When I first told my friends that I had committed to Brandeis University for college and that I was planning on joining Hillel, the first response was that I would be kicked out without preamble. It has been one full year, and I am still here, leading Kabalat Shabbat using the very same melodies I planned while jailed for civil disobedience for fighting for a Free Palestine, and leading the student congregation in welcoming the new Jewish year.
I have been leading services and regularly attending services of the traditional egalitarian minyan (“Masorti” after the global Masorti movement) since August of 2023. Initially, I planned to keep my politics regarding Israel close to my chest until I could assume a leadership role, at which point I would dramatically reveal all and reshape Hillel to my anti-Zionist whims. At the time, the Masorti minyan did not read the prayer for the State of Israel and Zionism was not the major focus of our days. Of course, I still was introduced to the Israel fellow and heard about the AIPAC chapter (here called BIPAC), but Israel (and Palestine) felt much more relevant to my activities outside of Hillel than inside of it. I worked on the RejectAIPAC campaign through IfNotNow and supported Israelism screenings. At Hillel, I continued to practice High Holiday services and to meet new friends. I confided my politics in individual people slowly, hoping to find allies to free me from the isolation I felt.
Despite the fact that my Hillel was not explicitly focused on Israel, Hillel International as an organization has always been dominated by Zionism. Not all of it is the hardline AIPAC Zionism, where denials of Palestinian humanity run rampant. Some of it is liberal, two-state solution Zionism, some of it is implicit, not-thought-out Zionism, but regardless, anything non or anti-Zionist seems like a pariah. It is not unwelcome so much as never mentioned, shied away from. I met very few friends through Hillel willing to identify as anti-Zionist, and most of the Jewish anti-Zionists I have met while in college stay away from Hillel. They do not view it as a space for them.
I was in Hillel on October 7. It was the first day of Shmini Atzeret. I spent the day like so many others in Hillel, calling my relatives and friends to make sure they were safe, sobbing for my people and their future. I remember that evening the minyan said the Prayer for the State of Israel for the first time since I had attended Brandeis. I left the room.
Like in so many other Jewish spaces, Israel became the foremost talking point of Hillel after 10/7. One of the staff members was called up to enter Gaza as a soldier, a table for the hostages was set up at every Shabbat dinner, there were vigils and gatherings, led by JStreet and BIPAC. I did not attend any of them. In those first weeks I continued to go to services every Shabbat. I could not imagine myself doing anything different, I sat for the Prayer for the State of Israel. I muttered the words “And Palestinians” under my breath every time the announcement was made about the Israelis caught in the crossfire of apartheid-fueled violence (of course those words were never actually used). I called my anti-Zionist Jewish community from back home and listened over the phone to their song circles.
In the months since October 2023, I have grown increasingly uncomfortable with Hillel despite the best efforts of staff and student leaders. Though to their credit they have attempted to engage with me and make me feel welcome, which I do appreciate, my reasons for feeling uncomfortable in Hillel are beyond their control. There is always a member of the student community saying something nasty to myself or to a friend. While my disillusionment with Hillel was solidifying, I was slowly making my way to the outskirts of Jewish community by ingratiating myself in Jewish Pro-Palestine organizing. I have been an organizer for multiple years, but this was the first time I was focusing explicitly on Palestine. I was attending actions multiple times a week, discounting the actions that I led. I spent my weekdays dressed in green, red, and black with a high-vis vest, even as I spent my Friday nights and Saturdays at Hillel.
“As part of our vision to inspire every student to create an enduring connection to Jewish life, learning, and Israel, Hillel provides every Jewish student with the opportunity to explore and build a lasting relationship with Israel.” The words are written proudly on the website. Hillel is an inherently, proudly, and explicitly Zionist organization. So where does that leave me and those like me? I feel a strong moral opposition to Zionism. I feel a strong moral opposition to indoctrinating college students through propaganda trips to Israel. I feel a strong moral opposition to worshiping at the altar of militarism and state violence. At the same time, I feel a strong sense of my Jewish identity. I love Jewish community, Jewish family, Jewish ritual and tradition and practice so strongly. I should not have to give my Jewishness up for the sake of my values that tell me militarism, colonialism, and genocide are wrong.
Hillel will not kick out a student for reasons related to Zionism, but any anti-Zionist student will certainly feel somewhat socially isolated and uncomfortable. Hillel purports that students can engage in their Judaism through queer spaces, feminist spaces, Sephardi spaces; they can engage and build community together across the political spectrum, as long as they remain within the Zionist parameters of Hillel. By providing incredibly well funded, robust spaces that monopolize Jewish life on campus, Hillel can house a rich variety of Jewish groups that are in turn reliant on their funding and institutional strength. Hillel, no matter how much it purports to support anti-Zionist Jews, will never give them spaces to find and build strong Jewish community with each other; despite external declarations of encouraged conversation and open tent politics, that would be antithetical to its mission. Even if Hillel did provide that support, it would still be requiring anti-Zionist Jews to engage with their Jewishness in a way that leaves their values behind, accepting the fact that they are taking money and support from an organization whose mission is to organize the youth into ever increasing support for the State of Israel.
As an observant Jew on a suburban campus, my options for davening and engaging Jewishly are essentially limited to Hillel. I attend not because I enjoy it, but out of a sense of obligation and necessity. I think that is the true insidiousness of it. It is impossible for one Zionist organization, no matter how open it pretends to be, to have a monopoly on Jewish life and Jewish student involvement. Yet it is difficult to organize other options outside of it. Once called Open Hillel, Judaism on our Own Terms is growing to fill that gap on some college campuses. But, for busy students, this upkeep means endless organizing and competing with an organization with infinitely more reach, capacity, and resources. So I try to stick it out, against my comfort (and my conscience) because I would personally rather organize a protest for a Free Palestine than an alternative to Hillel.
How is it that Hillel can feel so all-consuming, when for centuries leftist Jews have forged their own spaces, holy communities? Hillel is rightfully criticized for being the only non-Chabad Jewish offerings on a campus. The tent is too wide, not everyone is being sheltered.
I am a disgruntled member of Hillel. We are in the midst of the Yamim Noraim. I will take my place on the ammud, and a congregation will be led in the holiest services of the year by a known and proud anti-Zionist. I hope at least that counts for something for the people who come after me. And I hope that one day, Jewish anti-Zionist students can engage in their Judaism, and their community, and their humanity fully on their college campuses without ever feeling like they must attend Hillel.
“For the only kind of Jewish.”
