Israel Breaks Two Decade Aliyah Record, Expects 64,000 Immigrants By End of Year

A record number of immigrants are moving to the Jewish state amid regional conflict and Aliyah efforts, in a trend that Israeli officials expect is more likely to accelerate than reverse.

Nearly 60,000 people immigrated to Israel during the Hebrew calendar year 5782, which began on September 7, 2021 and ended on September 25, 2022, Israel’s Ministry of Aliyah and Absorption shared in an updated report on Wednesday, surpassing a two-decade high.

By the end of December 2022, Israel may greet more than 64,000 new immigrants, the Ministry stated. In comparison, some 323,000 immigrants made Aliyah in all of the last decade.

It would be the largest number of immigrants to Israel in a single year since 1999, when the country welcomed more than 76,000 newcomers — a figure that dropped steadily following the outbreak of the second Palestinian Intifada in 2000.

Of the immigrants who arrived in the past year, 47 percent came from Russia, while 25 percent came from Ukraine, six percent from the United States, four percent from France and Latin America each, two percent from Ethiopia, and 12 percent from the rest of the world.

The Ministry indicated that it expects immigration to remain at an elevated level amid geopolitical developments in former Soviet Union countries and continued fighting in Ukraine.

A smaller number of immigrants — some 1,500 — are also expected to arrive from Ethiopia before the end of 2022 as part of “Operation Tzur Israel,” an initiative launched in December 2020 to unify Ethiopian Israelis with family members who remained in Ethiopia, which has brought some 3,500 immigrants to Israel to date.

A majority — 63 percent — of all immigrants to arrive in the past year are working age, marking “a critical boost for the Israeli economy,” the Ministry stated. Of those, 27 percent are between the ages of 18-35, while 21 percent are ages 36-50 and 15 percent are ages 51-65. A further 23 percent are under 18 years old, while 14 percent are over 65 years old.

More than 6,000 immigrants settled in Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Netanya each, while Jerusalem took in some 4,300 more. Other top 10 destinations include Bat Yam, Ashdod, Rishon LeTziyon, Nahariya, Ashkelon, and Beit Shemesh.

The Ministry emphasized the benefits of the immigration wave, pointing out that newcomers who arrived in the last decade included thousands of doctors and medical professionals, researchers and scientists, engineers, teachers, students, and lone soldiers.

“I pray that next year,” said Immigration and Absorption Minister Pnina Tamano-Shata, “we will celebrate here with tens of thousands more new immigrants in Jerusalem.”