229 New Immigrants Land in Israel. Flight LY3004 from New York was not just another regular El Al flight. Its passengers were neither tourists visiting the holy land, nor were they Israelis returning from a trip abroad.
Twenty Tunisian Jews left the country for Israel because of the instability following the popular uprising which ousted Tunisia’s President Ben Ali, and dozens of others are also considering the move, reports said.
A group of 175 Ethiopians who claim Jewish heritage landed in Israel on Monday, seeking to become citizens of the Jewish state, a government agency in charge of helping new immigrants said.
More than 19,000 ‘olim’ or new immigrants chose to make their home in Israel in 2010, a 16% increase in comparison with 2009, according to figures from the Jewish Agency and the Israeli ministry of immigrant absorption.
The Jewish Agency for Israel brought 1,000 new immigrants from 17 countries to Israel last week, including 550 new olim from France, more than 100 from the United Kingdom, 60 from South Africa and 170 from South America.
Baron Edouard de Rothschild, a French businessman who is the main shareholder of the left-wing French newspaper Libration, has decided to move to Israel.
Riots in April led to the ouster of the country's president and thousands have been killed as ethnic tensions flared between Uzbeks and Kyrgyz this month.
