TEL AVIV — “Sometimes,” the Israeli fashion designer Mirit Weinstock said, “we are not exactly in the position to think about aesthetics.”

In a country that stares down hostility on a daily basis, art and design could easily be given a low priority. Israel’s likely next president Shimon Peres, in a private speech about the state of the nation, was asked what he saw for the future of Israel. His response was that it should be a combination of “the Bible and the Internet.”

Aesthetics do not escape Mr. Peres, who is easily the best-dressed man in Israel. But what about art? His vision skips over the fact that his country happens to be producing some of the most engaging modern dance of its time. Tel Aviv today is like New York City in the 1970s: It is the red-hot center of a boom in dance.

Israel’s strength can come as a surprise to the nondance audience — and even to Israelis. Instead of depressing the culture’s creativity, the political volatilityseems to spur it vibrantly on. The most widely known Israeli choreographer, Ohad Nahrin, established a level of success — as did our own Paul Taylor or Alvin Ailey — that has encouraged a wave of younger artists and helped them to flourish.

These “independent choreographers,” as they are referred to in Israel, tour the world extensively. Though they are wildly disparate in style, they have created an aesthetic — direct, physical, sometimes ugly, usually aggressive — that is distinct from much of the abstract, conceptual work coming out of America and Europe today. So much so that all you need to know about modern dance right now is: If it’s Israeli, get tickets.

The evidence came to New York City last summer as part of Lincoln Center Festival. Of the seven dance acts in the festival, three were Israeli modern dance companies: Batsheva Dance Company, Emanuel Gat Dance, and Yasmeen Godder. For a country with roughly the population of New York City to be responsible for nearly half the dance at an international arts festival is significant. Quantity, yes, but quality, too: These three companies are markedly different from one another, illustrating the depth of the talent pool. It’s a moment that deserves much broader attention that it receives.

What makes Israeli dance so engaging? On a recent press trip — paid for by the American Israel Education Foundation, a nonprofit, independent, bi-partisan foundation that funds education programs and is a supporting organization of AIPAC — I had the opportunity to explore this question. Of course, there is no simple answer. But after talking to choreographers, designers, and Israelis who are far removed from the culture industry, I had a sense of the broader picture of the arts in Israel — and of a healthy, growing infrastructure for the future.

First things first: the question of the military. People at home and abroad — most of whom were familiar with Israeli culture but unfamiliar with dance — would often suggest to me that compulsory military service in Israel contributes to the dance scene there: Both activities are highly physical and active.

It’s a fair, but surface, association. Dancing is about as far removed from boot camp as you can get. It’s a little like suggesting that New York has a dance scene because it’s a walking city. The simple act of movement or physical activity does not a dancer make.

But the choreographer Emanuel Gat, who has created dance for 10 years and founded a company in 2004, suggests a gray area. He studied conducting before serving in the army, driving tanks “during a quiet period.” Does his military experience affect his work? “I hope not. But I don’t think you can detach your experiences,” he said.

Renana Raz, who has been a choreographer since 1999, cites the physiological and cultural aspects of living in a volatile society. “It relates to the tension. The rhythm of life here is tense, and the body is like a seismograph,” she said. “We live in an aggressive environment. Sometimes it’s too violent.”

Arkai Zaides, who danced in his own piece “Adamdam” recently at the Suzanne Dellal Center in Tel Aviv, sees it even more broadly: “When daily life is difficult, creativity blossoms. It wants to get to the core of things and to strike out a story.”

But that story could just as easily be told in paints, words, or song. So why dance? In a speech about Israel’s vigorous high-tech industry, a venture capitalist, Jonathan Medved, argued that risk acceptance is something that comes along with an immigrant culture. Start-ups make sense: Why not take a stab at the future and try to make it yours?

That spirit of adventure has a parallel in dance. Israeli choreographers are not weighed down by dance traditions that must be broken away from — most importantly, ballet. Whereas American and European modern dance technique had to evolve away from ballet, Israeli dancers enjoy a more purely modern point of departure.

According to Mr. Zaides: “The absence of strong technique background gives Israeli creators the freedom to find their own style.”

This is not to say that the classical form is immaterial: Dancers still study it, and the Israel Ballet is one of the country’s three largest companies. But even its founder, Berta Yampolsky, addressed the lack of overlap in a recent interview with Ha’aretz Magazine: “Modern is the Israeli character. Our men are macho, hunk, they have power, and that’s good for modern dance. The Israelis are vulgar, outspoken, and impolite, and that is why modern suits us. They don’t want to be prettified with classical.”

Still, Israeli choreographers weren’t exactly starting from a blank slate. In a country that is a cultural, religious, and geographic crossroads, social dancing and ethnic music are all part of the palette that choreographers can draw from. “It’s Europe but not European. It’s the Middle East, but not Arab. It’s a point where many styles meet,” Ms. Raz said.

How can Tel Aviv sustain this creative crucible for the future? The government’s Ministry of Culture is active in supporting the arts: It gives 5.5 million shekels (about $1.2 million) to Batsheva Dance Company, 4.7 million (about $1 million) to the Kibbutz Dance Company, and 3.9 million (about $900,000) to the Israeli Ballet, according to Ha’aretz.

But private donors can be harder to come by. “It’s easier to get money from outside Israel,” Mr. Gat, whose company makes 90% of its budget from touring, said.

Mr. Gat knows the fund-raising landscape well, as he has landed corporate and municipal support for a new dance facility in the town of Kiryat Gat, less than an hour’s drive from Tel Aviv. The intent of the Kiryat Gat Choreographic Centre — designed, but not yet built — is to spread the artistic center out from Tel Aviv and to provide resources to the next generation of dancers and choreographers.

There, Mr. Gat, the center’s artistic director, will house his company and a preprofessional school for dancers. But he is adamant that the center should give new choreographers what he didn’t have. “They need studios, space to make costumes, to edit video, and make sets,” he said. “It comes from my own experience. I didn’t have a place to work.”

It’s a simple enough motivation, but the impact will be profound. Right now, the artistic energy is contained within Tel Aviv. Spreading out means sharing that momentum and bringing more ideas into the fold. Like businesses in Israel’s high-tech sector, artistic enterprises like Mr. Gat’s can flourish no matter what the political situation may be.