Israel is at war. Israel is riven with partisan dissent. Israel is crazily expensive, requiring both parents to work and grandparents to help rear their little ones. Oh, and yes, the number of people who left the country rose significantly last year.
If that sounds like a society in extremism, filled with self-doubt, if not self-loathing, you might be onto something, except for one revealing fact: Israel has by far the highest birthrate among Western countries.
In fact, other than tiny Monaco and its disproportionately wealthy population, Israel is the only Western country to boast an above-replacement birthrate. Ours is not just above replacement; it’s way above.
Replacement is deemed to be 2.1 births per woman. Israel’s Jewish birthrate hovers just above 3 per woman and is now slightly higher than the Arab birthrate here.
Our birthrate is not just limited to the haredi (ultra-Orthodox) community (whose rate has been slowly declining over the past few years) but represents an across-the-social-spectrum-phenomenon.
Three kids seem to have become the norm in Israeli society, much as having two kids was the norm in post-war America. No one blinks an eye when people say they have four kids, and even five sounds normative.
Why does Israel have a high birth rate?
What is going on? How does this happen in the face of almost unparalleled adversity and insecurity? By the way, births rose some 5% in Israel from 2023 to 2024, boosted by a 10% rise in the final months of war-torn 2024.
Is this some kind of social whistling past the graveyard or the widespread, willful suspension of disbelief? Or rather, is this a profound existential statement, a desire for the future, a cleaving to life itself, an act that reveals the depth and strength of the Jewish soul?
Why have those difficulties, prevalent across the board in all western societies, succeeded in derailing almost all Western family formation and then family growth, while here in Israel abortions are declining and single people and gay couples strive as well to have children?
Ultimately, I believe that the very existence of the phenomenon elicits reasons, explanations, and perspectives that might provide some light on it.
The question, therefore, is not just why a society would embrace childbirth but also what the embrace of childbirth says about a society?
What is it that Israelis, across the board, see in having and raising children that others don’t? Why would Israelis not be impeded from having kids or not be deterred by the all too obvious impediments and difficulties that having children represent?
All kids are cute, but they are also demanding. But what differentiates between having one kid and saying, “Well, we did it,” and having one and saying, “well, this is a great start?”
One thing I happily often notice is how involved, affectionate, and playful fathers are with their children. There is no reserve, no distance, no feeling that this is not something men do. Indeed, men do it, love it, and look forward to it.Children are not relegated; they are shared as an endeavor by both parents.
This willingness to enjoy children, this desire to participate in their upbringing, might provide some insights. They are the great project, the ultimate start-up. They are the canvas ready for the portrayal of the human spirit.
Is there something about being Jewish that leads people to have children? Well, in the United States, non-religious Jews are having children at the same below-replacement levels as their Gentile neighbors.
Does that mean that religious people find special meaning in having children? Perhaps, but less observant Jews in Israel are also having a multitude of kids.
Maybe there is something about living in the Land that was given to the Jews by God to be an eternal inheritance? After all, how does it stay an eternal heritage if you are not populating it?
As an oleh (new immigrant), I am more than prepared to believe that there is a spirit, a character, and a specialness to this place that enhances the desire to be part of it, to see oneself as a contributor to the ongoing saga that is living in Israel.
But I also believe there is a transferability from our experience of having lots of children. In other words, there is a “light unto the nations” aspect of our experience with children, and that light has to be able to shine elsewhere as well.
We have children hoping that they survive and surpass us and that they in turn will want to keep the party going with children of their own. Children represent the potential to make the world a better place. They are the ultimate tikkun olam because their efforts will continue once we are all gone.
Children represent the future
To have children is to welcome the future, hopefully one better than the present. Look at our amazing soldiers, the hundreds of thousands who proudly came to Israel’s rescue after October 7.
They came from somewhere. They bore the imprint of their parents, grandparents, teachers, and communities. We, their forebears, get some of the credit for their heroism and hope in turn that their heroism rubs off on their own children.
We are willing to be engaged. We want our imprimatur to last, and we believe that with all its problems, life is worth sustaining, replicating, and, yes, striving to make it better.
Israel is indeed an adventure. Perhaps when others see that we are encountering life, with all its difficulties and absurdities, as an adventure worth sustaining, then we can lead by example.
Perhaps that is too much to hope for, let alone to expect. But it is a great aspiration, right up there with wanting to have children, lots of wonderful children.
The writer is chairman of the Board of Im Tirtzu and a director of the Israel Independence Fund.