44 | JANUARY 26 • 2023 

A

aron Poris is an “acci-
dental” journalist. So is 
Owen Alterman.
Both are Detroiters who had 
different professions before mak-
ing aliyah to Israel and whose 
first jobs in Israel were not in 
journalism.
Prior to making 
aliyah in 2015, 
Poris, ILTV’s 
anchor, reporter 
and editor-in-chief 
was a full-time 
art teacher at Our 
Lady of Mercy 
High School in 
Farmington Hills. 
“I studied art education … every 
medium you can think of, from 
jewelry and printmaking to 
drawing, painting and graphic 
design, and educational psychol-
ogy.
”
Poris, a Wayne State 
University and North 
Farmington High School alum-
nus, is K-12-certified in art.
For Alterman, i24 News 
senior diplomatic correspondent, 
traveling with prime ministers, 

meeting kings and reporting 
from war zones is a far cry from 
what seems to be a normal, 
pretty unexciting childhood 
in suburban Detroit in the late 
1980s and 1990s. Growing up 
in Bloomfield Township, the 
Bloomfield Hills Andover High 
School graduate left for an Ivy 
League education and has not 
looked back.
Living in Israel never was a 
foreign concept to Poris. “My 
mother is Israeli, and my par-
ents met in Israel. My father is 
American, but he made aliyah 
when 18 and did the army.
”
He said his father brought 
his bride back to Detroit before 
beginning a family and spoke 
Hebrew at home. “When I actu-
ally started going to kindergar-
ten, I didn’t speak any English. 
I had attended the JCC for 
preschool, and they didn’t know 
what to do with me.
”
So, it was no surprise to his 
mother when he told her he was 
making aliyah.
“I always just felt very attached 
to the country and to the culture 

and to the people. I remember 
when I told my mother finally,
” 
he related. “I said, ‘You know, 
I’m going; I think I’m going to 
move.
’”
Poris continued, “She said, ‘I 
figured that if any of the kids 
would have done that, it was you’ 
who would make aliyah.
”
Explaining his passion for 
Israel, he said, “I’m also quite 
Zionist in terms of politics. I 
obviously don’t agree with every-
thing that the country does, but 
I do believe in the core funda-
mental ideology behind Zionism 
that this country should exist 
and would like to see it continue 
to exist.
”
Alterman took a more circu-
itous route to Israel.
After graduating with a B.A. 
in Near Eastern studies from 
Princeton University, the now 
45-year-old headed to Eastern 
Europe with the United States 
Peace Corps for two years, where 
he “taught English, among other 
things.
” Economically, “Romania 
was a basket case,
” he said.
The 1990s were unkind to 

Romania after the fall of the Iron 
Curtain and the 1989 Romanian 
revolution. The nation expe-
rienced a decade of economic 
decline and instability. The 
government’s goal consistently 
was to join the European Union, 
taking the first formal steps only 
five years after the fall of the 
Soviet Union, and culminating 
in joining along with neighbor-
ing Bulgaria in 2007. 
Alterman was there in the 
midst of the structural economic 
reform. According to the official 
government Romanian Statistics 
Office, the country’s GDP rose a 
healthy 7% as he was leaving two 
years later. It has since grown 
more. “Being in the E.U. has 
helped a lot. It’s a different place 
than it was 25 years ago,
” he said.
Graduating from Harvard Law 
School in 2004, he went to Israel, 
“… for a year at the Supreme 
Court [as a foreign law clerk] 
and then [at the Reut Institute], 
a think tank. I went to New York 
after that in 2005 to a big firm.
”
After five years doing high-
priced litigation at Allen and 
Overy LLP
, Alterman made the 
decision. “I moved here; I made 
aliyah.
”
Pressed about his “moment,
” 
his decisor, he responded sim-
ply. “I love it and I believe in it. 
There is a one-hour speech, but 
at the end of the day, that’s what 
it comes down to” after actually 
considering the move for 16 
years, he said.
Poris’ story is a bit different. 
Coincidence, Hashgacha Pratit/
Divine providence/fate stepped 
in, directing him about when to 
make aliyah. “It’s like the chips 
just kind of fell in the right place 
at the right time as well. I was 
working at Mercy High School, 
and I had been heavily thinking 
about it. A couple of months 
later, my department head came 
to me and said, ‘Hey, we just got 
the budget for next year and we 

ERETZ

Metro Detroit natives end up with careers in Israeli media.
‘Accidental’ Journalists

Nathaniel 
Warshay
Contributing 
Writer

Owen 
Alterman 
on the air.

