Learning Israel’s Investment Story – in Israel

At IIA, we know that the best way to learn the story of Israel’s remarkable and ongoing transformation into the “Scale-Up Nation” is by going there. That’s why several members of our team (and a few spouses and partners) spent 10 days in Israel earlier this month, to witness first-hand what Israel is really like today.

The Israel we crisscrossed differs greatly from the Israel of the popular imagination. Even those who have visited in the past may still think of Israel as a land of refugees, from Holocaust survivors to Ethiopian and Russian Jews, dependent on American generosity as they struggled to thrive in an arid land. Or they may think of Israel as a land under siege. Or as a miraculous place of both Biblical wonders and modern technological ingenuity. And while all of those Israels still have some validity, we wanted to see the Israel we invest in, the facts-on-the-ground Israel, the one where cultures and religions casually mingle, where innovation arises naturally out of necessity, and where businesses are poised to interact with the rest of the world not as supplicants but as partners.

During our travels, we did a lot of things visitors to Israel often do. We ate delicious falafel and knafeh, floated in the Dead Sea, prayed at the Western Wall, and walked in the footsteps of Biblical prophets and kings through millennia-old ruins. But we also learned from economists and scholars at the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (pictured), wandered through gentrifying neighborhoods underneath countless construction cranes, dined at restaurants whose chefs are workshopping new fusion cuisines, traveled to a border outpost in the Golan Heights patrolled by the UN and the IDF, visited kibbutzim that are deftly navigating the transition between their socialist roots and 21st-century global agribusiness, flew F-16s in a virtual-reality flight simulator created by Israeli air force veterans, heard the cross-cultural sounds of the Jerusalem East and West Orchestra, comprised of musicians from three religions, performing with a group of Moroccan musicians (a cultural exchange made possible by the recent Abraham Accords), and met with executives from several of the companies in our portfolio, who showed us how ready their firms are to become even bigger players on the world economic stage.

We are planning a similar trip this fall for current and prospective clients. If you are thinking of becoming an IIA investor, or if you already are one and you want to see your investment capital at work (spoiler alert: laser weapons may be involved. Or designer sportswear, or pipe fittings, or skyscrapers), we encourage you to join us. Prepare to be inspired, not just by the awesome and inescapable awareness of 3000 years of history, but also by the excitement of Israel’s present and the promise of what Israelis are building for their future. For more information, and to secure a spot in our October 23rd Israel Trip, contact Amy Kaufman, Director of Investor Relations at akaufman@israelinvestmentadvisors.com.