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does anyone have any ideas what one should do regarding getting a student visa for seminary when one of your parents are an israeli citzen and you dont want to become one?
if you have any ideas or know someone that was/is in the same situation please let me know!
thanx
Touch base with the Sochnut
It is basically impossible. If your parents are Israeli they make you get an Israeli passport (not make Aliyah but be a citizen) the only way I know out is to spell your last name differently (in Hebrew) then your parents and even then they can catch on. If you are a male the problem is worse because of the army.
In Any case Behatzlacha
If the Israelis give you any trouble, notify the U.S. Embassy or Consulate (or the embassy of whichever country you’re from) of your troubles. The Israelis are afraid of messing or getting into trouble or bumping heads with American diplomats regarding causing problems for American citizens. (Actually with any foreign citizens but especially Americans once the embassy/diplomats start making a stink about the issue.)
Especially since technically it is illegal for American citizens to serve in the Armed Forces of any foreign nation. But it works regarding any kind of headaches the Israelis might make for an American or other foreign citizen.
Do NOT!!!! tell them you are israeli. the only real eitzah is to lie when you go dor your visa and change your arents names and where they were born. otherwise, theyll mkae you a citizen AND make you pay backtaxes since you were born. ive seen it. do not tell anyone in any official capacity that you are the child of a natural israeli. simple.
Do NOT!!!! tell them you are israeli. the only real eitzah is to lie when you go dor your visa and change your arents names and where they were born. otherwise, theyll mkae you a citizen AND make you pay backtaxes since you were born. ive seen it. do not tell anyone in any official capacity that you are the child of a natural israeli. simple.
Toi – can they figure it out anyways even if you don’t tell them?
No. they will ask you for the names and maiden names of your mother and father, and where your g-parents were born. they may also ask if anyone of them is israeli. you need to say no. and stick to it.
I was in the presence of a great RY that when asked by a talmid as to what to tell them in this situation replied in yiddish, ven ich hob gigangen tzu misrad hapnim, ich hob zey gezogt az mine tatte’s nummen is moshe charles!
which it isnt.
I see, so lying is fine. Well, that’s nice to know. And silly me just thought one should always be honest, especially facing government officials.
Do NOT!!!! tell them you are israeli. the only real eitzah is to lie when you go dor your visa and change your arents names and where they were born. otherwise, theyll mkae you a citizen AND make you pay backtaxes since you were born. ive seen it. do not tell anyone in any official capacity that you are the child of a natural israeli. simple.
No, it’s not simple. The Israeli’s have these electronic devices called “computers,” and the computers are linked on a thing called a “network.” The information needed is all there on the screen. They may not catch you when you go through Ben Gurion, but if the authorities do catch on to what you are trying to pull, they will arrest you, even if you’re at school.
The American embassy will not be able to do anything to help, because at that point you are already identified as an Israeli citizen; once you are in Israel, Israeli law takes precedence over American law.
What I would strongly suggest is that you contact either the closest Israeli consulate to where you live now, or contact the embassy in Washington. The only problem you may have doing that now is that many of the Israeli diplomatic workers are on strike, and they are not processing any visas right now.
Good luck.
We lied to the Cantonist government too when they wanted to draft our children.
ya that was dumb of you.
Toi, it’s very lucky you didn’t mention the name of your ‘great RY’ – would have been Loshon Hora/Chillul Hashem/Bizoyon Talmidei Chachomim to report that he advises people to lie?
How is that not geneivas da’as? More to the point, if you do in fact owe back taxes, how is that not geneiva?
as toi said the only way is to lie but you also will have to make up their birth dates and remember it for next time around
takah: Actually American diplomats in the embassy very much *will* intervene if you’re a U.S. Citizen and request their assistance. They are legally obligated to take your case up with the Israeli authorities irregardless whether or not the American citizen holds dual citizenship with any other country. As far as the U.S. Consulate is concerned you hold a U.S. passport and that is all they care about and they will intervene on your behalf.
It is certainly worthwhile getting the American diplomats (or the diplomats of your country) involved on your behalf. The Israelis are quesy about messing with America. Just the fact that America is coming to her citizens defense will possibly cause the Israelis to back off. I know of such a case where an American in the IDF was discharged only after getting the U.S. Embassy involved.
And especially considering if it is a case of a born-and-bred American citizen who lived in America and who is only a technical Israeli by virtue of one or both of his parents Israeli passport, America will certainly come to bat on his behalf.
takah- bad idea. newsflash, the Israelis have not linked their computer systems.
you wont get nailed as a student. gimme a break. i know dozens of people who have a parent thats israeli and have pulled this off. OP, do not go to anyone official to help you, they will only mess you over. another pointer, when trying to avoid getting nailed by israelis, dont take advice from anyone on here who sympathizes with anything zionist, they have too much faith in a very messed up system.
If a person was born outside Israel and his Israeli parents never registered his birth with Israel, I dont see how the Israelis (in general) can link him to who his parents are unless he tells them.
Why don’t you take a trip outside of Israel when your tourist visa is going to expire or a few weeks later and then make sure to go home for Pesach. (I am assuming you are going to be a seminary student, so ignore this if you’re not). If you are only going to be here for the school year then you won’t ever have to apply for a student visa.
Toi, my husband would love you! You’re just his type!
i said so: Israel has a procedure where you can renounce your Israeli citizenship.
Good Luck!
It is not always as simple as presented by some.
We had children living in Israel. One had no problem and the other was given the run around and could not even get health insurance. Whatever they tried did not work. So they came bach to the USA.
Even if your parent(s) were not born in Israel but lived there for even a short time, they may bother you.
Each time we travel, they bother me tooand ask for my Israeli passport. They have even used tricks to try to frame me, but i’m the wrong person to start with.
In the past, my husband asked to have both his Israeli and US passport stamped. On our most recent trip to Israel they refused and only stamped his Israeli passport.
Good Luck!!!
Ms. Critique: What difference does it make which one (or two) passports they stamp?
For one’s personal record of howmany times they visit Israel and for reasons if the government starts up with you and you end up with someone who does not speak not understand English well!
What we’ve successfully done a few times already is have our child pick a cousin as his “parents”. Just in case get/memorize their names, birthday’s and address. Most Seminaries submit for many students’ visas together-in bulk, so it’s easier this way. We haven’t had a problem. No guarantees or responsibility but as long as YOU have never been entered in their system, it should work.
BTW- after 20 years of going in and out with my US Passport, one visit they asked for my Israeli Passport. Seems like the computer system finally caught up. I never pulled any other “shtick” or took anything from them, so there was nothing they could catch me on (-don’t get greedy, that’s when one makes a mistake and they can catch you)
If a person was born outside Israel but has one or two Israeli parents, even if the child never lived in Israel the Israelis will still give him a hard time regarding army or passport if they know he has an Israeli parent?
when i went to seminary, what one girl did was she that i think the rule is that you dont need a student visa unless you are there for 3 months or more. Every 3 months or so she would leave the country. it sounds annoying but it ended up working out because she went home for pesach and then twice she just went to one of the greek islands, that is an hour flight from israel, for the day. hatzlacha
She could’ve simply walked into Jordon and come back.
you think the jordan river would have split for her or she would have to pay for a flight cuz eppis then its not worth it ya know?
Isn’t there an international bridge? I believe there is. In any event, she could have gone to Jordan and back quickly.
yeah if she didnt die first! and the whole point of leaving the country is so she can prove that she hasnt been in israel for more than 3 months at a time, so she needs her passport stamped
Everybody I knew went in under a tourist visa and then just overstayed it. A few people renewed it, but you def don’t have to leave the country to do so–you just go down to the misrad hapnim.
When you leave, they yell at you for not renewing it, and sometimes write nasty and scary things on your passport. But you just tell them that the misrad hapnim was on strike (it isn’t lying, because it really was–you can look it up and check yourself). I didn’t check, so I just said nothing, and then came back and did it again.
Popa – they’ve gotten much stricter since your days. Now they make people pay big huge fines when leaving the country if their visa expired too long ago. They will also refuse to allow you back into the country and if your parents paid $20,000 for your year in sem, you’d sure better be able to get back in here to finish it. The procedure to renew your tourist visa is the same as getting a student visa, so they figure out who you are then anyway. It’s a lot of bureaucracy. They also changed the rules and it’s either free or pretty cheap now to get a student visa. It used to cost a fortune. I remember paying almost 200 shekels per person in my family, including the kids. Now you just pay one fee for the head of the family.
Wwwwaaaiiittt a sec here… Nechoma just said Israel will deny entry to people for whatever perceived insults one may cause the great Israeli bureacracy.
Now I always was taught that the Israeli zionist utopia was being the great Jewish bastion of refuge that would NEVER deny entry to ANY JEW.
Wow! Boy was I mistaken here.
Everyone has their own stories, and no two stories are the same. I know people that have been fine, and I know people that have been busted. Also, if you have ever come to Israel with your parents, you’re putting yourself up for higher risk. Trust me. When I made aliyah and I had to go to misrad haklita to find out if I had any rights left, they went through EVERY SINGLE trip I had taken to Israel in my life, starting with a family trip in 1994, which was about three passports previously. They asked me if I’d come with both my parents and siblings, and flew back with only my father. They asked me why I came. They noted that there were times that I’d come alone.
Also, I know someone who was in seminary who’s parents happened to have the exact same birthday, down to the year, and despite the fact that her paperwork was sent in with the entire school’s, misrad hapnim put a halt on her papers because they thought it was a mistake and wanted to see a copy of her parent’s birth certificates.
As someone said before, IF you go down the lying path, you better make sure that you memorize every detail you tell them, because if you mess that up, you better believe they’re going to catch and you’ll be in a heck of a lot more trouble then when you started.
If you’re coming for only one year, it’s not an issue. But if you have any thoughts of coming to Israel after you get married, or staying for a second year, or anything like, take into account the effects of your actions. You’ll have trouble getting onto a health insurance plan here, and they can catch you in your lie at any time. Just because you’ve managed to get out of the country X amount of times with no problem doesn’t mean that you won’t have a problem the next time you go.
I am American. Both my parents are born and bred Israelis. I “look” Israeli, as a child I traveled very frequently with my parents back and forth from Israel to America, under an American passport while my mother had to present her Israeli passport. While under 18, i was never forced to get an Israeli passport nor did they cause my mother any problems, except for asking her why she feels like her children don’t need an Israeli passport, but it was pushing an agenda not foreign policy. BUT my AMERICAN passport was marked as the child of an Israeli citizen.
When I went to Israel after high school, I tried to apply for a visa. My mother came down with me to the embassy, questions were asked and whoops! Guess who wasn’t granted a visa? (Last time my mother ever accompanied an adult child of hers to a government office.) In the end, I entered Israel on a tourist visa with no issues, besides for the general pushing of an Israeli citizenship on me. When they push it on me I say no, I’m an American I was born in America and I’ve never had residency in Israel and I speak in English. They always leave me alone.
The only issue I had was re-entering after Pesach when the agent saw I had overstayed my visa last time and told me I needed a student visa. I lied (slightly) and told her I was not in yeshiva but dealing with a family situation. She let me go after a few more questions. And all this was with a marked passport. They can’t actually do anything to you anymore. Their foreign policy changed. It’s not 1985 any more.
I would just go in if I was you.
OP- the lying move works, even if people here object to it.
When I went to seminary my mother went to the Israeli Embassy here in the US and got me a one year multiple entry visa. No, it didn’t say student anywhere on it. I had no need for that. They didn’t give me any issues about it. It is possible to revoke Israeli citizenship, but they don’t make it easy…
I asked the woman at the embassy how to revoke my citizenship. She said first you have to fill out all the paper work to become a citizen. I said, so I am not a citizen yet? She didn’t have an answer. They’re all lying in the office you are not a citizen because your parents are unless you wish to accept that citizenship.
Be careful if you want to do what frumgirl said, I know someone who did it And ok her second or third trip back in they caught on and told her she needs to become a citizen.
However the first question is why are you avoiding dual citizenship.
I’m assuming you’re a girl since you said seminary, so the Army wouldn’t be A problem because you just sign the paper that you’re a frum jew and get exempt. Plus you’re not required in anything really for the first year there.
Plus there Are advantages to being a citizen like cheap student ravkavs
I had multiple friends in seminary with Israeli passports, and it wasn’t a problem, so unless you’re avoiding it for a reason, your best bet is to stop trying to beat the system and just roll with it
There are many hashkafic reasons not to become an Israeli citizen. But there are also practical reasons for, even a girl, to avoid citizenship. One such reason is that if a girl becomes a citizen, although she may not be drafted, her (future) sons will automatically be citizens. And, then, the Israelis may be attempt to draft her boys.
Hi, My daughter is going to seminary in September 2017 and my wife is American but I was born in Israel. We really prefer for my daughter to not have to get an Israeli passport but the Seminary gave us a Form to fill out for the Student Visa and it requests the name of both parents so the Israeli Consulate can determine if any of the parents are Israeli. Based on the recommendations in the comments above from people who were able to avoid getting the Israeli Passport, I am still not clear on exactly what I should write on the form as who the father is? Make up a name? or give a cousin’s name who is American with the same last name as myself?
isaacmalul: Read the comments above from “Toi”, as will as “a mirrer” and “kasher”.
oh sure, someone posts to a group of frum people asking if they should be deceitful and a bunch of frum posters advise it. My filter must be broken – seems a lot of halachically inappropriate garbage is coming thru
Syag Lechochma shtika. You need to be Yaakov with lavan Ha-Arami.
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