Israel’s remarkable numbers tell a story that statistics alone cannot explain. Behind the country’s longevity, strong families, and high levels of happiness is a deeper Jewish idea: a meaningful life is not a life without problems, but a life in which we know that we are part of something greater.
The Numbers Tell a Story
On the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the media published a statistical snapshot of Israel. And these numbers tell a very interesting story.
Today, about 10.3 million people live in Israel. In the past year alone, Israel’s population grew by approximately 124,000 people. About 7.8 million are Jewish, and about 2.2 million are Arab. And in the entire world, there are about 16 million Jews today. Nearly half of the Jewish people now live in Israel.
But let us look at a few more numbers. First, life expectancy. The average Israeli man lives 81.4 years, while the average Israeli woman lives 85.9 years. In male life expectancy, Israel ranks seventh in the world, and in female life expectancy, it ranks eighth.
Now let us compare that with America. In the United States, life expectancy is about 79 years. In other words, on average, a person in Israel lives about four and a half years longer than a person in the United States. And that is an interesting statistic in itself: Israel is a small, crowded country, with wars, and so on, and yet people there live longer.
But the next statistic is even more interesting. In 2024, more than 53,000 couples married in Israel, including 37,646 Jewish couples. In other words, in a single year, tens of thousands of Israelis chose to build families.
And then comes an even more remarkable statistic. There was an article published under the headline: “Parenthood for the Wealthy, the New Trend Among Affluent Families: Lots of Children.”
In recent years, a new old trend has been flourishing among affluent Israeli families: expanding the family. If in the past large families were associated with the lower class, today it is the wealthy families that have four, five, and even six children. When you can afford an au pair, a nanny, and a cleaner, why not? Having many children has become an affair for the wealthy.
For many years, people thought that the more educated, successful, and wealthy a person became, the fewer children they would want. After all, children require time, money, responsibility, and sacrifice. Seemingly, the more options a person has in life, the more they would want to preserve that freedom for themselves.
But the article points to an interesting phenomenon outside Israel as well. Even in places like Manhattan, among affluent populations, we can see families having more children. In the past, one might have thought, “I have a lot of children, which means I do not have much money.” Today, it has been reversed. A large family has become a symbol of abundance.
And that makes the Israeli statistic even more interesting. In Israel, a woman has an average of almost three children. In the United States, the number is about 1.6. In other words, Israelis continue to have children at very high rates.
The article interviewed several women who are influencers, actresses, and so on, and despite their careers and busy lives, they have many children. When they are asked, why are you willing to deal with so much in order to raise children?
One of them said that she has four boys and a daughter. She said: “Four boys is like a war at home, there are fights and noise all the time. Sometimes I feel more like a police officer than a mother. People do not understand why I am so thin, but with five children at home, I never stop.”
And then they ask her: So why do you do it? And she answers: “On Friday, after all the chaos, after the cooking, the preparations, and everything that needs to be done, everyone sits together around the Shabbat table. I look at my children, and in that moment I say: It is all worth it.”
And it was not just her answer. They interviewed more and more women, and again and again they said the same thing: all the exhaustion, all the work, all the chaos, it is all worth it for this moment. The moment when, on Friday night, the entire family sits together around the table. And that moment gives a person such satisfaction, such a feeling of happiness and meaning, that they say: For this, everything was worth it.
And now, after seeing all these numbers, we arrive at the number that may be the hardest to understand: happiness. Israel ranks eighth in the world in the happiness index.
Eighth in the world. Above the United States. Above Britain. Above Germany. Above France. And that really raises a question. How is it possible that Israel, with all of its difficulties, ranks so high on the happiness index?
It sounds almost unbelievable. If we had to describe Israel in recent years, we would say tension, burnout, anger, anxiety, the high cost of living, war, reserve duty, ballistic missiles. What does any of that have to do with happiness? And this is not a single unusual year or a one time jump, but a fairly consistent pattern: ninth place in 2022, fourth place in 2023, fifth place in 2024, and eighth place in both 2025 and 2026. This no longer looks like a statistical fluke.
A 2025 report attempted to understand what strengthens or weakens the well being of young people around the world. Within that section, Israel came in first in the quality of social connections. Young people in Israel reported more than young people in any other country that they have people they can rely on. This does not mean that everyone has lots of friends. It means that more young people in Israel report having support, having help available, having people who will show up when needed. And this is precisely the population that encounters the heavy price of life in Israel up close.
And here we find the essence. Happiness is not only a result of how comfortable life is. Happiness is also a result of living with the feeling that we are together, that we are part of a community, that we are truly not alone. We are accustomed to thinking about happiness in terms of how pleasant I feel or “how much fun I am having.” But human beings are not built only to seek comfort. They are also built to seek a place within a human network. The human brain responds not only to physical danger, but also to loneliness, to a lack of support, to the feeling that if I fall, there is no one to pick me up. In other words, what calms human beings is not only that the world is safe. What calms human beings is knowing that someone is with them in the world.
What Every Jewish Child Should Know
Fifty years ago, in 1976, the Rebbe began a special initiative in the education of Jewish children. The Rebbe selected twelve verses and teachings of the Sages and asked that every Jewish child learn them and know them by heart.
Each one expresses a different fundamental idea in Judaism: the Torah, the unity of G-d, the Exodus from Egypt, the value of every Jew, the ability of every person to come closer to G-d, G-d’s presence in the world, love of Israel, and more. The Rebbe asked that children not only learn them, but repeat them and know them by heart, so that these words would be with them wherever they went.
The Rebbe wanted a Jewish child to know from a young age who he is, what he believes in, how he should behave, and what his role is in the world. The Rebbe created a small core of Jewish knowledge that could be taken anywhere.
I am not going to go through all twelve verses now. But if we look at several of them, we can understand what the Rebbe believed every Jewish child should know.
The first verse is Torah Tzivah lanu Moshe, the famous song. “The Torah was commanded to us by Moses, the inheritance of the congregation of Jacob.” The Rebbe wanted every Jewish child to know that the Torah is his inheritance. The Torah does not belong only to rabbis, or only to someone who has spent his entire life studying in a yeshiva. Every Jew has ownership of the Torah.
The second verse is Shema: “Hear, Israel, G-d is our G-d, G-d is One.” This is the most basic statement of Jewish identity. It is the sentence a Jew says when he wakes up in the morning, it is what he says before going to sleep, and it is what Jews have said throughout the generations, everywhere in the world.
Then the Rebbe includes among the twelve verses: “In the beginning, G-d created the heavens and the earth.” A child must know that the world was not created by chance. There is a Creator of the world.
Then comes another verse that is perhaps one of the greatest foundations of Judaism: “Love your fellow as yourself.” A Jewish child needs to know that his relationship with G-d is expressed through the way he treats the Jew standing beside him.
And then there is a verse that I think connects in an incredible way with the local culture as well: “If I worked hard and did not succeed, do not believe it; If I did not work hard and said that I succeeded, do not believe it; If I worked hard and succeeded, believe it.” The Sages tell us that there is no real success without work. If someone tells you, “I succeeded without making an effort,” do not believe it. There are no shortcuts. Hard work, persistence, and effort are the path to success.
And then comes the final verse. “Israel shall rejoice in its Maker,” meaning that everyone who is descended from Israel has the ability to rejoice in G-d’s joy, who rejoices and is happy with His dwelling in the physical world.
The Rebbe explains this verse in a talk on Lag BaOmer in 1976: “Everyone who belongs to the Jewish people, regardless of what his status and situation were one day earlier, since he is descended from Israel, has the special mission to rejoice with G-d’s joy, which comes from a person fulfilling his mission: making himself, his home, and the entire world a dwelling place for G-d, through Jewish matters, Torah, and Mitzvos.
In other words, in addition to the command placed upon every student to engage in all the matters mentioned above, they have an additional command to contemplate the content of this idea, and through this they will come to great joy. They should engage in all the aforementioned activities with great joy. Moreover, this joy is not merely their own joy, but their joy is part of G-d’s joy, for He created the heavens and the earth, and He chose everyone who is descended from Israel to transform the world into a dwelling place in the physical world. Beginning with young boys and girls, who are also filled with great joy, knowing that together with all of Israel, and especially each individual, G-d is happy. And in this way they carry out all of the aforementioned matters with joy, strength, and vitality.” (Collected Talks, Volume 84, page 193).
A Different Definition of Happiness
The Rebbe changes the definition of happiness here. True happiness is not a life without problems. True happiness is knowing that even within a life filled with all kinds of problems, my life has meaning. I am happy because I know that my life is part of something greater. Happiness is essentially the knowledge that I am part of G-d’s mission in the world, and that G-d Himself is happy when I fulfill my mission.
And when you really think about it, suddenly you understand: being Jewish is more than winning the lottery!
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