Remember this?

It has been over three years since I approached these Rabbis and Jewish Leaders asking them to put their names on a general call for American Jewry to go home to Israel.

Some reacted with consternation. "Don't people know this already," said one signer. I told him that what people DID know was that they couldn't remember the last time their rabbi, teacher or any other authority figure had told them that Aliyah was anything more than an admired option "for some" who are up to the challenge.

Now, as my neighborhood abuts another chock full of American yeshiva students doing "shana rishona" - their first year of marriage - studying in a Yeshiva in the Holy Land, it has become clear to me that although I gathered those signatures with a bit of a tongue-in-cheek approach (I mean, the wording is not very strong, but it is a positive message for many who limit their reading of signs to ones that carry heavyweight signatures) - it is a very powerful message that I would like to see replicated and spread.

Approaching one's Rabbi, teacher, or community leader and asking them to sign such a statement brings the topic to the forefront and whether the particular public figure says yes or no - it created a win-win situation in terms of pushing forward the objective of massive western Aliyah.

I invite all of you to approach any and all Rabbis, politicians and Jewish public figures and ask them to affix their signature to this document. You can print it out, collect signatures - with the title and name of the signer printed underneath - and mail it back to us to add to the web-declaration and eventually we may take out full-page ads in North American newspapers.

Sometimes the leaders of a generation need a little prodding to do the right thing. Let's do just that.