Are you crazy?

 Have you ever wondered if you are crazy? Did you move your family to Israel? There's your answer. Did you stay? Did you fall for the line that the first year is hell but it becomes heaven for those who stay on? So now you know, you are crazy.

You have to be crazy, genuinely crazy to move from an affluent, free, and safe society like the USA to live in a lunatic asylum like Israel. It's not just about the tyranny and police abuse, it's also 3 bedroom apartments that cost $800,000. It's about sweat shop level jobs. It's about rude people who respond to requests for directions with the eloquent expression "F... off." I have encountered that numerous times.

It's about mandatory military conscription and a military that sends soldiers into dangerous situations without blinking and for nothing, just to show how tough they are. It's about a country that is so aggressive and so paranoid that they bombed seven countries this month.

If you want to get a divorce, come to Israel because I know oleh after oleh whose marriages fall apart here. If you want to ruin your children come to Israel because I know family after family who have a kid who lost his way here. Some of the best kids can't handle this place, can't handle the bullying Israelis, the howling teachers, the pressure, the crowded buses, the lack of play space. One of them passed by me this Shabbos. He was one of best yeshiva boys around, a mentch, a masmid. Now, I'm not even sure if he keeps Shabbos. He has long hair and was dressed all in black, black shirt, black everything, which evidently is how he feels about his life. Another one is a cashier at a local supermarket. He has piercings all over his face. These are American olim. They get ruined in the so called Jewish state. 

I'm warning you, don't move to this place. It's a horrible country. It's not even a country. It's a prison. And anybody who tells you otherwise is somebody you should stay far from. How far? I recommend 7 to 10 time zones. A galaxy would be better, but time zones will do if you have the sense never to talk to such a bastard ever again. Never once, not even to say hello, not even to forgive him should he ever wake up because he'll just try to con you into something else.