34 | JULY 1 • 2021 

ERETZ

E

ach month, we’ll feature a 
Metro Detroiter who has 
made aliyah.

Q: Tell me about your life in 
Detroit and what your connection 
was to Israel.
Rachel Lichtenstein: I was 
born in Israel, but I was raised 
in Detroit from the age of 3. I 
went to Thompson Junior High 
[Southfield] and Vandenberg 
Elementary [Detroit].
Although I was raised in 
Detroit, I used to come back 
and forth to Israel all the time. 
I enlisted in the Israeli army 
when I was 18, and I served for two 
years. It was an amazing experience, 
and that was the beginning of my 
finding religion. My father had become 
religious prior to that, and I had wanted 
nothing to do with it. But being in the 
army gave me a sense of something 
bigger than myself, and when I finished 
the army after two years, my first 
college experience was at Tel Aviv 
University.
Then, I went back to the States and 
worked for National Conference of 
Synagogue Youth (NCSY) and started 
going to Oakland County Community 
College and Wayne State. I came back 
to Israel and went to seminary for a 
year, then I went back to Detroit and 
met my husband, Moshe. We lived in 
Israel for two years and then we went 
back to Detroit for 12 years before we 
made aliyah.
In those 12 years that we were in 
Detroit, I had six boys. All of them went 
to Yeshiva Beth Yehudah. My husband 
was a board member of Congregation 

Beth Tefilo Emanuel Tikvah in 
Southfield. We lived two blocks from 
my parents and across the street from 
my brother. It was a good life.

Q: What finally prompted your aliyah 
and what was it like?
RL: I had always yearned to be here. 
It had always been a goal of mine, and it 
took 12 years of convincing my husband 
to finally get him on board. I started 
the process of aliyah even before my 
husband agreed.
My kids were automatically Israeli 
because I was born here, so I got them 
all their Israeli passports, and I had 
already applied for aliyah with the 
consulate in Chicago. Then one day, 
out of the blue, my husband said, “I’m 
ready to give Israel a try.” The minute 
he said he was ready, I said, “Hold 
that thought.” I called the consulate 
in Chicago and said, “Okay, process!” 
Within nine months, we were here.
We made aliyah on the first Nefesh 
B’Nefesh flight of 2002, so it will be 19 
years this August.

My husband and I came with 
our seven boys, and I was pregnant 
with my daughter. We settled in 
Ramat Beit Shemesh and rented 
two different apartments until we 
bought our home.
I have not once regretted that 
decision. I feel we are living the life 
that Hashem expected of us to live.

Q What have you been doing beside 
raising your family here in Israel?
RL: I had a playgroup in my 
house for a number of years. 
During that time, I also went back 
and took a course to become a 
life coach. Because I had been an 
advocate for olim and helped them with 
bureaucracy, I became a life coach for 
olim and for at-risk youth. At the time 
that I took the course to become a life 
coach, I also opened a ceramic studio 
with a friend, and we were in business 
for about a year.
My husband has been working for a 
wills and estates company here in Israel 
for more than 10 years. We have four 
married kids and soon-to-be seven 
grandchildren, and my parents live near 
me now.

Q: What do you miss about Detroit?
 RL: The people — whether it’s family 
or the few close friends that I’m still in 
touch with today, even though I don’t 
see them. That is the only thing I really 
miss.

Q: Do you have a message for the people 
reading this interview?
 RL: If you’re Jewish and you identify 
as being Jewish, come home. And do 
not let anything stand in the way. 

Native Israeli brought her family to her homeland.
Rachel Lichtenstein

AVIVA ZACKS CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Moshe and Rachel Lichtenstein

COURTESY OF THE LICHTENSTEINS

MEET THE OLIM

