The newest wave of disclosures tied to the so-called Epstein Files has left people stunned, sickened, and angry. The crimes associated with Jeffrey Epstein belong in the darkest category of public scandal, and every new detail tests the public’s tolerance for how long powerful circles looked the other way.
One line in the reporting also deserves serious attention, especially from an Israeli and Jewish perspective. The reports attribute remarks to Ehud Barak about immigration to Israel and the need to “control the quality” of olim (Jewish immigrants to Israel).
According to those reports, Barak told Epstein a little over a decade ago that Israel could absorb another million immigrants from Russian-speaking countries, and added that authorities should be more selective than during the mass aliyah of the 1990s, aiming for “quality” among new arrivals.
That wording carries a heavy charge. It treats human beings as a sorting exercise, and it invites the ugliest kind of shorthand about who counts as “good” and who arrives with a question mark over their head. Leaders can debate housing, jobs, infrastructure, and schools in plain terms. “Quality control” belongs to products, not people.
Israel’s immigration story also makes the language feel especially out of place. Israel was founded to be the national home and refuge for Jews, including Jews who arrive with trauma, poverty, imperfect Hebrew, unfamiliar degrees, or no degrees at all.
Aliyah, an act of belonging
The central idea of aliyah is belonging. It rests on shared peoplehood and responsibility, not a resume screen.
Israel’s record shows what that looks like in practice.
The country absorbed survivors who arrived with little more than the clothes they wore. It absorbed Jews forced out of countries across the Middle East and North Africa. It brought Ethiopian Jews home in dramatic rescue operations involving Ethiopia. And it absorbed the massive post-Soviet wave that reshaped the economy, culture, science, and the IDF.
That last chapter matters because it exposes what “quality” talk often masks. In the 1990s, Russian-speaking immigrants were hit with lazy smears, accused of crime, alcoholism, and cultural incompatibility.
Many Israelis remember the jokes, the whispers, the suspicion at the clinic counter, and the job interview. Israel moved forward anyway, and the country gained an extraordinary infusion of talent, energy, and civic strength. Anyone trying to measure that aliyah by a gatekeeper’s standard would have misjudged it badly.
Hearing “quality control” language today lands even harder because the outside world has grown more hostile. Antisemitism is rising in many places. Jewish communities in Europe have faced a sharper sense of vulnerability.
The practical meaning of Israel as a haven has intensified. People make life decisions under pressure, sometimes overnight. In that reality, the message Israel sends matters. Leaders set the tone for how society talks about newcomers who may arrive frightened, disoriented, and bruised by events beyond their control.
The broader context in which these remarks surfaced adds another layer.
The Epstein disclosures portray a world where status-insulated people were insulated from consequences, and decency was traded for access. That atmosphere makes precise language and moral discipline even more necessary.
Public life needs fewer private-room hierarchies, fewer coded conversations about human worth, and more public standards that hold up in daylight.
This episode can still serve a useful purpose if it prompts a clearer statement of principle. Israeli leadership should speak about aliyah the way the country has lived it at its best: with solidarity, realism about capacity, and a deep respect for the dignity of every Jew who chooses to come home.
Policy discussions can handle numbers and planning. They can address where Israel needs more housing, how to expand local services, and how to support integration into the workforce. Those are legitimate questions. They deserve responsible answers. They also deserve language that remains faithful to the country’s founding purpose.
An apology from Barak would help; it should focus on the wording and what it conveys. People can disagree about absorption policy while still agreeing on the core ethic: olim are family. They arrive with stories, fears, skills, and burdens. Israel’s job is to build a society that helps them land, stand, and belong.
Israel grew into a strong country because it chose to absorb, again and again, even when it was hard and even when the newcomers arrived with little. That choice built families, cities, and a shared future. It still should.