From “aliyah” to onward moves: circular dynamics in Zionist archives on Argentine migration to Israel

This article examines Argentine Jewish migration, a substantial share of Latin American movement to Israel. Rather than rehearse linear, nation-centred push–pull models that structure national narratives of aliyah, we adopt a circular, networked perspective that situates Israel as one node within wider migratory circuits. Reading Zionist state archives – documents originally crafted to promote a one-way journey – against the grain, we show that migration is rarely a single event. Individuals and families circulate among Israel, Latin America, and Europe, with many re-settling in Israel more than once; in other cases, circularity emerges as regret, or even deferral, and aborted moves prior to arrival. These trajectories – often obscured by origin–destination statistics and bureaucratic classifications – reveal relational dynamics across multiple sites that, while traceable in Zionist documentation, are routinely effaced in national meta-narratives.