Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu welcomed a planeload of olim on Tuesday at Ben Gurion Airport, telling them "we're close to a tipping point."According to the prime minister, "for the first time in 2,000 years, there are going to be more Jews in Israel than outside it."Speaking to a terminal full of olim from the United States and Canada, who came with Nefesh B'Nefesh on the organization's 38th chartered aliya flight since the first one in July 2002, Netanyahu noted that Israel's Jewish population was nearing the six million mark. Full speech:
"You know what a tipping point is? A tipping point is when something changes “bevat echat” – on the spot. We’re very close to a tipping point. I think all of you are going to be part of it, and you’ll witness it. And here it is: for the first time in about 2,000 years, there are going to be more Jews in Israel than Jews outside of Israel. This has been a long time coming. We had a very large diaspora in the Eastern Mediterranean and Egypt and what is today Turkey, and it branched out but then it got a whopping increase when we lost our independence under the Romans and under the Arab conquest. The country depleted and the Jews left their land, and from there we went from one catastrophe to another.
And so our whole history since that, in the last 2,000 years, has been to come back to this land, re-establish our independent state and our ability to control our fate and our destiny, and that involves the ingathering of the exiles. That’s the number one base for the re-establishment of Israel and for the continuation of the State of Israel.
In the 19th century, when this modern return began, we were about 30,000 Jews here. We already had a majority in Jerusalem, but we were about 30 to 40 thousand. At the beginning of the State in 1948, we were 600,000, and very soon, because of your efforts and our efforts, we are now close to six million Jews, and the number of Jews is going to grow and grow and grow because the Jewish future is here in Israel.
So when I say to all of you, as did Natan Sharansky, who exemplified it in his own great struggle for freedom and the return; and as did Tony Gelbart, who’s been a visionary; and Rabbi Fass who’s been there with him; and all the others who are here today – I have to say that when we say “welcome home”, we mean it in the historical sense and in the personal sense. Welcome home, bruhim haba’im. Bruhim haba’im habaytah!
I want to welcome especially Leon Gordis. Leon, I hope I’m not revealing a state secret, is 75 years old. Leon, would you stand up? Leon? Look young. Thank you. And your wife Hadassah is with you. Welcome Hadassah too. Thank you.
I’d like to ask the parents of three-month-old Orly Rosen to stand up with Orly. Where are you? Where? Mazal tov to you.
So we have three months to 75 years. I think this is quite a gathering. We have 238 people here. We have doctors, bankers, heads of departments, businesspeople; we have grandparents, we have grandchildren. This is an extraordinary experience and extraordinary collection. The Aliyah from North America and from other Western countries contributes to us what immigrants from everywhere contribute to us – that is the strengthening and revitalization of the strength and the realization of the dream of centuries. But you do something else. You bring in a professionalism, dedication to work and to excellence, an antipathy – this I like – an antipathy to bureaucracy. You know, go ahead: voice it, express it. Believe me, you’ll find a ready ear here. We want to change this country. We want to make it at once not only the realization of the dreams of the past, but a beacon to the future. This will be the most advanced country in the world – it already is in some areas. But we can make it excellent in all areas, and you’re part of that – an important part of that.
So we want you to bring in the dream of ages in your commitment to our commitment. But we also want you to bring in the things that you learn, the things that you yourself are part of in the United States, in Canada and elsewhere – how we make this country better, more competitive, more friendly to its citizens, and how we make the bureaucracy smaller – I’m very good for that.
And this is why I welcome what Tony did. Tony basically said, we’ll cut through the bureaucracy, we’ll go around it, and we’ll get the bureaucracy – the government and the Jewish Agency – to support this. And we are, and we have and we will. But the most important thing is that you are here and you have an opportunity to start your own new, personal life part as of our own, new renewal in the land of our forefathers. You’re going to pass here to Modi’in, some of you will go to Be’er Sheva, others will go the Golan, and others will go to Jerusalem. So this is a real homecoming. Build our home, be part of our lives. Welcome home".
