Kashua accepted teaching positions in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois and Chicago, moving there with his wife and three children for the 2014/15 academic year. His "Haaretz" column of July 4, titled "Why Sayed Kashua is Leaving Jerusalem and Never Coming Back: Everything people had told him since he was a teenager is coming true. Jewish-Arab co-existence has failed." was published at a volatile time in the country's intergroup relations, involving the &lt;a href="2014%20kidnapping%20and%20murder%20of%20Israeli%20teenagers"&gt;kidnapping/murders of Jewish students in the West Bank&lt;/a&gt; and an Arab youth in East Jerusalem, though prior to the July 8 outbreak of the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict. His declaration elicited numerous responses in the Israeli press from colleagues and readers who were concerned by the issues he raises. Kashua’s concern for his family and despair at the Jewish-Israeli community’s continued rejection of Arab-Israelis despite his 25 years of writing motivated his move to the United States. In his "Haaretz" newspaper column, he wrote that “I’d lost my small war” and that he saw no hope of a world for his children where Arab- and Jewish-Israelis could coexist.