Check out this interview of Rabbi Shlomo Riskin by my friend Go’el Jasper (host of the Aliyah Revolution show on Arutz Sheva radio).

Some of the highlights:

Let me tell you very, very seriously. A rabbi can never truly and effectively preach something he does not practice. Most of the rabbis who took non-mechitza [partition between men and women] synagogues never really put in a mechitza. Because the congregation felt, and justifiably so, that if the rabbi was praying without a mechitza, it can’t be so bad. And a rabbi who preaches Aliyah and still lives in the Diaspora, will never effectively move his people to Israel. It has to be “acharai”, “after me,” just like IDF generals say. And if you go back to The Jewish State, by Theodor Herzl – when he pictures mass Aliyah, he says “rav rav u’kehilato” – each rabbi with his congregation. The rabbi has to come set a personal example, first and foremost. I think without that, he’s not going to be an effective inspiration.

The most important word I can tell you is that the greatness of living in Israel is hearing little children speak Hebrew. It is waking up to the radio news at 5 AM with Kri’at Shema before the news begins. Even if you are watching television at night, before the television stops broadcasting, it ends with the verse-of-the-Torah of the day.

The glory of living in Israel means relating to every person one the street, whether he is a black Ethiopian or a very light-skinned Scandinavian, as a brother and a sister because everyone is Jewish. It means not really fighting for survival but struggling to achieve redemption. And I thank G-d every day that I have the great privilege of living here.