Aliyah is increasingly becoming a story not just about arriving in Israel, but about building something inside it. That theme emerged clearly during a ynet Global discussion, featuring three Olim who made Aliyah with the assistance of Nefesh B’Nefesh, in cooperation with the Ministry of Aliyah and Integration, the Jewish Agency for Israel, Keren Kayemeth Le-Israel, and Jewish National Fund-USA.
These three individuals’ lives in Israel now stretch across advocacy, sports, entrepreneurship and community building.
Studio interview Danielle Yablonka, AJ Mitnick, Hilli Marcu
Danielle Yablonka, who made Aliyah around a year and a half ago, arrived in Israel already carrying a growing global platform centered on Jewish identity, advocacy and social media influence. Today, the entrepreneur and Miss Herzliya 2025 finalist has transformed much of that audience into a platform focused on Israel, antisemitism awareness and public advocacy.
“I actually never even thought about making Aliyah,” Yablonka said. “Then I finally came here and felt it as an adult, found a community and said, ‘I have to be in this country.’ After October 7th, there was no question.”
Yablonka explained that her advocacy work began years earlier through Holocaust remembrance art projects and online conversations about antisemitism, before evolving into a much larger digital presence after October 7.
“I joked that I tricked people into following me for fashion and modeling, and then suddenly they were learning about Judaism and Israel,” she said.
She also described using international pageantry platforms, including her participation in Miss Herzliya and upcoming plans to compete in Miss Tel Aviv, as another avenue to represent Israel globally.
“Anywhere that we can represent Israel and define what Israel is about, that’s where I want to be,” she said.
For AJ Mitnick, founder and CEO of Maccabi Aliyah, the connection between sports and belonging became central to his life in Israel. Mitnick, who has lived in the country for more than 15 years, built Maccabi Aliyah into a basketball-centered community helping new immigrants integrate socially and professionally through sports.
He recalled first feeling deeply connected to Israel during solidarity trips in the years of the Second Intifada, and later through Maccabi Tel Aviv’s golden era in European basketball.
“Seeing that you can do it in Israel really opened my eyes,” Mitnick said, describing how Israeli basketball helped merge his love of sports, Israel and Jewish identity.
Today, Maccabi Aliyah functions as far more than a sports organization. According to Mitnick, the network helps Olim find roommates, jobs, friendships and support systems that often become essential during the adjustment process.
“You have a consistent group of friends, a WhatsApp group, people who help you move your fridge or deal with bureaucracy,” he said. “It gives you another sense of community.”
Hilli Marcu, founder of the Tel Aviv business What the Ficus TLV, described how entrepreneurship in Israel can become deeply personal, especially during wartime. Marcu, who has lived in Israel for nearly a decade, built the popular Tel Aviv plant and lifestyle brand with her husband, only to see their newly opened shop damaged by a missile strike during the war.
“The whole front half was destroyed,” she said. “But at the end of the day, you have to be grateful no one got hurt.”
Despite the destruction, Marcu said the response from the surrounding community reinforced exactly why she chose to build her life in Israel.
“You’re overwhelmed by the amount of community and people who come to support you,” she said. “You won’t find that in any other country in the world, in my opinion.”
For all three participants, Aliyah was described less as a single moment of arrival and more as an ongoing process of contribution, resilience and identity, one increasingly tied to shaping the country itself from within.
In collaboration with Nefesh B’Nefesh
First published: 14:54, 05.06.26