immigrant – The News Desk

Liza came to my family from Ukraine in 2015 after Russia invaded her homeland. Seeking safety and opportunity in America, she applied for and was accepted into the U.S. au pair program, lived with us for two years and learned to love this country. Her dream is to become a naturalized citizen. Would we welcome someone like Liza into our home again? Absolutely, but we couldn’t do it if the Biden administration finalizes a regulation it proposed on Oct. 30.The State Department essentially wants to end the au pair program, which connects more than 21,000 foreigners with American families a year. The forthcoming mandate would require employers to treat au pairs more like traditional employees, though the program was designed to combine cultural exchange and child care. Families currently can p...

As people around the world demonstrate for Palestinian rights, we shouldn’t overlook another group of Middle Eastern refugees who also have suffered for decades but whose plight is seldom discussed: the displaced Jewish refugees from Arab lands. I should know; I am one of them. Our story needs to be told. I was born in Baghdad, Iraq, as were my parents and grandparents. When Cyrus the Great liberated Babylon in 538 B.C. and gave Jews the choice to leave, my ancestors stayed. By 1948 an estimated 135,000 Jews lived in Baghdad, comprising one-third of the city’s population—more Jews by proportion than Warsaw or New York at the time. Iraqi Jews were active in government, launched businesses and held prominent positions. Iraq’s first finance minister, Sassoon Eskell, was Jewish. He insisted t...

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Au Revoir, Au Pairs – WSJ

Many Israelis Are Refugees From Arab Lands