There are many ways to measure the distance between two countries. You can look at miles, culture, language. Or—you can just get behind the wheel.

Driving in America and driving in Israel are technically the same activity: a car, a road, a destination. But in practice? They are two entirely different sports.

In America, a red light is a pause. A breath. A moment to sip your coffee, adjust your playlist, maybe even reflect on your life choices. The light turns green, and there’s a polite, almost ceremonial beat before anyone moves. No one wants to be that person who honks too quickly.

In Israel, that beat does not exist.

Here, the honk comes before the green. It’s less a reaction and more a preemptive strike. A way of saying, “I believe in you, but also, let’s not test my patience.” You learn quickly that hesitation is not a virtue—it’s an invitation.

And then there are the laws.

In America, enforcement can feel… selective. You might see someone scrolling through their phone at a red light, or even creeping forward with one hand on the wheel and one hand texting. Not legal, of course—but not exactly shocking either.

In Israel? Touch your phone while driving, and suddenly the system wakes up. Cameras, tickets, enforcement—it’s taken seriously. As it should be.

But here’s where it gets interesting.

You can’t touch your phone—but you can sometimes find cars casually parked halfway on a sidewalk, as if the laws of urban planning simply… bent for a moment. It’s a kind of organized chaos that somehow functions. There’s a logic to it, even if it’s not immediately obvious to an outsider.

And being pulled over? That can feel different too. In America, you might get a warning for something minor. In Israel, there are moments where the rules are enforced with a kind of precision that catches you off guard—not because they’re unfair, but because they’re consistent in unexpected ways.

But all of that—the honking, the parking, the tickets—that’s the lighthearted version of driving in Israel.

Because there’s another layer. One that doesn’t exist in the same way anywhere else.

There are moments here when driving isn’t just about getting from point A to point B. It’s about calculating risk in real time.

I remember the first day of the war. I was driving from Efrat back toward the center, eventually heading to Netanya. What should have been a routine drive turned into something else entirely. Sirens. Alerts. The kind of sounds that don’t just interrupt your journey—they redefine it.

At one point, on the Ayalon Highway, the sirens came—three, back to back. Traffic stopped, not because of congestion, but because of instinct. We all got out of our cars and lay on the ground.

And then it happened.

An interception overhead. The unmistakable sound of the Iron Dome doing what it was built to do. Close enough that you don’t just hear it—you feel it. In your chest. In your bones.

There’s a moment in experiences like that where time stretches. Where your thoughts narrow down to something very simple, very human.

And then, just like that, it’s over. You get back in your car. You keep driving.

Because that’s what people do here.

Another time, I was driving from Tel Aviv toward Netanya when I got one of those alerts: a possible siren in the area within ten minutes. Then it updated—one and a half minutes, in the exact area I was driving through.

And I had a decision to make.

Do I slow down, prepare to stop, follow protocol? Or do I speed up—try to outrun the zone, get to a place where maybe, just maybe, I wouldn’t have to pull over and lie on the side of the road?

These are calculations that don’t appear in any driving manual. And yet, they’re part of the reality here.

And then there’s today.

I found myself in Ra’anana this morning, at a clinic, trying to time everything so I’d be home before the 11:00 a.m. siren. But Israel doesn’t always run on your schedule, and by the time I left, it was already clear—I wasn’t going to make it.

Not rushed, not frantic—just aware.

I made it off the highway just in time, pulled onto a quiet side street, and stepped out of the car. Another woman did the same, just a few meters away. We didn’t speak. We didn’t need to.

For two minutes, everything stopped. Cars. Conversations. Movement itself.

The sun was warm. The air was still.

And in that stillness, there is a number that is impossible to truly hold:

25,644 fallen soldiers and members of Israel’s security forces since 1860. 

Each one a life. A family. A story that didn’t get to finish.

You stand there, not because you’re told to—but because there is nowhere else you would be.

And then, as the siren fades, life resumes.

People get back into their cars. Engines start. Roads fill again.

Because in Israel, driving isn’t just about movement.

It’s about resilience.

It’s about the strange, almost impossible coexistence of the ordinary and the extraordinary. Of honking at green lights and stopping for sirens—both the ones that tell you to go, and the ones that remind you why you’re here in the first place.

And somehow, all of it exists on the same road.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)