These are tough times for Israel program directors.
Just ask Rabbi Aubrey Isaacs, educational director of the WUJS (World Union of Jewish Students) Institute. Isaacs was in San Francisco last week to drum up interest in his program.
A new session at the Arad-based center had just begun with a 25 percent cancellation rate due to the current spate of violence in the region.
“That’s not bad,” Isaacs said in the thick brogue of his native Scotland. “Especially when you look at it like 75 percent of the people still showed up. But if this violence becomes long term, it will make recruitment a lot harder.”
The WUJS program was founded in 1968, specifically as a graduate program for diaspora Jews who might contemplate moving to Israel but first wanted work experience there.
Isaacs hopes young Jewish adults will continue to come, to learn what Israel is all about.
“Because of our location, we really don’t feel it,” he said of the current fighting. “TV can make it look like a war zone, but our special location allows us to feel very safe and secure.”
Arad, in the Negev Desert of southern Israel, is a development town with a population of about 27,000.
“What you’ve got here is the Israel that is not a tourist site,” he said. “It’s not isolated but it’s far enough so people can concentrate on the program and really meet an Israeli community. All the residents of Arad really get to know them.”
The program consists of seven months in intensive Hebrew classes, with additional courses in Jewish studies — from the Torah and the Bible to Zionism and Middle East politics.
Several excursions allow participants to see the country, and students are able to celebrate Shabbat and holidays in a traditional, yet no-pressure, kind of atmosphere. “People come from all religious persuasions, from strictly Orthodox to secular and everything in between,” he said. “People are free to take part in Shabbat and holidays or not. There’s no coercion at all.”
Once the seminar part of the program is completed, the WUJS office places the participants in jobs around the country. If a position cannot be found in someone’s field, often they are put to work in Jewish organizations, or somewhere where skills learned at WUJS can be put to use.
While North Americans are always represented, people from 50 different countries have participated, with an average of 15 countries represented each session. There are usually 30 to 40 students in each group, with two groups there simultaneously.
This fosters an atmosphere where participants learn in the classroom and from each other, said Isaacs. This not only “widens people’s perspectives of what they think Israel and Judaism are about,” he said, “but it helps them to feel that they are part of a worldwide Jewish community.”
The center also shares quarters with an absorption center, so WUJS participants can get to know new immigrants to Israel from all over the world. The program is heavily subsidized by the Jewish Agency, and costs participants $2,200, which includes the trips and one hot meal a day, but not airfare.
To Isaacs, the fact that the violence in the Middle East has heightened anti-Semitism in Europe could in fact provoke more Jews to consider spending time in the Jewish state.
“Israel is becoming politically isolated again, and this could have a rebound effect on the individual,” he said.
“A lot of very well-educated Jewish young adults have never had the opportunity to address what it means to be Jewish and what Israel means to them,” Isaacs added. “This is a way to do it.”