This page is still under construction.
Disclaimer: The author of this page was president of the North American Aliyah Movement as Yamit was being established. At that time, the movement was called AACA, an acronym for the Association for Americans and Canadians for Aliyah. As president I directed many of the people making Aliyah at that time to Yamit, a new and exciting location that was under construction at the time. The new immigrants would be pioneers in that settlement. They would determine its future and its development. The project was very exciting, and many immigrants did move to Yamit. They wanted to be part of this new beginning.
Yamit was a tremendous success. It was a wonderful, lovely, and happy community of good people who were excited about doing their part to make the Land of Israel bloom.
Unfortunately, the government of Israel made a peace agreement with Egypt after Yamit was settled. As part of the peace agreement, the Yamit settlement was dismantled and destroyed. This was quite traumatic for these in Yamit, and many of them returned to their country of origin.
Although I did not move to Yamit myself, I visited that wonderful community several times. I was proud to have done my part to help it get settled. When it was destroyed I felt guilty. I felt that I had misled people and sent them to a home that was then destroyed. I felt that I had given them faulty information.
True, I had no idea that it would be destroyed in the future. Nonetheless, the fact that the home that I had sent them to was destroyed was very difficult for me as well.
Subsequently, other settlements were dismantled as well. Gush Katif is a notable example in the summer of 2005, and other settlements were also destroyed by Israel for political reasons.
The trauma to the residents is obvious. The trauma to those who had helped them is less obvious, but is an issue as well.
Unfortunately, these issues repeat themselves. Settlements are developed with due fanfare; people are brought to live in the settlement, hopeful that they will be part of building Israel, and then they face a crushing blow when realpolitik convinces politicians to disband the settlement.
I promised these people a paradise, and they did indeed live in one. The government disappointed us.
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