Bring University In-House

Why do American Jews still outsource higher education?

As if inverting the Holocaust and slandering Israel as a Nazi regime weren’t enough, as if BDS blood libels and depictions of Jews as bloodthirsty pigs weren’t enough, as if fake eviction notices to Jewish students wasn’t enough: we know now, with the ugly cacophony of overt anti-Semitism from countless student groups at the most elite academic institutions across the United States, our universities are polluted, and if we Jews want to continue breathing, we need to get out. 

It would be easier to believe like Abraham of Sodom and Gomorrah that our institutions of higher learning retained a modicum of integrity. American universities, particularly among the Ivy League, represent a fast-lane to the highest echelons of social and economic success. Degrees from these institutions beget not only higher lifetime earnings, but unquantifiable prestige and status. To give up on them will not be easy. But it is time. Here's why. 

On Tuesday hundreds of students marched across the University of Pennsylvania, shouting what you might mistake for Nazi propaganda at the Führer Headquarters: “There is only one solution.” They also declared how civilian victims of Hamas terror deserved to die. This is Penn, one of the most coveted Ivy Leagues in the country, one of the most Jewish Ivy Leagues in the country, with 17% of the student population—1,750 students—Jewish in 2022. Ironically Rabbi Gabe Greenberg, executive director of Penn Hillel, said earlier this year: “Penn has a beautiful heritage of being a place where Jewish students could thrive in one of the top schools in the nation.” Now it seems like a sick joke. How can Jewish students survive, let alone thrive, with self-avowed supporters, potential perpetrators, of the systematic murder of Jews?

Calls for the death of Jews on American college campuses are not new—as organizations like Israel on Campus Coalition have documented in herculean efforts for decades—but they’re rarely so overt. Anti-Semites are now crawling out of the woodwork because they feel emboldened by Hamas’ slaughter and their welcome reception, indeed exhilarating celebration, in protests and rallies in more than 80 cities around the world.

Once they hid behind the woke shield of anti-Zionism, which could, at best, be justified as a political movement aimed at dismantling a wayward nation. But in case you had any doubts, it was a sham. They were anti-Semites all along. How else can you understand calls for “one [final?] solution” at Penn, “Gas the Jews” in Sydney, and “Stop the Israeli massacre on Gaza” in London, after the barbaric massacre Hamas committed on men, women and children, not to mention the rape, beheading, mutilation and burning alive? They are shameless and they are honest, and we ought to take their wishes at face value rather than jumping through loopholes to try and explain away their blatant, racist, incendiary hate speech.

Because that’s exactly what it is. Don’t believe me? Here’s further evidence of the infestation of anti-Semitism in the form of calls for sheer sadism and savagery at our universities in response to Hamas’ massacre, the deadliest day for Jews worldwide since the Holocaust. Some statements:

• Northwestern: “[Hamas] resistance…is not only expected, but is a testament to the indomitable human spirit.”

• University of Michigan Law School: “Israel has waged a war against the Palestinians since its bloody inception…[now they feel] the consequences of their…racist…actions.”

• George Washington University: “Every Palestinian is a civilian even if they hold arms.”

• Georgetown: “The violence…is a direct result of the brutal decades-long occupation of Palestinian land…daily human rights abuses…bombing, gunning down…ethnic cleans[ing].”

And lastly, at NYU students were seen tearing down pictures of children and elderly abducted by Hamas into Gaza, not only trying to erase their identity but their suffering.

It’s hard for me to say this, as a graduate of Brandeis University, a proud American and native of Boston, but Jews are no longer welcome at these universities. We need to pay attention. These are the signals. These are signals we need to get out. What else should we wait for? Physical attacks? Well that’s happening too. Stabbings? Pogroms? It's time we identify other viable paths forward which are consistent with our values and guarantee our safety. 

What can we do instead of outsourcing our education to universities inflamed by anti-Semitism and blatant calls for Jew murder? We can move our educational operation in-house. Specifically, I see three options: (1) Expand an-already Jewish institution like Yeshiva or Touro Universities, (2) Start a new American university, like the University of Austin, a project of Bari Weiss, Niall Ferguson and others, or (3) Export our children’s higher education to Israel, like we’ve already been doing anyways in a sense vis-à-vis Birthright since 1999.  

Now you might be raising your eyebrows. You might agree with my dire assessment on American universities but find contention with my suggestion these universities are past the point of no-return. Perhaps you believe they can be salvaged. Perhaps you want to believe they can be salvaged. It’s easier to maintain the status quo. America isn’t Europe. America is different! Look at our commitment to freedom of religion! Liberal democracy! Our constitution rooted in the Bible! True, America might be different. But people are not. People have hated Jews for a long time, and the notion that a modern democratic republic can change what has been called a sickness embedded in the human psyche is preposterous and worse, dangerous. At the very least we ought to entertain our options. Let’s examine the 3rd: exporting American Jewish higher education to Israel.

In 2019, Liel Leibowitz proposed free college in Israel for American Jews. As American campuses became increasingly hostile to Jews, he suggested Israel as a viable, cheaper and even better alternative. With such an investment, he writes that

Funders get to invest in a far more profoundly meaningful experience than a few days on a tour bus [Birthright], and Jewish families get a free college ride worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, which would otherwise come directly out of their bank accounts, or else be added to crushing mountains of student debt…

[And] the significance of an initiative like this far transcends any individual bottom line, whether familial, communal, institutional, or national. Instead, it will give American Jews the two things that we need the most: A sense of clarity, and a sense of community.

With existing English-language programs at Bar Ilan, Tel Aviv and Reichman Universities, and a new program recently unveiled at Hebrew University, it’s not hard to imagine how a fully-funded university degree for American Jews in Israel might look like. Options for study could run the gamut, from math and science to arts and humanities. Students could study alongside Israeli peers too, narrowing the culture gap between Jews raised in Israel and abroad. Students can come for an excellent education and, after three or four years, return home, and those who choose to stay will be equipped well for a successful integration into Israeli society from a social, cultural and economic standpoint.

Fundraising for these programs can be simple if the students whose parents are used to paying north of $200,000 for a four-year degree can spend a portion of that amount on their kids’ education in Israel. Not to mention the cadre of Jewish millionaires and billionaires currently severing ties with their American alma maters who will soon begin searching for more worthy recipients of their funding. Our business magnates will need a place to park their capital to fulfill their philanthropic commitments to education. Instead of continuing to bet long on American universities as canaries shriek in the coal mines, why not invest in the Jewish People, our people, perhaps the most resilient in the world?

Interestingly the main objectives I’ve heard on this plan are not at all related to funding, logistics or Israel’s noisy neighborhood. They’re about two things: (1) a reluctance to relinquish the status and prestige bestowed by top US universities, and (2) a reluctance to abandon the American project more broadly, which feels like what you’re doing when you give up the university.

If you fall into either of these camps, we need to take a step back and reconsider our priorities. I believe our priority as Jews must be Jewish flourishing today and tomorrow. It's nice and important that we’ve become fond of America, the most hospitable foreign nation for Jews in history. Indeed we owe her a huge debt of gratitude for the immense social, cultural and economic opportunity we’ve been afforded, despite America’s history of anti-Semitic quotas at top universities and employment discrimination leading many Jews to change their names.

But however warm, however welcoming the United States has been, she is not our permanent home—our sovereign state in our ancestral homeland—but rather a temporary abode, like the Sukkahs we erect for seven or eight days each Fall. From Zacharia to Psalm 126 we know this to be true, and innumerable other Jewish sources suggest our stay in the Diaspora was always meant to be a stage on the way to redemption. But that’s not our topic here, and for reasons I will explain shortly, I do not advocate for mass aliyah. I am only proposing we consider bringing our higher education in-house. And as for the prestige bestowed by American universities, it’s time we open a parallel track. We do not need a stamp of approval from the outside world to validate the quality of our students and their abilities. We can do it ourselves.

And we don’t even have to start from scratch. Israeli universities are some of the best in the word, building off millennia-long legacies of Jewish analysis and inquiry. Their English might be rusty, and many Israeli academics have left to America in recent years, but with increased funding we can reverse the academic brain drain. “Relative to the size of national population, Israel has sent a larger proportion of academic researchers to the United States than any other country, U.S. State Department data show,” according to Haaretz in 2019. The Taub Center has also reported how the number of senior research faculty in Israeli universities per capita has diminished consistently since the 1970s. These trends are worrying, but they can reversed. We’re all impressed by Idan Offer’s severing ties with Harvard, but none of us have asked why the Israeli billionaire was donating in the first place to a foreign university? Why not invest at home? Now that Mark Rowan, Bill Ackman and other business magnates are demonstrating their moral courage to break ties with top US universities over their failure to condemn anti-Semitism, it is within our capabilities to assemble a serious cadre of capital and vision to do our own thing, whether expanding current universities in Israel or, more logistically challenging, start one anew.

There are drawbacks to this plan. Famously Bibi Netanyahu was educated at MIT, acquiring there countless contacts and impeccable English. If we export American higher education to Israel, we may surrender these kinds of opportunities for networking and collaboration with others, perhaps further isolating Jews and the Jewish State. Another qualm might be a fear of waning intellectual diversity. Existing English-speaking academic programs in Israel are limited, and may detract from the Jews’ ability to master and contribute to a wide variety of fields and subjects. In light of these disadvantages, one might suggest we advance rather than retreat; that is, double down on our esteemed American universities—with time, resources and influence—in order to earn seats around the decision table and ensure our students safety and success.

Now I don’t minimize the gravity of the United States’ unwavering support for Israel, and with recent events it’s not hard to imagine how isolated Israel might be without Biden’s continuous declarations of solidarity and actions on behalf of the Jewish State. There is no reason not to believe Bidens’ personal experience with Jews, in America, and the presence of Jews in America generally, are part and parcel of his Zionism. It is therefore to prevent the isolation of Israel I do not advocate for a mass aliyah of all Jews to Israel.

Concerns about waning intellectual diversity are fair, too, but in the long term, with further proliferation of Jewish Israeli renaissances in the arts, music, culture, economy, technology and more, there is reason to believe growing Jewish education in Israel will unleash enormous creativity and enable Jewish achievement in ways that are hard to imagine outside Israel.

With the state of Israel we became self-reliant with out safety, and on Oct. 7 we were reminded of its importance. It’s time we become self-reliant with our education too. The universities are polluted. I don’t want our children to choke. Let’s go.