of the newcomers, a total of eight out of ten immigrants from the fourth aliyah, stuck to their way of life and settled in the cities, especially in Tel Aviv. They invested their little capital in workshops and factories, small hotels, restaurants, shops, but above all in the construction industry. There was also significant agricultural development in the coastal plain. New settlements, whose livelihoods were citrus plantations, were founded, including Magdiel , Herzlia , Binjamina and Netanja .

In 1926 immigration stagnated due to a serious economic crisis in Palestine. Of the 13,000 who arrived in 1926, more than half left the country. In 1927 more than 5,000 emigrated, but only 2,300 immigrated, which subsided the wave of immigration.

The fifth aliyah

The fifth aliyah stretched from 1930 to 1939 and brought 250,000 immigrants. Most of them came from Poland, Germany , Austria, Romania, Greece, Yemen and Iraq. Single-period from 1933 to 1936 came after the assumption of power of Adolf Hitler 164,000 Jews legally to Palestine, among other illegal refugees. The vast majority settled in the cities; About half of the immigrants moved to Tel Aviv alone.

The German and Austrian Jews, who made up over a quarter of the total number of immigrants, made a decisive contribution to the development of the yishuv. They were the first large group of immigrants from Western and Central Europe. Many of them had medical or other academic training. They also made up the majority of the musicians in the new Philharmonic Orchestra. The cities experienced an increase in the level of business life and city facilities due to the high level of education, the bourgeois way of life and Central European values ​​such as punctuality and a sense of order, as well as professional experience. Many of these characteristics have been incorporated into the image of German immigrants, the Jeckes , which is still associated with irony and respect today . With this influx, the Tel Aviv success story began.

On the eve of World War II , there were 475,000 Jews in Palestine, about forty percent of the country's total population.

The Aliyah Bet

The Alija Bet (Bet is the 2nd letter of the Hebrew alphabet) denotes the secondary ascent, i.e. illegal entry. It is also known as Ha'apalah . It began around 1934 with the persecution in Germany during the National Socialist era and lasted until the state was founded. Immigration defied the British government's hurdles (including the 1939 White Paper ) and attempts to control immigration routes. In 1939 the Mossad was established as an organization for illegal immigration within the Haganah .

Despite British restrictions, 115,000 illegal immigrants reached the country between 1934 and 1948, while 51,000 were detained by the British authorities in Cyprus and were only able to enter after the independence of the State of Israel. The Jewish population in Palestine rose to 650,000 Jews by 1948.

In the literature there are also periodization attempts that name a sixth aliyah and date to 1936-1940. It comprised around 90,000 immigrants, mainly “illegal” refugees before National Socialism (Maapilim) .

Aliyot since the founding of the state

20th century

  • The Law of Return was adopted by the Knesset on July 5, 1950 as the first law after the founding of the state in 1948.
  • 1948–1951: A total of approx. 687,624 immigrants, mainly from Egypt , Iraq , Poland and Romania, as well as 123,371 from Yemen , 34,547 from Turkey and 21,910 from Iran. This doubled the Jewish population in Israel.
* Between June 1949 and September 1950, Operation Magic Carpet brought about 49,000 Yemeni Jews to the new state of Israel in initially secret transports .
* In March 1951, the Airlift “Operation Esra and Nehemiah” brought 107,603 Iraqi Jews to Israel via Iran and Cyprus.
  • 1955–1957: around 100,000 immigrants from Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya, with the end of French colonial rule (on immigration from Morocco in the 1940s and 1950s see also: History of Morocco from 1948 ).
  • After the cargo ship Egos sank 16 km from Morro Nuevo in the Bay of Alhucamas on January 11, 1961 , killing all 44 Jewish refugees from Morocco and 2 crew members, with the permission of the Moroccan government from November 1961 to spring 1964, 80,000 Jews were in the Operation Jachin brought to Israel via France and Italy.
  • 1969–1975: around 100,000 immigrants from the USSR.
  • Between November 21, 1984 and January 5, 1985, Operation Moses (Miwza Mosche) and, in March 1985, Operation Joshua brought about 8,000 Ethiopian Jews to Israel.
  • 1989 to 1995: around 600,000 immigrants from the Soviet Union or the CIS .

21st century

statistics

Immigrants since the founding of the state of Israel on May 15, 1948 by continent:

year unknown A. + O. 1 Europe Africa Asia total
01948 2nd 11,865 00.478 076,554 08,192 04,739 101,828
1949 05,702 01,422 011,963 39,215 071,652 239.954
1950 03,687 01,954 081,195 26,162 057,565 170,563
1951 03.141 01,286 047,074 20,382 103.396 175.279
1952 00.275 00.950 006.232 10,286 006,867 024,610
1953 00.382 00.930 002.147 05.102 003,014 011,575
1954 00.165 01,091 001,369 12,509 003,357 018,491
1955 00.061 01,155 002,065 32,815 001,432 037,528
1956 00.101 01,067 006,739 45.284 003.139 056,330
1957 01,435 01,410 039,812 25,747 004,230 072,634
1958 00.241 01,320 013,695 04.113 007,921 027,290
1959 00.137 01,147 014,731 04,429 003,544 023,988
1960 00.204 01,158 016,169 05,379 001,782 024,692
1961 00.194 01,969 023,375 18,048 004.149 047,735
1962 00.350 02,187 011,825 41,816 005,355 061,533
1963 00.143 06,497 014,213 38,672 004,964 064,489
1964 00.327 04,188 028,124 17,340 005,057 055.036
1965 00.382 03,096 013,879 08,535 005,223 031,115
1966 00.229 02.132 007,435 03,024 003.137 015,957
1967 00.148 01,771 004,295 06,268 001,987 014,469
1968 00.161 02,275 006,029 07,567 004,671 020,703
1969 00.330 09,601 015,236 05,926 007,018 038.111
1970 00.222 11,405 014,434 03,785 006,904 036,750
1971 00.025th 12,885 020,888 02,354 005,778 041,930
1972 00.020th 10,814 039,145 02,766 003.143 055,888
1973 00.008th 09,522 040,492 02,839 002,025 054,886
1974 00.021st 06,439 023,126 01,216 001,177 031,979
1975 00.006th 04,989 013,417 00.689 000.927 020,028
1976 00.011 05,774 012,137 00.697 001,135 019,754
1977 00.040 06,201 012,660 01,620 000.908 021,429
1978 00.121 06,305 016,549 01,683 001,736 026,394
1979 00.367 06,024 022,404 01,340 007,087 037,222
1980 00.077 04,350 011,792 01.007 003,202 020,428
1981 00.062 04,243 005,909 01,170 001,215 012,599
1982 00.046 05,003 006.168 01,555 000.951 013,723
1983 00.056 06,758 006.154 03,094 000.844 016,906
1984 00.035 04,876 005,485 08,885 000.700 019,981
1985 00.014th 03,739 003,964 02,318 000.607 010,642
1986 00.031 03,634 003,675 00.982 001,183 009,505
1987 00.016 03.812 006,044 01,205 001,888 012,965
1988 00.019th 03,969 006.012 01,334 001,700 013,034
1989 00.091 04.147 016,766 01,861 001,185 024,050
1990 00.139 04,315 189,650 04,472 000.940 199,516
1991 00.062 03,023 152.142 20,251 000.622 176,100
1992 00.123 03,006 068,962 04,075 000.891 077,957
1993 00.048 03,283 070,315 01,431 001,728 076,805
1994 00.051 03,593 072,553 01.928 001,719 079,844
1995 00.025th 04,330 068,987 01,772 001,247 076,361
1996 00.068 04,587 052,475 01,998 011,791 070,919
1997 00.018th 42.48 049.903 02,283 009,769 066,221
1998 00.033 03,316 042,155 03,514 007,712 056,730
1999 00.034 03,580 062,147 02,681 008,324 076,766
2000 00.003 03,359 046,955 02,509 007,377 060.202
2001 - 03,604 030,794 03,573 005,500 043,473
2002 00.004th 08,737 018,021 02,949 003,859 033,570
2003 00.003 04,430 012,626 03,342 002,872 023,273
2004 - 03,428 011,149 03,878 002,444 020,899
2005 - 04,065 011,279 03,766 002,071 021,183
2006 00.006th 03.813 009,872 03,801 001,777 019,269
2007 00.019th 03,894 008,849 03,795 001,575 018,132
2008 - 03,361 007.109 01,892 001,338 013,701
2009 - 03,932 008,566 00.561 001,516 014,575
2010 - 04.155 009,128 01.937 001,415 016,635
2011 - 03,567 009,286 02,934 001.104 016,893
2012 - 03,417 009,361 02,643 001,137 016,560
2013 - 03,488 010,848 01,562 001,029 016,929
2014 - 03,808 019,098 00.396 000.817 024,120
2015 - 04,062 022,600 00.394 000.852 027,908
2016 00.471 04,410 019,635 00.348 001,113 025,977
2017 00.432 04,365 019,862 00.425 001,273 026,357
2018 00.353 04,245 021,707 00.365 001,429 028,099
2019 00.361 04,253 021,745 00.366 001,431 028,156

1 = America and Oceania
2 = May 15 through December 31, 1948 only

Source: 1948–2015: 2016–2019:

Youth Aliyah

The Jugendalija or Kinderalija , a department of the Jewish Agency , was founded in 1933 by Recha Freier from Berlin to rescue Jewish children and young people from Nazi Germany. In Palestine the organization was headed by Henrietta Szold and later by Hans Beyth . Before World War II, around 5,000 youth were brought into the country and educated. After the war there were 15,000 Holocaust survivors.

In Germany: Arbeitsgemeinschaft Kinder- und Jugend-Alija founded in July 1933 with headquarters in Berlin-Charlottenburg 2, Kantstrasse 158 (non-partisan organization for the transfer of Jewish youth to Palestine), comprised the three Berlin associations: Ahawah children's home, Jewish orphans and youth welfare.

literature

  • Gur Alroey: Aliyah. In: Dan Diner (Ed.): Encyclopedia of Jewish History and Culture (EJGK). Volume 1: A-Cl. Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2011, ISBN 978-3-476-02501-2 , pp. 36-39.
Historical representations
  • Lothar Mertens: Alija. The emigration of Jews from the USSR / CIS. 1993, ISBN 3-8196-0122-8 .
  • Julian Grzesik: Aliyah after the dispersion of Israel. Bible and facts. Three volumes, Lublin 1989.
  • Alex Bein : The Jewish question. Biography of a world problem (two volumes). Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, Stuttgart 1980, ISBN 3-421-01963-0 .
Experience reports
  • Jay and Meridel Rawlings: Alija. Return to the promised land. Schulte + Gerth, Aßlar 1984, ISBN 3-87739-551-1 .
Artist's impression
  • Wolf Stegemann: Alija - The rebirth of Israel. 25 lithographs by Salvador Dali. Dorsten 1993.

See also

Web links

Commons : Immigration to Israel  - Pictures, Videos and Audio Files Collection
Wiktionary: Alija  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. Alex Bein: Die Judenfrage , Volume II, DVA, Stuttgart 1980, ISBN 3-421-01963-0 , p. 354.
  2. Alex Bein: Die Judenfrage , Volume II, Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, Stuttgart 1980, ISBN 3-421-01963-0 , pp. 272, 354.
  3. Alija, the ascent In: Israelnetz.de , August 26, 2016, accessed on August 17, 2018.
  4. ^ The First Aliyah
  5. ^ The second aliyah. In: jewishvirtuallibrary.org , accessed April 2, 2018.
  6. ^ The third aliyah. In: jewishvirtuallibrary.org , accessed April 2, 2018.
  7. Tom Segev: Once upon a time there was a Palestine - Jews and Arabs before the founding of the state of Israel. 4th edition. Siedler, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-88680-805-X , p. 244f.
  8. ^ The fourth aliyah. In: jewishvirtuallibrary.org , accessed April 2, 2018.
  9. The fifth aliyah 1929-1939. In: Jewish Virtual Library, accessed June 30, 2018.
  10. ^ Aliyah Bet 1939-1948. In: Jewish Virtual Library, accessed June 30, 2018.
  11. Immigration of Jews to Israel - Migration or Flight? In: Israelnetz .de. June 27, 2019, accessed July 7, 2019 .
  12. Immigration of Jews to Israel - Migration or Flight? In: Israelnetz .de. June 27, 2019, accessed July 7, 2019 .
  13. Aliyah, the rise. In: Israelnetz.de , August 26, 2016, accessed on August 17, 2018.
  14. ^ Ministry of Immigrant Absorption: “On Eagles' Wings” - Aliyah from Yemen (1949) , accessed on July 6, 2018 (English).
  15. Megan Melissa Cross: King Hassan II: Morocco's messenger of peace , pp. 66-67.
  16. ^ Ethiopia Virtual Jewish Tour . In: Jewish Virtual Library . American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise , accessed December 4, 2018 .
  17. http://www.cbs.gov.il/shnaton67/st04_02.pdf , information from the Israeli Statistical Office, accessed on July 29, 2018.
  18. Information from the Israel Statistical Office , accessed on August 4, 2018, November 9, 2019 and August 9, 2020.