By Daniel Rotman, Career Israel, Toronto, Canada

 

My first images of Israel are from TV clips during the Intifada in 2001: Israeli gunships were shown hovering over modern day ruins.  This was all I knew of the land that my parents had defended in their teens and left soon after for a different life in Canada. Then, after over 25 years in Canada, re-living old fears, they second guessed our upcoming family trip.  Too young to realize the impact of my statement, I told them, “If we don’t go now, we will never go.”

 

Growing up in Toronto, Canada, and raised by secular Israeli Jews, my identity was something of an enigma. My family was not a part of any Jewish community nor Canadian community. It wasn’t until my years at York University that I began to seriously inquire as to whom I was. I felt...