Lisa Goldman
New Lines Magazine / June 29, 2026
Emigration from Israel has been rising over the past two years, while immigration has been dropping.
According to Channel 12 News, Israel’s most-watched commercial television broadcast, the National Insurance Institute reported that in 2024 and 2025 more than 82,000 Israelis fell off the registry because they were no longer legal residents of the country. This happens either when someone has been abroad for more than five years, or because they have formally terminated their residency, meaning they do not plan to return. Israel is for the first time in its history seeing emigration outpace immigration. The data also shows that tens of thousands of people who once thought they would go abroad temporarily have since decided to make their permanent homes outside of Israel.
Meanwhile, Globes, a leading Israeli financial newspaper, reported that Israel now ranks eighth in the world in the number of applications for foreign passports and citizenships, which is in line with a trend I wrote about for New Lines Magazine in 2023. At that time, Israel ranked tenth, which means the trend of seeking a Plan B, “just in case,” is gaining momentum.
Social scientists cite several factors to explain these changes. One of them is deep disquiet over Israel’s future after Oct. 7, 2023.
The Globes article quotes an unnamed Israeli who had applied for German citizenship after Oct. 7; the Hamas-led attack, the hostage-taking and subsequent war convinced him that he and his family needed another country to look out for their interests. He shared the widespread perception among Israelis that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right government had deliberately abandoned the hostages in Gaza for political reasons. Many of the hostages who were Israelis with citizenship in another country were released because the governments of those countries negotiated with Hamas.
About half a million Israelis hold a European passport while a similar number hold, or are eligible for, an American or Russian passport.
Israelis are fairly obsessed with demography and security; the army consistently polls as the country’s most trusted institution. Currently, the Palestinian population, which includes citizens and those under military occupation in the West Bank and Gaza, is equal to the Jewish population. For decades, the government and the media have warned that Jews could become a minority in the territory under Israeli control. The country’s most popular satire program, “It’s a Wonderful Country,” has released several skits about the national obsession with demography (a recent one shows an Israeli and an American Jew meeting at Ben Gurion Airport; the Israeli is emigrating because he seeks a better future abroad, while the American Jew is moving to Israel because she fears antisemitism in the U.S.).
The failure of their government to protect them from the Oct. 7 attack is a national trauma that makes Israelis feel deeply unsafe. Netanyahu’s failure to deliver his much-promised “total victory” against Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the regime in Iran has exacerbated that insecurity. These factors, combined with the far-right government’s ongoing campaign to dismantle civil society and end the independence of the judiciary, which is the only check on the prime minister’s power, have led many Israelis to despair of their country’s future.
Before Oct. 7, when the major concern of the liberal opposition was the Netanyahu government’s plan to end the judiciary’s independence, there was a “relocation” trend. People who had the option of living a digital nomad lifestyle, or who worked for high-tech companies with offices abroad, said they would try living outside Israel for a year or two, leaving open the option to return when their children reached school age. It seems that many have decided not to return.
Israel’s educated liberal class is aware that the country is increasingly becoming a pariah state. The vast majority reject the conclusions of international bodies like the United Nations that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, but they understand the implications of being marginalized by the global community. They worry about their children’s future. Anecdotally, at least a dozen friends and acquaintances who once said they would never leave the country, not for patriotic reasons but because exile — living away from their families, friends, language and all that was familiar — would be too hard, have since changed their minds. Others have told me that while they do not have the option to leave, they despair over the country’s future and are educating their children to seek a life abroad.
For decades, Israelis were united in the belief that no matter what happened, their government would protect them. They no longer feel that this is the case. The numbers illustrate the consequences of that loss of faith.
Lisa Goldman is Europe Editor at New Lines Magazine
