This flight was supposed to take place earlier, but on June 13, Israel launched a preemptive strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Planes stopped flying, borders closed, plans changed. But as soon as the skies over Israel became safe – people arrived. They didn’t delay for a month, didn’t wait for full stabilization. The next day.

You won’t find this anywhere else in the world. Usually, war means exodus, evacuation, seeking a safe haven. Israel remains the only country where people strive to go during military actions, not despite them.

Since October 7, 2023, more than 45,000 new repatriates have arrived in the country. A third of them are people under 35, those who make a conscious choice not just of a place to live, but of a destiny. They could have stayed in relatively calm Europe, could have chosen Canada or Australia. They chose Israel.

“The war has exposed the true face of European anti-Semitism,” explains Marina Rosenberg Koritny, Head of the Department for the Promotion of Aliyah of the World Zionist Organization. “And it’s not just about open hostility on the streets, in university campuses, and the media’s stance. The problem is deeper – in the governments’ and society’s helplessness to change the situation, in the inability and unwillingness to protect their Jewish citizens.”

In this situation, Israel turns out to be not just an alternative, but the only place where one can live without looking over their shoulder, without hiding, without apologizing for who you are. Even when there is war here. Even when you have to join the army. Even when the future is uncertain.

The 110 people who boarded the flight from Paris made a choice not between war and peace. They chose between fear and the freedom to be themselves.