Rahm Emanuel sits in a White House job soley on his ability to round up Jews to gain funds. Same when he worked in Investment banking that was his job. Apart from that one can't say he is a great orator or possesses any great quality for being a leader. Kind of reminds one of Bernie Madoff

Please do not allow your opinion about an ancient civlization and their homeland to be determined an emotional reaction to the opinion of a single individual like Hagai. Would you a;bandon the US because someone there told you they don't like Jews and wish t hey would go back to Europe or Israel,et? Why would you allow yourself to be dictated to either an anti-american Israeli or an anti-semitic American? I hope you will instead maintain your solidarity with our people and homeland.

This is just hatemongering. It's language and attitude is no different than religious fanatics from the US Christian right, or any polarized group flailing against those who don't agree with them 100%. Is there any wonder Diaspora Jews don't support Israel, when this kind of hostility is printed in Israeli media? I see that many Israelis and Americans disagree with the author--thank g-d!

Oh please. You have so many friends that you can afford to insult Americans?

What an absurd posting. You hate-filled Right-wingers are now even going to attack liberal Jews who visit Israel as Jew-haters? YOU are the Jew-hating Jew buddy. But don't worry, any Jew with half a brain wouldn't want to associate with you.

Don't be sily. IF you are really a committed Zionist suely one article will not stop you from supporting our homeland. check out your loyalites. Arw they to your hurt feelings, or to Israel?

So...which of those adjectives applies to you?

We would not want your kind here either. And keep your dollars to buy your way out to Australia when they kick you out of US..

That only people who intend to make Aliyah should come to Israel? That people who choose to live in the U.S. should NOT come to Israel for the Bar/Bat Mitzvah of their children? That unless you are going to move here there is something wrong? As someone who has made aliyah, this is one of the dumbest articles I have read in a long time. Have no illusions that all Jewish American's will move to Israel. It is not easy to leave families and the world you know to move half-way around the world. I would rather we embrace all of them who come to visit with open arms. Let them come, visit, tour, have Bar Mitzvah's wherever they choose, and go back with a wonderful experience.

Rahm's children are not even Jewish. His wife "converted" right before they got married. It was a Reform "conversion" just to please Rahm's parents. Ironically Zach is not definately not considered Jewish in Israel, as it should be.

You just put all Israelis and all olim into one of two horrible categories, and have the nerve to call it "The Truth". Sorry to see that you live here, attitudes like yours we can do without.

I know nothing about the Rahm guy, but what I am is a good face reader and can see through words like I was seeing them in a mirror. Having said that, I wouldn't trust Emanuel any more than I would trust an arab. He even looks arab. Watch your q's Israel. You have neither Son nor friend in Emanuel. Both him and the arab obama are two of a kind.

While I am no fan of Rahm Emanuel and his disastrous policies from a pro-Israel perspective, no one should mock American Jews for wanting to give their children a Bar Mitzvah in Israel. I am an American Jew and I most certainly don't view Israel to be Mar Mitzvah-land or Disneyland. I first came to Israel on a Birthright Israel trip in 2004 during the end of the Second Intifada. I then returned for a summer ulpan program at Hebrew University during the Second Lebanon War in 2006, for thirteen months between July 2007 and August 2008 for a study abroad program at Ben-Gurion University, for three weeks during the Gaza War, and on June 24, I made Aliyah. My husband is a Sabra and I met him when I studied abroad at Ben-Gurion University and we got married this past September. I started out by visiting Israel, then eventually I moved here. I did not pack my bags to move when I was 18 before even visiting here. In fact, studies show that olim that do that don't in most cases having suceessful aliyahs and then end up descending to the galut. The Israel Aliyah Office in the US heavilly discourages young American Jews from making Aliyah in the abscence of a visit for this reason. You can't expect people to leave behind every thing that they know before visiting Israel first unless they are living in a desperate situation in their countries of origin. For this reason, I support any Jew who wants their kid to do their bar mitzvah in Israel. When I was thirteen, I wanted to do my bat mitzvah in Israel, but my parents did not have the money for it. People should be doing every thing in their power to make Israel a positive experience for Diaspora Jews, so that they will want to come back, if not move here.

Although I essentially agree with you about Jews that shouldn't marry out. There are many exceptions to the rule. In fact my mum converted via Reform and I consider myself Jewish. I made Aliyah to Israel, Im a Zionist, i'll raise my family here. Times are changing.

I must say that each and every one of us (Jews) has the right to choose where we wish to live. If it hadn't been for my chance meeting with a SABRA in N.Y. I never would have landed here. God bless America - and Israel too !

are you serious? many in washington and in u.s jewry know emanua; for what he is- a little man, pushy, with a loud and foul mouth, who likes to intimidate others, but himslef highly insecure. and yes, HE is behind the obama anti- israle sentiments, not that b.o needed much encourgemnt... r. emanuel after the demise of this administration will return to obscurity and nothingness.

VERY SAD what is happening to the jews in the USA and around the world. people like emanuel are "dangerous". STAY HOME.

When you consider that Hussein Obama's mideast policies are widely viewed as not just failing, but so disasterous that they are now alarming every government converned with the M.E. EXCEPT Iran and Syria, you must conclude that this senior advisor is a disengenuous and lying betrayor of Israel. If Emmanuel is so assinine that he spent this precious meeting time with Jewish leaders to make some fluff speech about his kid's BM, then how should we assess the president's truthfulness about his support of Israel. This speech was a dodge. THE PRESIDENT HAD 3 DAYS TO APPEAR, SO WHERE WAS HE? Emmanuel appears to be in cahoots with a president who so hates Israel that he makes our PM arrive and leave meetings by a side door in the middle of the night. He unabashedly ignores the alarm over his positioning on the Israeli street. Rahm Emmanuel may be Jewish, but he is absolutely disengenuous in his loyalty to Israel. He is, to be brief, a liar. OBAMA OUT IN 2012! (and take your toady with you)

To see the real promised land that Moses missed on the way US-AMERICA !!!!!

I too have read more than once that Rahm Emanuel's wife did not have a Halachic conversion, which makes their son not Halachically Jewish!! I don't think that it's a bad thing to make Bar Mitzvahs here, the problem is the majority of Jews who never come here.

Mkor Rishon in Ivrit. Even there, like here, many don't approve of his superficial, often childish comments made in bad taste. Ynet deliberately and carefully chooses and prints articles that do not belong in its columns, with the sole aim of inciting hatred.

I disagree with Segal, a Jew should not be condemned for not feeling worthy to live in Israel yet. The problem is with Rahm specifically, not American Jews. This man is bringing his son to the Western Wall, yet he is sparing no effort to ensure that as soon as possible no Jew will be able to visit the Wall again, or any other Jewish historical site: Joshua's altar, the Beth El altar, Rachel's tomb, the tomb of the Patriarchs or Jericho. What will Rahm say if his son asks "Why must we pray at the foot of an unimportant wall instead of visiting the site of our Temple"? Will Rahm answer "Because you are a Jew"? and will Rahm proudly say "I did my part to make sure Jews like you aren't allowed to go there"?

I agree. Furthermore I think that by using these cheap tactics,so popular in modern times, that they only cheapen the value of their product.Glad I read your post. Wake up Ynet you should be at least one step ahead not 100 behind.

i just hope that the boy marries a jew!

Quote "Rahm Emanuel, possibly the most important Jew of this generation..." How is Rahm Emanuel possibly the most important of this generation? Who is he being compared with and what criteria is being used? Just curious.

"Once upon a time, Jews would arrive in Israel in order to be buried here; today, they drop by for a visit in order to celebrate a bar mitzvah" Are you suggesting that it would be preferable better for Israel to be a giant graveyard for bodies from abroad? "In the eyes of the young child, who barely understands a few words from the Haftarah he reads, Israel is a banquet hall, rather than a place to live in. In his parents’ view, Israel is an insurance policy, in case of some kind of future trouble. When he gets married, the son’s chuppah will be held by the Hudson River." And if the son grew up in Israel, he could go to college in the US, and decide, like our ancestor Jacob, to stay 21 years that seemed like "just a few days"? Maybe even marry a nice non-Jewish girl and stay for good, because rabbinic authorities make it impossible for her to convert and for his children to be registered as Jews? In point of fact, Rahm Emanuel's children have always gone to Jewish day schools, and are observant to an extent that Israelis can't possibly understand. Shabbat isn't a day either for throwing rocks or eating shrimp on the Tel Aviv beach. "By the time he turns 40 or 50, he will become a Woody Allan or a Bernard Madoff, or possibly a senior presidential aide on the issue of the settlements." Apparently you'd prefer him to make aliya and become Baruch Goldstein or Yaakov Teitel or YOU (who Jeffrey Goldberg of the New Yorker calls "a veteran of the terrorist underground, Haggai Segal-he planted the bomb that blew off the legs of the mayor of Ramallah, in 1980")? Fortunately those aren't the only choices for a young Jewish American. He could grow up to be Rahm Emanuel or David Axelrod!

You are mixing 2 different topics here; R Emmanuel and Jewish American tourists. What do you care why American Jews come? I made Aliyah 26 years ago and am very happy here, but most American Jews would not be happy living in Israel. I welcome all visitors who come for whatever reason.