''if you're a Jew, Zionism mkaes good sense''
Then why are so many leaving?
Aliyah sees 9% dip from 2005
By Moti Bassok
Only 19,264 people immigrated to Israel in 2006, down nine percent from 2005. It is the lowest number of immigrants recorded since 1988.
Nearly 3 million people have immigrated to Israel since the country's founding in 1948, roughly one third of which immigrated during the 1990s. Some 300 people immigrated from India in 2006 - a fivefold increase from 2005.
According to the Central Bureau of Statistics, since 2002 - the year in which the major wave of immigration from the former Soviet Union came to an end - there has been a consistent downward trend in immigration. In 2006, immigration was down to 1980s levels, during which time 9,000-24,000 people immigrated annually.
In 2006, only 2.7 people immigrated for every 1,000 veteran residents. In 1990-91, at the height of immigration from the former Soviet Union, that figure stood at an average of 35 per 1,000, and from 1990-2001, it averaged 17 per 1,000. Starting in 2003, that figure fell to below 3.8 per 1,000 - also the rate during 1980-89, the period of lowest immigration in Israel's history.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/828415.html
Emigration from Israel exceeds immigration, report
04/20/2007
Tel Aviv (dpa) - In Israel, the number of emigrants exceeded the number of immigrants for the first time in 20 years, the Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot reported Friday.
Many emigrants were recent arrivals who wanted to leave Israel again, the report said. In 2007, 14,400 immigrants are expected in Israel while 20,000 people are expected to leave the country, according to the report based on figures for the first months of 2007.
The last time emigration exceeded immigration was in the aftermath of the 1973 Yom Kippur War and in 1983 and 1984 when inflation was high.
Meanwhile the Maariv newspaper reported that approximately a quarter of the Israeli population was considering emigration.
Almost half of the country's young people were thinking of leaving the country, the report said. Their reasons included dissatisfaction with the government, the education system, a lack of confidence in the political ruling class and concern over the security situation.
http://stlouis.ujcfedweb.org/page.html?ArticleID=144274