To escape from the dictates of contemporary capitalist society, an ultra-Orthodox American Jew moves with his family to a small illegal Israeli outpost in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, joining – for advantage and convenience – a "human avant-garde" that is an essential tool for the development and operation of the colonial mechanism. In this context of expropriation, Gedalia feels free to build his home and to try to fulfil his dream: a simple life, in harmony with God, outside the laws and duties of society. Life is but a dream is the story of the daily life of a settler's family, between contradictions, radical choices, difficulties, needs, and possible fears.