Spaces are filling up fast for Americans traveling to Israel to learn about its war in Gaza and show “solidarity” with the Israeli Defense Forces.
Multiple companies are offering “mission” trips to Israel as the nation bombards neighboring Gaza, while the IDF has killed more than 30,000 Palestinians, the majority of whom were women and children.
Jewish National Fund-USA Travel and Tours is offering a four-day volunteer mission trip to Israel for $2,000 per person, excluding air fare.
Its website features a quote from bestselling American author Brene’ Brown: “Sometimes the bravest and most important thing you can do is … show up.”
Promised “highlights” of the trip are “picking vegetables and other crops that will ensure we will help prevent a massive shortage in the Israeli market and that no farmer is left alone”; spending time “with evacuees and the people who are providing lifesaving efforts to support them”; rebuilding “Israel’s southern communities affected by Oct. 7 … to create a better future for the land and the people of Israel”; and meeting with “Israelis, soldiers, survivors and influential figures to hear firsthand about the ongoing situation and personal experiences.”
Upcoming trips in March, April and May are sold out, but space is still available for trips in June, July and August.
Disclaimer trip participants sign with Aylet Tours.
Ayelet Tours just completed a 5-day “Solidarity Mission to Israel” tour led by Rabbi Susan Rheins. The Feb. 11-16 tour offered deluxe accommodations and meals and promised: ”In Israel’s time of need, we invite you on a unique mission. Travel to Israel to volunteer, show support for the victims of terror, console the families of the hostages and those displaced, to meet with leaders, first responders, social service agencies and more. Join us and support Israel by being there in person at this critical time!”
Additional Ayelet solidarity tours are planned for March 17-22 and June 26-July 3.
The company’s website says: “We are currently operating multiple solidarity missions — offering Israelis emotional support through this terrible time.”
Israel Connection Tours also offers “solidarity trips” to Israel.
“Through volunteering initiatives, heartfelt interactions and acts of kindness, we aim to contribute to the healing process, standing side by side with those who have endured the impact of terror,” the website publicity says. “This trip serves as a bridge of understanding and empathy, fostering connections between volunteers and the brave individuals who defend and rebuild their communities.”
Ed Hill Tours just today completed a nine-day “solidarity mission” tour in Israel. This was done in partnership with evangelist Mike Evans and the Friends of Zion Heritage Center in Jerusalem. Cost to each participant was $1,390 plus airfare.
“Ever since the barbaric attack on Oct. 7, Friends of Zion has been providing ongoing support, supplies, meals and housing to untold numbers of displaced families, Holocaust survivors, and IDF soldiers both serving or wounded,” the website says. “Thousands of Israelis are displaced from both the south and the north or have lost everything including family, even children who have lost one or both parents. When they see multitudes demonstrating against Israel, it is not enough for us to simply say a prayer … they also need to see us, and we want them to see us as agents of hope and blessing.”
None of these tour promotions mention anything about the ongoing Israeli assault against Palestinians in Gaza or the 30,000 Palestinians killed — 22 times the number of Israelis killed in the Hamas surprise attack of Oct. 7.
As pressure mounts around the world for a ceasefire and as most of Gaza lays in rubble, American evangelicals are traveling to Israel and to within a mile of the border to show support for the IDF and to help harvest food because of the labor shortage created by Israel’s conscription of 360,000 reservists to fight in Gaza.
Travel Weekly took note of this trend in a Feb. 26 article titled “Solidarity travel’ lifts Israel’s visitor numbers amid war.”
It reported: “Despite the ongoing war with Hamas, Israel’s ministry of tourism reports that in January, the country reached 34% of the number of North American tourists it had during the same month of 2023.
Chad Martin, Israel Ministry of Tourism’s director of the U.S. Northeast region, called the number “astounding” and “inspiring.”
Travel Weekly said Mejdi Tours, a Florida-based company, is the only tour operator offering trips with another viewpoint that tells both sides of the story. These “socially conscious group tours” are led by both Israeli and Palestinian guides.
Mejdi Tours plans to resume tours to Israel March 9 with a six-day itinerary called “Israel and Palestine Beyond the Headlines.”
The magazine quoted Kim Passy Yoseph, director of operations, as saying Mejdi wants to counteract “what she sees as a growing number of tours capitalizing on the recent tragedies from a one-sided, pro-Israel perspective.”
She explained: “There is no other company today that is willing and brave enough to offer an additional narrative. Everyone is so strongly stuck to their own narrative and stuck to the idea that one side has to be right. And they’re doing trips that are solely focused on one side.”
On the Jewish National Fund-USA Travel and Tours website, New York City resident Karen Kolodny offers a testimony of her recent experience on a solidarity tour.
“The most impactful and meaningful part of the trip was the hours of volunteer work that we did,” she wrote. “Since Oct. 7, Israel’s $2 billion agricultural industry lacks thousands of day workers, and this void is having a major impact on the economy. Someone has to tend the farm, and that is what we did. … Our mission also worked with Sar-El in an army warehouse and packed 16,000 bags of energy snacks for soldiers in Gaza. By doing this work, soldiers or other civilians could focus on other tasks or family members. We witnessed these bags of snacks immediately get boxed up and loaded onto pallets and were told they were heading out to the battlefields in Gaza the next day. How rewarding — to see our work immediately and directly get into use and have an impact.”