Throughout the late 1980's and early 1990's, Russian immigrants reached Israel in huge numbers. To absorb them evenly across the country, every town in Israel increased its population between five and ten per cent. The new immigrants began life in Israel with whatever skills they could muster, often as street sweepers or street musicians. Among the 300,000 who reached Israel between 1989 and 1991, 8,000 were doctors.
On one occasion I was present when several hundred Ethiopian and Russian Jews—among them Shcharansky's mother Ida Migrom—reached Ben Gurion airport immigration hall at the same time, people from two different worlds who would have to make a life together despite their wide cultural divide.
Martin Gilbert, From the Ends of the Earth