Israel Engagement

A Conversation with Rabbi Jill Jacobs (T’ruah), Esther Sperber (Smol Emuni), Peter Beinart, and Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove (Park Avenue Synagogue)
Moderated by Rabbi Irwin Kula

American Jews have long spoken of a “big tent”—a communal space capacious enough to hold deep disagreement while maintaining a shared sense of peoplehood. Today, that tent is being tested as never before. A generational shift that has been brewing for some time has come to the fore since October 7, challenging old assumptions about Israel and Jewish identity. Debates over Israel, Zionism, Jewish safety, Palestinian rights, and the meaning of democracy have grown more urgent and more polarized. The question is no longer just what Liberal Zionism stands for, but whether a tent large enough to include its supporters, its skeptics, and its fiercest critics can still exist.

This conversation brings together panelists who represent distinct and diverging perspectives on Zionism, Jewish democracy, and the future of Israel–Diaspora relations. They will explore the fault lines reshaping Jewish identity, and the very practical question facing communities and institutions: How big can the Jewish tent be, and what must it hold in order to endure?

The opinions presented in this conversation reflect those of the individual panelists, and not those of BJ.

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Harvard historian Derek Penslar, the William Lee Frost Professor of Jewish History and Director of the Center for Jewish Studies, will deliver a lecture exploring how the promise of belonging in America’s universities has given way to a new sense of alienation—and what that shift reveals about Jewish life in America today.

For many American Jews, this has become a time of deep vulnerability—unlike any experienced since the Second World War; traumatized by the Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and by the spike in antisemitic incidents worldwide that have paralleled the last two years of war in Gaza. Colleges have been of particular concern to Jewish students, parents, and alumni who feel that pro-Palestinian students and faculty have had free rein to shut down other points of view, disrupt campus life, and shame or shun Jewish students who refuse to disavow Israel.

The fraught emotional state of American Jews today is a product of previous generations of Jewish integration and acceptance within American society. From the 1960s until the recent past, universities like Harvard welcomed Jews, but demographic and cultural changes have altered the composition of elite university student bodies and students’ views on Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Campus politics over the past two years illuminate American Jewish expectations, frustrations, and fears today.

Penslar has previously taught at Indiana University, the University of Toronto, and the University of Oxford, where he was the inaugural holder of the Stanley Lewis Chair in Modern Israel Studies. Derek has published a dozen books, most recently Zionism: An Emotional State (2023), and is currently writing The War for Palestine, 1947-1949: A Global History. Penslar is a past president of the American Academy for Jewish Research, a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and an Honorary Fellow of St. Anne’s College, Oxford.

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This year’s mayoral election has had an outsized impact on the Jewish community in New York City and around the country, shining a spotlight on the place of Judaism and Zionism in local politics. The race raised the already-high levels of tension and polarization in our NYC Jewish community, and with the election over, many of us are asking: Where do we go from here? Is a greater sense of unity possible? How can we go about healing the fractures among New York’s Jewish communities?

Amy Spitalnick, CEO of the Jewish Council on Public Affairs, offers reflections and analysis in conversation with Andrew Silow-Carroll, editor at large of the New York Jewish Week.

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Each and every member of our Israeli delegation has been deeply impacted by the events of October 7 and all that has come after. For all that has been lost and destroyed, each member of the delegation has been a part of trying to heal society, plant new seeds, and rebuild. Listen to their stories and hear about their work.

This event was part of Voices of Partnership: A Week with BJ’s Israeli Partners and Friends, generously sponsored by Steve Stulman as part of BJ’s bicentennial celebration. https://bj.org/programs/voices-of-partnership/

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With Israel celebrating its 77th year in the midst of an ongoing war, with 59 hostages remaining in Gaza, and profound questions about the future of its democracy; we will hear reflections from the 14 members of the Israeli delegation about the purpose and meaning of Zionism.

This event is part of Voices of Partnership: A Week with BJ’s Israeli Partners and Friends, generously sponsored by Steve Stulman as part of BJ’s bicentennial celebration. https://bj.org/programs/voices-of-partnership/

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For the past 30 years, BJ has cultivated a meaningful and transformative relationship with leaders and members of several Israeli organizations that have helped shape a vibrant, pluralistic, and authentic expression of Israeli Judaism. In this special conversation with the visiting Israeli delegation, we reflect on the impact we’ve had on one another, what we have learned from one another, and the journey we have taken together—through both the highs and the lows.

This event is part of Voices of Partnership: A Week with BJ’s Israeli Partners and Friends, generously sponsored by Steve Stulman as part of BJ’s bicentennial celebration. https://bj.org/programs/voices-of-partnership/

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In this session with Dr. Rachel Korazim, we will read and discuss poetry written during and in response to the calamity of October 7 and the war that has followed, leaving Israel and the Jewish world in shock and despair. The poems come from different parts of Israeli society and reflect a variety of voices.

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Join the Tel Aviv Review of Books as we kick off Israel at 76—a new series of captivating lectures and eye-opening conversations with teachers, thinkers and activists who are thoughtfully wrestling with some of the most essential questions about Israel’s future at this moment.

The Israel at 76 series is generously sponsored by Helena Diamant Glass, in cherished memory of her beloved parents, Regina Landwirth Diamant and Karl Diamant, and in honor of Yom Ha’atzma-ut 5784.

Hamas’ offensive on October 7, 2023, threw Israel into turmoil. Vulnerable as never before, Israelis were made to revisit old assumptions about their society, the political system, the meaning of living in a Jewish state, and their relationship with the Palestinians. Join Professor Clemence Boulouque (Jewish and Israel studies, Columbia University) and American-Israeli author Oren Kessler (Palestine 1936: The Great Revolt and the Roots of the Middle East Conflict) for a conversation exploring these complexities with Gilad Halpern, the founding co-editor of the Tel Aviv Review of Books, which is also a co-sponsor of this kick-off event.

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In the months that have passed since October 7, BJ has hosted several Israeli-Palestinian groups working toward peace and a shared society, as we continue our commitment to lift up the courageous voices of those working together, advocating for a solution to the decades-long conflict.

In February, in partnership with the New Israel Fund, we hosted May Pundak and Dr. Rula Hardal, the inspirational Israeli and Palestinian co-executive directors of the rapidly growing “A Land for All” peace movement.

“What we have not had in 20 years is a political vision that will give A: hope, B: realistic horizon, and C: a commitment to an end game,” May Pundak said at the February 12 event.

“We provide the last two elements, vision and hope,” said Dr. Rula Hardal. “But we need on both sides as well as here in the States, the right political leadership who are able to make a decision to start this shift and to decide that we can have another way of life and another reality for both people in Israel and Palestine.”

Through the voices of those who refuse to accept the status quo, we will continue to advocate to transform the current landscape into one of hope and change.

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