A New Communal Norm
B
irthright Israel is about
to reach its 100,000th
participant on the 10-
day free Israel trips designed for
18-26-year-olds. This is a spec-
tacular accomplishment for
Israel and the Jewish people.
Anyone who has been to Israel
knows how transformational the
experience can be. The 730 par-
ticipants on the Jewish
Federation of Metropolitan
Detroit's Family Miracle Mission
over Chanukah can attest to that.
Imagine the impact on 100,000
college students who had never
been on a peer-based Israel trip.
Now the State of Israel is going
one step further. It has created an
annual fund of $100 million,
administered by a company
called.MASA, to double the num-
ber of students spending a
semester or a year in Israel to
20,000 per year by 2008.
MASA recognizes that partici-
pation in a long-term program in
Israel is one of the most effective
ways to cultivate young adults'
sense of shared destiny with the
State of Israel and with world
Jewry. Whether volunteering at
Magen David Adorn as an emer-
gency medical technician, or
studying at Hebrew University or
at a yeshivah as a student, these
experiences give young
American Jews an authentic
opportunity to see themselves as
part of a living people with a rich
history, a dynamic language and
a vibrant nation.
Sociologists note that these
long-term programs address an
aspect of Jewish identity that
American Jewry is less capable of
strengthening outside of Israel:
the notion of peoplehood. While
the number of students in Jewish
day schools is increasing, and the
number of adults that study
Talmud is at an unprecedented
high (even when compared to
European yeshivot of a century
or two ago), these successes pri-
marily shape one's religious
identity.
But Jewish identity has at least
two components: a sense of
family and shared ideals.
Alexander, a professor
Avraham Yitschak
of the philosophy of
Kook, the first chief
education at Haifa
rabbi of Israel, called
University, "Jewish iden-
these two aspects of
tity needs to be both
identity brit avot, a
political and religious.
covenant of family,
The great mistake of
and brit Sinai, a
American Jewry was to
Rabbi Lee
covenant of religious
opt for the latter with-
Buck man
commitments. Since
out the former.
Comm unity
the time of Abraham,
"The great mistake of
Perspe ctive
we have been part of
secular Israel has been
a definable family
and people; at Sinai we became a to try to keep the former without
the latter. Since Israel is the sym-
nation defined by a religious
bolic and material expression of
mission.
Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik cap- Jewish political identity today,
Israel is the key to enriching the
tured the same idea but .
brit avot for American Jews."
described the two covenants as
In the mid-1980s, Orthodox
brit goral, a covenant of fate, and
families began to send their chil-
brit yeud, a covenant of destiny.
dren for a year of yeshivah study
The covenant of fate describes
following high school. Twenty
the fact that we share a common
years later, the gap year in Israel
history and feel a common
is nearly, a rite of passage in the
responsibility to intervene when
Orthodox community
a fellow Jew is in need. In con-
Now it is time to set a new
trast, the covenant of destiny
communal norm in which col-
reflects the mission that we were
lege-bound students from all the
charged with and the commit-
Jewish denominations spend a
ments we made at Sinai.
year studying or volunteering in
To paraphrase Hanan
Israel. Thanks to MASA, funding
is in place.
Thanks to American universi-
ties, there is a new understand-
ing of the benefits of study
abroad. Many have endorsed
and, in some cases, even man-
dated such programs because
they recognize that an extended
period of time in a foreign coun-
try is not a deviation from a
profitable career; it is a life-
enhancing world experience that
deepens the path to mature
adulthood.
And for Jewish students, a
semester or yearlong study or
volunteering in Israel can culti-
vate and strengthen a neglected
part of our Jewish identity: our
sense of being part of a sacred
family.
Israel has extended a new invi-
tation. It is now our turn to act
— for the sake of our people and
for the sake of our children. Cl
Rabbi Buckman is head of school at
the Jewish Academy of Metropolitan
Detroit in West Bloomfield.
Same Show, A Whole New Story
Washington
his week, some will look
to Georgetown
University where the
Palestinian Solidarity Movement
(PSM) will be holding its fifth
annual national divestment from
Israel conference. Yet those who
focus too narrowly on PSM risk
missing a much larger and far
more important story.
This year, tens of thousands of
Students, Jewish and non-Jewish,
on more than 400 campuses
across the U.S. have assumed
their rightful and proper roles in
fostering support for Israel on
campus and making Israel a pos-
itive, permanent presence at
their respective universities.
Together with the 30 member
organizations of the Israel on
Campus Coalition (ICC) and oth-
ers, these students have charted a
course that has made Israel come
alive on campus.
In the fall semester alone,
T
36
February 23 2006
approximately 4,000 students
participated in Israel extravagan-
zas nationwide and an additional
3,000 showed up to hear one of
Israel's most popular bands
bring their Hebrew music to
campus.
Some 1,500 students traveled
far and wide to attend multi-day,
intensive pro-Israel conferences
on local, regional and national
levels. And more than 5,000 stu-
dents returned to campus this
January having experienced
some part of their winter vaca-
tion in Israel on missions and on
Birthright Israel.
These numbers do not even
include the tens of thousands of
students who will be a part of
winter semester initiatives, such
as the 1,000 students who will
soon arrive in the nation's capitol
to attend the American Israel
Public Affairs Committee's policy
conference.
In addition, over the past year,
Israel campus cul-
nearly two dozen
ture.
schools have reinstated
These projects,
Israel study abroad pro-
ranging
from pub-
grams following out-
lishing
Israel
journals
standing student, facul-
to
creating
American-
ty and community
Israeli exchanges,
activism. For those
have
demonstrated a
unable to travel to
desire
on the part of
Aaron Goldberg
Israel, the opportunity
students
to take own-
Special
exists to study with a
ership
of
their corn-
Commentary
growing number of vis-
munity
and
promote
iting Israeli scholars
Israel
in
a
serious
manner.
By
who are being placed on cam-
continuing
to
support
these
stu-
puses throughout the country —
dents,
the
community
can
help
a number that will likely triple in
them develop the skills and tools
the coming year.
they need to be successful on
While these statistics are
campus and, when they gradu-
themselves noteworthy, they do
ate, in our communities.
not begin to convey the depth of
PSM conferences have histori-
pro-Israel activism throughout
cally
attracted significant nation-
the country. Over the past few
al
attention
for their hateful con-
years, the ICC has had the privi-
tent
and
their
consistent failure
lege, in partnership with the AVI
to
condemn
terrorism.
But this
CHAI Foundation, to invest
same,
small
group
of
alienated
approximately $500,000 in nearly
and disenfranchised Israel bash-
100 student-initiated projects
ers has gained no traction.
aimed at changing long-term
While universities that have
played host to the conference,
includihg Georgetown and the
University of Michigan, and have
resisted calls to cancel the con-
ference, year after year university
presidents have publicly declared
their outright rejection of divest-
ment and its cynical use meant
to undermine Israel's right to
exist.
More important than the con-
ference itself, however, is the fact
that over the past four years,
when conference attendees pack
their bags, roll-up their tents and
move the circus to another
region of the country, the pro-
Israel community on each cam-
pus has emerged stronger, more
capable, and better prepared
than ever before. And, this year
will be no different.
Georgetown University stu-
dents are working tirelessly to
ensure that Israel is fairly repre-
sented on campus and that the
1