Rothman family enriched and challenged by year in Israel

Jesse, Liana, Jay, Mori and Randi Rothman, and their dog Paz, spent the past school year in Israel reconnecting with their cultural roots and exploring what it means to be Jewish American.

By Lauren Heaton

At age 13, Mori Rothman knew he was going to Israel. His birthplace and the home of his ethnic, religious and cultural heritage, the land known to Jews as Zion was the natural destination for one who wanted to develop his identity as a Jew, he believed. To learn Hebrew, to make Israeli friends, to be immersed in the Judaic rhythm of life, he had to be there. So when he told his parents he was ready to spend his junior year of high school in Israel, they said if he waited a year, they would go there together.

The year was 2006, and the plan was all worked out. Jay Rothman had received a Fulbright fellowship to teach at an Israeli university, and Randi would volunteer at Hospice and with a local synagogue. Mori and his younger brother Jesse would finish their high school course work, and their younger sister Liana would attend sixth grade there.

And then in July, the month Jesse was scheduled to go ahead on his own to get a headstart on his Hebrew, the war with Lebanon broke out. Though the country had settled into a time of peace for several years, as an island of Jews sitting on land that a whole sea of Arabs feel is rightly theirs, Israel is never far from conflict. If the family from Yellow Springs, Ohio, was going to feel what it was really like to live in Israel, to be Jews in their sacred land, with the current political landscape, perhaps war would have to be part of the experience, the Rothmans decided.

They spent the year in Zichron Yaakov, a town of 16,000 situated along the Mediterranean at the foot of Mount Carmel where almond and olive trees grow next to white stuccoed buildings with red tile roofs. And for the most part, they loved it. Within three months, Mori was speaking Hebrew fluently and had begun to take classes with Jay at the university, and Jesse was well on his way to being conversant. Liana found some difficulty connecting with people who always seemed to be in a rush, she said, but Randi, while still worried that the fighting could return, had relaxed enough to allow the children to navigate on public transportation on their own and felt it ironic that in many ways she felt safer in a war-torn country than in an American city.

Jay and Randi both lived in Israel as young adults, having sought it out in just the opposite way their parents had left it a generation before to raise their families in a secular America. When Jay, who grew up in Yellow Springs, told his parents, Phil and Esther Rothman, he was going to spend a year out of college in Israel, they wondered why as an American he needed to reconnect with “that old, separate, religious identity” they had long ago left behind, he said.

Now the third generation was seeking to reconnect with the family’s roots, but with perhaps an even greator fervor. Mori not only wanted to live in Israel, he wanted to become an Israeli, he said. A dual citizen of Israel and the U.S., he felt that in order to fulfill his role as a citizen of Israel he would have to serve in the military.

Both as a parent and as president of The Aria Group, a conflict resolution business, Jay objects to the philosophy that to be a legitimate citizen of Israel one must serve in its military. Though he and Mori agree that a military is necessary for Israel’s survival, Jay feels that the greatest service to Israel, particularly for Americans, would be to bring pluralistic values and dialoguing skills to promote peaceful solutions to the political and religious divide in the region.

But while Mori agrees that eventually the world will get to a point when a military force in Israel will no longer be necessary, he feels that the military is the only reason Israel still exists. And in order to be taken seriously as a proponent of peaceful solutions there, he would have to sacrifice something and perform the requisite duty of every citizen over 18. Though as a student at Middlebury College, he is on exempt status now, he intends to return to Israel to live, and he will have to decide then on the best way to serve his country.

On this trip, however, the family participated in peace-making activities with both Jewish and Arab Israelis. Jesse volunteered to teach chess to Arab children, while Mori travelled and acted in a play between 10-hour shifts as a minimum-wage dishwasher. And Jay’s course, Identity, Conflict and Visions of a Cooperative Future, brought Arab and Jewish students together for discussions he said were engaging as well as tinged with a sense of hopelessness at times. He also advised the prime minister’s office in how to respond constructively to minority Arabs asserting their rights.

Both Jay and Randi noted that the war had traumatized Israelis, which manifested in a kind of “collective depression” among the citizens, who, according to Jay, predicted the war would start again the following summer. “I felt the people were deeply dealing with the issue that we are going to be a country dealing with conflict for the rest of our lives,” he said.

Yet on a day-to-day basis, according to Randi, though conscious of the tension, people continued to work and play and were able to maintain a strong community life. And there are a lot of people working creatively to find ways to bridge the Arab-Jewish gap, they said.

After a time, even Liana, having found some friends in a Jewish youth group, began to feel at home, and the family settled into a society that for once was on their schedule, observing the weekly Sabbath. Mori especially appreciated being greeted every Friday with “Shabbat Shalom” by perfect strangers on the bus, in stores and on the streets, he said. While Israeli policy wasn’t perfect, Mori said, it was easier for him to feel proud of his country there, he said.

“It’s a nice feeling to be proud of your country and to have a strong national identity,” he said. “On independence day, I would put up a flag there, where I definitely wouldn’t think of hanging an American flag in front of my house here.”

Though Israel is in some sense a home that the Rothmans reclaimed as a family, Jay still has trouble imagining living there because of the military culture that overshadows life in the Middle East.

“Unless I can bring my pluralistic commitment and that notion of democracy and participation, I’d be giving up a major part of me,” he said. “By joining the military dynamic there, I’d be giving up what’s most important to me.”

Still, the Rothmans intend to return to Israel soon for a visit, perhaps next summer for a few months to brush up on their Hebrew. There is hope that the military culture may be starting to shift a little. According to Jay, people are beginning to see the military as a necessary evil rather than a badge of honor, and there is talk of substituting mandatory military service with non-military “national service.”

And they all have faith that at some point in the future both Israel and the U.S. will be two truly pluralistic and peaceful societies they can be proud to call home.

Contact: lheaton@ysnews.com