I know a few illegal Jews hiding from the authorities in America. That does make them "hidden Jews." Doesn't it? They don't have valid visas. Recently I discovered that a friend of ours had spent decades in the states, even was married to a United States citizen for over ten years but for whatever reason, he never did the citizenship procedure.
Other people I know of are young, trying to build lives and careers, but they're missing that valuable ingredient, visa, papers and citizenship.
I just can't imagine living in that constant "fear." I guess that they block it out for the most part. But one of the things that must be most difficult is that basic services and health insurance are only for the legal. This Foward article about the illegal Jews in America mentions a woman who had to get charity for serious, expensive medical care. We have American friends who spent a few years in Israel, became Israeli citizens, then went back to the states. They return to Israel for good, reasonably priced medical care.
Illegals can't do that. If they leave the states they'll never be able to return; at least that's their fear. Getting visas isn't easy.
Our grandchildren are now all American citizens. There's a procedure that allows grandchildren of first class U.S. Citizens to pass citizenship to their grandchildren, so our daughter had done it for the kids in husband's name. A lot of our friends' kids have done it with their kids. It's not cheap, and you have to fill out a lot of forms and travel with the children to the United States and have an appointment with a special citizenship office. But at least the kids will never need visas to visit or work if they wish to do so. Of course I would prefer that all my kids and grandkids stay forever in Israel, but it's not under my control.
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