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Why Birthright Israel, at $1,000,000,000, is Hafuch

By

coffee-1by Rabbi Aaron Meyer

So named for the little bit of coffee added to a greater quantity of milk, turning the norm on its head, or perhaps for the order in which the ingredients are combined, Cafe Hafuch, upside-down coffee, is the Israeli answer to cappuccino. Though pleasant tasting and popular, these hollow calories are often the first to go when a diet is in order. Birthright Israel is increasingly showing signs of becoming the upside-down answer to promoting Jewish life and a much-needed paradigm shift cannot come soon enough.

Take young Jews, 18-26, on a free trip to Israel and they will return rededicated to Jewish life, says the conventional wisdom. They will develop a connection to Israel. As funder Sheldon Adelson expressed to an auditorium full of Birthright participants in 2012, they will engage in some “hanky-panky”. They will overcome the forces of assimilation and affiliate with the established Jewish community.

This wisdom, promoted by a philanthropic, well-intention, and above-all-else different generation, has proven itself outdated. It isn’t working. A 2009 study by the Brandeis University Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies, the first to comprehensively look at participant engagement five years following their trip, reported that “Participants … were not more likely to report feeling connected to Jewish customs and traditions or their local Jewish community” and that any increase in involvement was “only marginally statistically significant.” A 2012 update revealed that “Taglit [Birthright] participants and nonparticipants who are intermarried are equally likely to be raising their oldest children Jewish” and that while Birthright participants are more likely to belong to a Jewish congregation, to have a special meal on Shabbat, or to celebrate Jewish holidays, “the effects were small.”

This is not to take away from the “life-changing” experience that some Birthright participants have had, and indeed there are other ways to measure the success of these trips. Positive, statistically-significant findings can be found in the same study. Many participants report significantly elevated feelings toward Israel and the Jewish community upon their return, and many say they feel positive about being Jewish. The study also reports a significant increase in in-marriage among trip participants, though it cannot control for the bias of predisposition: namely how much more likely are those willing to participate in a long-term Israel program to in-marry generally. All of this is true, yet … with more than 330,000 young adults having participated in this trip at a cost of $3,000 per participant, the time to ask the now $1,000,000,000 question has come: Is feeling positive about being Jewish – without translating those feelings into action – worth a billion dollar expenditure of Jewish communal resources?

Take young Jews, 18-26, on a free trip to Israel and they will return rededicated to Jewish life, says the conventional wisdom. This model would have worked a generation ago. Jewish identity for the baby boomers – those funding Birthright – was built around memories of the Holocaust and a visceral defense of the State of Israel against the enemies seeking its destruction. Supporting Israel was a way to show, and in fact to be, Jewish. For too many millennials, though, and particularly those on the margins of Jewish life, the Holocaust is ancient history and Israel is seen as the aggressor rather than the underdog. These core elements, which once drove Jews toward Jewish life, are no longer the predominate reasons to be Jewish. Motivations are fundamentally different than they were just one generation ago, and our models of engagement need to change accordingly.

If we want to ensure vibrant Jewish life, and with it strong American Jewish support for Israel, from among my generation, we need to invest more philanthropic dollars domestically in programs that reach the hearts of our 20-somethings. Social justice. Meaningful relationships taken offline. A moral existence beyond concern for the self. Judaism that can experienced and lived in the here and now rather than while on vacation, confined within the borders of the State of Israel.

This winter, the Jewish community in North American, Israel, and around the world will reach the billion dollar mark in our support of Birthright Israel. Are the positive feelings that have been generated about being Jewish – without translating those feelings into action – worth such a significant expenditure of resources? Let’s try spending the same money domestically and see what happens. What won’t happen is an erosion of support for Israel. Al ha’hefech – to the contrary: support for the Jewish State in my generation comes more often from a strong Jewish identity than Jewish identity comes from supporting the State of Israel. When young Jews are engaged Jewishly, they will pay us to visit the Jewish homeland, and the dynamic will again be right-side up.

Rabbi Aaron Meyer is the Assistant Rabbi at Temple De Hirsch Sinai in Seattle, WA.

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Comments

  1. I agree-we are long overdue for a more serious evaluation. The program was never really free. Not for the Jewish community anyway. While there is no argument that Taglit has been an incredible life-changer for countless people, we must start paying more attention to the countless people who went back to their pre-trip lives. For a billion dollars, we can’t afford not to.

  2. Birthright is nice but it is not the solution. There is no replacing the long-term Israel program. With over 40 years of experience and 22,000 alumni later – the Alexander Muss High School in Israel has first hand proof of the impact we’ve had. Many of our alumni are engaged and have become leading Jewish professionals and lay leaders. Unless day schools become tuition free, there is no better return on investment then a long-term Israel program.

  3. This is a thoughtful piece. I wouldn’t juxtapose investing in Israel programs vs. domestic programming. I would ask: what are the best programmatic modalities that can inspire young people to continue and deepen their Jewish lives, whether in Israel or in their local community? We will come up with very interesting and out of the box answers that will will be very different than putting people on bus for 10 fully packed days narrated by an old fashioned tour guiding paradigm.

  4. As a supporter of Taglit since it’s inception, we have always viewed this as an important investment in the continuity of a Jewish life in this country and many other countries throughout the world that send participants on this Taglit experience. Other than being critical Rabbi Meyer, how much time and effort has your synagogue and/or community (Seattle) reached out to these returning participants to engage them in meaningful Jewish activities? Birthright Next provides meaningful opportunities – perhaps that would turn your lemon experience into tasty lemonade.

  5. A study is only as good as the questions asked. While the experience of Birthright may not be translating into traditional organizational affiliations, is that goal, and if so, is that a worthy goal in the world today? I believe it is having a more profound and subtle impact on the most hard to reach and therefore important segment of American Jewish youth. My casual observations of Birthright participants from the edges of the Jewish community- young people from families who are unaffiliated, ambivalent, non-participanting, staunchly secular, universalist and/or intermarried has demonstrated the trip has a surprising (to them) profound, identity changing impact. Critical or clueless about Israel and its connection to the Jewish People and Judasim before they embark, they return sensitized to the complexities, good and bad. It is an inoculation against the anti-Israel, and ultimately anti-Jewish propaganda that abounds in every media outlet worldwide. For the first time they are perceiving Israel in the first person, with ownership and connection, with pride and affection, with appreciation and compassion, with excitement and concern. Domestically, as we in the US face a new and growing form of dangerous assaults on the Jewish People in the form of denouncements by the likes of the ASA, it is immeasurably important that the outliers of the Jewish community retain an appreciation and emotional connection with ‘us’ so that they are not swept up in the new growing assumption of hate and delegitimization that is springing up everywhere. If the baby boomer generation’s touchstone to Judaism was the Holocaust and Israel’s difficult birth, then it is no less valid, no less important that the more assimilated, more diluted millennial generation’s touchstone be a personally positive experience of an Israel they might never have taken the time to get to know were it not for the Birthright Trip. Those who are already well grounded and connected, have their ideals enhanced. Those who are connected by a thread, have that cord strengthened irrevocably. Success is not so easily measured by membership registration. If we think that is the bottom line, then we are both narrow in our perspective, and short-sighted in our strategy for group survival.

  6. Birthright may have had some initial successes, but I have always advocated that the money would be better spent, i.e. invested, in sending high school students to Israel. Their Jewish identities and orientation have not been fully formed yet, whereas 18-26 year olds have already made their lifestyle decisions. Unfortunately, Birthright all but decimated high school trips to Israel.

  7. If the existing Jewish domestic programming infrastructure had been effective to begin with, there would have been no need for Birthright. What Birthright did was create a paradigm shift in Jewish and Israel engagement – one that reflected the growing distance between the traditional pillars of American Jewish identity (Holocaust, anti-Semitism) and the daily lives of young American Jews. What we need in order to capitalize on the Birthright investment is exciting and inspiring Jewish engagement that is as inspiring and exciting as Taglit-Birthright Israel. In order to do that we need another paradigm shift. But established Jewish organizations are not so good with change. There are some exceptions however – ROI Community is pretty darn exciting for instance and, if I may, this sort of thinking is what informs our own Jewlicious Festivals. Just sayin…

  8. Perhaps the measure of success of Birthright should be some contemporary interpretation of the Z word that never seems to get mentioned (Zionism), rather than the model of institutional affiliation that is falling off across the Jewish spectrum, not just among millenials. Whatever its faults, Birthright exposes young people to the complexities and challenges of Israel (albeit in a highly choreographied fashion) that appears to be more attractive that what their home congragations offer. (Can one really envision much of a response to a free trip to the bienniel meeting of a major jewish organization, or free entry into a division meeting of the local federation?) Can we envision a new, globalized, internetworked Zionism that makes Israel a permanent fixture in people’s lives, wherever they live? Can we make it axiomatic to live a portions of one’s life in Israel? Can we incorporate such things as congragational time-share apartments in Israel, or long-term volunteer and employment programs for American and Israeli Jews in each other’s countries? The cultural cross-pollination could be profound. Can we use available technology, communications, and travel to dissolve the Israel/Diaspora dichotomy and re-imagine the Jewish people? Or are we locked into finding in the research only those items that deviate from or support our particular territorial biases?

  9. Sandy, thank you for your comment. I am, have been, and will be impressed with the folks at Birthright NEXT. They are incredibly thoughtful and systematic as they go about the very work for which I try to advocate in my article, namely investing money domestically to enhance engagement with Jewish life. I hope that Jewish organizations the world over partner with and augment their important mission!

  10. The author makes good points about the problem, but the solution he gives is way off the mark. Judaism is more than simply being more Western than the Westerner. We must connect Jews to authentic Torah and Judaism in an inspirational and meaningful way.
    http://www.GetYourJewOn.com

  11. Rabbi,

    Please tell us what education about modern Israel and Zionism the students in your synagogue receive, at any age.

    Thank you.

  12. ” . . . we need to invest more philanthropic dollars domestically in programs that reach the hearts of our 20-somethings. Social justice.”

    I applaud Rabbi Meyer’s focus on relevant statistics. So here’s a question: Where are the statistics to indicate, not anecdotally, but on a national scale, that “social justice” (why not just “justice”?) programs have brought significant percentages of Jews to greater commitment to Judaism?

    It can’t be that there’s been a lack of effort regarding “social justice”. The Reform movement has made “social justice” a primary cause for quite some time now. I would suggest, as a result, that the Pew research study tells us something quite to the contrary. That “social justice” programming has been over-emphasized. The Reform movement has been deteriorating rapidly, in my opinion, by not redirecting its efforts towards a greater emphasis on Jewish education and ritual observance. If anyone thinks I’m exaggerating about the degree to which “social justice” concerns the Reform movement, take a look at the list of resolutions proposed at the recent and previous Reform biennials: http://urj.org/about/union/governance/reso/

    I truly wish for a stronger and more vital Reform movement. Jews need a viable option to Orthodoxy as everyone is not going to be Orthodox (I’m not Orthodox). But let’s talk about what works vs. what makes us feel good.

    Before Rabbi Meyer critiques Birthright, a brilliant program in my opinion, and never offered as a complete solution, he should come with a proven solution and not the aspirational one he offers.

    I don’t need a synagogue or a Jewish community to perform acts of “social justice”. I can do those through the myriad secular organizations which already offer me these opportunities. But I do need a synagogue and community to celebrate Shabbat, Sukkot, Purim, and the rest of our holidays and to help me appreciate their relevance. I need a synagogue and community to learn the lessons our Torah wants us to know and live.

    I believe I can be self-reflective enough to differentiate between what I like and what works.

    I would very respectfully ask that Rabbi Meyer do the same.

    Joel Alperson

  13. I am genuinely confused by this posting, which in itself strikes me as “Hafuch” — quite literally upside down. What if, instead of writing the negatives before the positives, Rabbi Meyer had first written (and I am quoting him): “Many participants report significantly elevated feelings toward Israel and the Jewish community upon their return, and many say they feel positive about being Jewish. The study also reports a significant increase in in-marriage among trip participants….” Shouldn’t he then have written: “WOW, finally, the Jewish community found a program that IS working among highly secularized Jewish youth!!!” Moreover, if he read the Brandeis study carefully, he would see that the researchers have done a pretty good job of “control[ling] for the bias of predisposition: namely how much more likely are those willing to participate in a long-term Israel program to in-marry generally.” The control group is the thousands of young Jews age 18 to 26, who wished to go to Birthright but couldn’t because there was not enough money to send them.

    Ultimately, I’m a qualitative historian not a quantitative one, so I do not live and die by statistics ( I also am the voluntary chair of the Birthright Israel Education Committee, having started as a skeptic but seen that it works). There are by now also tens of thousands of testimonials of Birthright participants testifying to the fact that the program launched them on a richer Jewish journey, with more Israel engagement, that also had great payoffs for them as human beings. Still, let’s face it, it is rare for any kind of educational program to have that kind of control group — and that track record of success. Moreover, I am skeptical that “tikun olam/social justice” programs build Jewish identity — I often think participants relate to it as Christian charity with a Yiddish accent, but I would love to see some serious statistics like the Cohen Center Study that prove me wrong.

    I am much more intrigued by Rabbi Meyer’s other suggestions of “Meaningful relationships taken offline. A moral existence beyond concern for the self. Judaism that can experienced and lived in the here and now.” I would have been fascinated to read a more detailed program proposal by the Rabbi rather than a headline-generating Birthright bash — that, too, struck me as morally “Hafuch.”

    Jewish identity building need not be a zero-sum ballgame, given all the wealth in America today. Rather than trying to detract from the most successful mass Jewish identity building of our generation, Rabbi Meyer should figure out ways to inspire his congregants and his peers to divert some of the charitable dollars they now give to their local opera or prep school or university back to Jewish causes. That would truly be Hafuch — and most welcome….
    Professor Gil Troy

  14. I think it’s fair to ask the $1 billion question. But I think to answer it requires a much broader perspective. Birthright is an international program whose impacts on the entire Diaspora as well as on Israelis is not captured by the Cohen Center. Like the Pew study, the Cohen Center focuses on traditional Jewish behaviors and finds modest impacts. But there’s more than meets the study…

    I once ran all of Birthright NEXT’s operations and programs like NEXT Shabbat, microgrants for social entrepreneurs, and more have challenged young adults to construct their own Jewish programs and communities, rather than criticizing existing offerings. And they responded. Over 250,000 have participated in NEXT Shabbat, in build-your-own-sukkah and make-your-own-seder programs and much more.

    Birthright Israel reaches broadly, and for most, perhaps not too deeply. But it is a welcome and important part of the Jewish rite of passage for the Diaspora, and it builds real relationships between Israeli and Diaspora Jews.

  15. I think there is a middle ground on this debate. For over 15 years I ran a synagogue based youth group and sent many teens off to Israel.
    I realized that we were creating a disconnect between their spiritual homeland (Israel) and their physical homeland (the United States). All to often I would hear from the teens that Israel is where I am, and practice Judiasm, but I live here in America.
    Twelve years ago I created a Jewish summer program called Etgar 36 (www.etgar.org) to address this disconnect. The program is steeped in our tradition of social justice and activism by exploring history, politics and activism as well as Jewish identity and participation in America. While exploring America and getting the “feel” for the various cities we meet with all sides of current political issues as well as discuss Jewish views and participation in these topics. Each Friday night we celebrate Shabbat by attending a different denominational service so the participants can see the wide range of offerings available in this country.
    The goal at the end of the summer journey is for the teens to understand that they can be a part of the Jewish community here in America and that there are various entree points to that community. It is as valid to be a shul goer as it is a “pursuer of peace and justice”.
    Hopefully, they see that you can be both.
    Just as I think we can, and should, create strong Jewish feelings and connections to Israel and to America. After all, the large percentage of people we send to Israel will not live there.

  16. There is indeed a real need to review Birthright Israel in an open and constructive environment. The Jewish community has poured enormous resources into this project and continues to do so. I do not think we need to see Rabbi Meyer’s article as bashing. Being critical and recognizing Birthright as the perhaps the biggest and most engaging program of the Jewish community are not mutually exclusive. Let’s applaud it for doing what it does but still challenge it to meet its mission.

    The fact is that we should be asking about long-term involvement.Attempts by Birthright Next to capitalize on Birthright have not lived up to expectations and indeed, that organization has gone through a long process of redefinition, becoming one of connecting and promoting exisitng organizations and initiatives. There is a reason that there was a disconnect between Birthright and Next just as there is with many community focused activities looking to capitalize on the Israel experience.

    However, I would not be so fast to call for a reversal of funding and indeed, there are large sums of funding available for local engagement programming. What is perhaps more in order is a question as to what elements of the Israel experience need to be developed and/or emphasized in order to foster a foundation upon which to build. What will make the Israel experience a Jewish experience? What will inject the participant with a sense that Judaism is a rich and relevant part of his or her life?

    As Program Director at Livnot U’Lehibanot, we have 34 years of experience with these issues. It is not really so much an argument about the program length as it is the content. These elements should include a celebration of Shabbat, Jewish learning, Jewish meditation and spirtuality, with a touch of Judaism’s deep connection to nature. These can and should be part of every Israel experience.

    Someone experiencing Israel on such a trip will be far more likely to search for and engage with the Jewish community upon their return.

  17. I wanted to end my last post by saying, I think making the connection to Israel is vital to a strong Jewish identity but how much stronger it would be if it were part of a holistic approach and combined with a Jewish connection to one’s physical homeland.
    During the school year, Etgar 36 is hired by synagogues and day schools to do short versions of our summer journey. How great that the participants on these trips are able to understand Jewish connections to the Civil Rights movement of the 60s while touring the South, to food as a social justice issue while we take them to the Lower 9th ward in New Orleans as examples while also having a connection built to Israel.
    How great to celebrate both homelands!

  18. Almost 18 years ago, I served as the inaugural CEO of Israel Experience, Inc., the Jewish community’s response to the 1990 Jewish Population Study that highlighted the need to elevate Israel Experience programming as a core dimension of Jewish life. At that time, there was compelling research (conducted by the CRB Foundation) indicating that high school/teen Israel Experience programs and NOT collegiate programs offered the best opportunity for enhancing Jewish engagement. A significant number of youth groups ran programs of various shapes and sizes and our initial efforts at elevating Israel Experience programs within that framework were quite successful. The youth group framework was excellent – it offered pre-trip planning, trip logistics and post trip follow-up all in the same organization. Then the Birthright bandwagon began – classic “tyranny of philanthropy” because big money decided that this is what they wanted to do and basically forced free 10-day collegiate travel (“Israel as Theme Park”) on the community despite little evidence it was effective. Teen programs were decimated and replaced with short, content-poor college break trips. There was no up-front work other than “organizational meetings.” and little follow-up. Despite the efforts of Birthright NEXT, long term engagement has been minimal. Cohen Center research is not objective as funding comes from Michael Steinhardt, a Birthright founder. While it is premature to call Birthright a failure (after all the numbers are substantial and the anecdotal successes of individuals are all real) it is clear the program has fallen far short of everyone’s expectations. Ironically, my daughter is on a Birthright trip right now. Her feedback is disturbing – poor logistics, little/no content and little real Israel focus – it could be a frat party in Cancun or the Bahamas. A billion dollars is a lot of money (even if Sheldon Adelson made more money per day than any other American). The PEW report indicates that >50% of Birthright attendees still see their Jewish engagement as minimal. It is time for the Jewish community to recognize that marketing free trips to the unaffiliated is not the solution. For some, it is the best we can do. For others, more is needed. The community needs to recognize that “Israel as Theme Park” will not instill the kind of Jewish engagement needed to sustain the community.

  19. I went on Birthright back in 2001 through Hillel. I was already committed to Jewish living, but had not been to Israel. Birthright made it possible for me to go, for which I am forever grateful. However, there was no follow up afterwards, which surprised me. I thought there would be a “Hey, you had this great experience. We’d love for you to come join us at……” (insert a social, religious, volunteer, advocate for Israel on campus, take a class on Jewish history, or other program). I think there was a reunion meeting with pizza later on, but I don’t remember anything else of substance. It would be interesting to compare results between Birthright trips that made an effort to engage prior participants vs. those that didn’t.

  20. While there are no doubt questions about the long-term impact of Taglit on participants, there is no question that the trip can be a spark for the individual. The trip itself is a trigger. The question is what happens after the trip. Is there follow up? Do synagogues reach out and connect with participants? What about other organizations? When there is follow up, great things happen.

    The author writes:

    “If we want to ensure vibrant Jewish life, and with it strong American Jewish support for Israel, from among my generation, we need to invest more philanthropic dollars domestically in programs that reach the hearts of our 20-somethings. Social justice. Meaningful relationships taken offline. A moral existence beyond concern for the self. Judaism that can experienced and lived in the here and now rather than while on vacation, confined within the borders of the State of Israel.”

    It is precisely the vacuous nature of the things the author calls for, when divorced from Jewish content, that create the new religion of Social Justice. Disconnected from Jewish content, from the idea that fixing the world is an obligation (dare I say we have obligations as Jews?!), we are left with social justice as random act of kindness.

    As for presenting a Judaism that can be lived in the here and now, if you present something of high quality, with real content, that communicates meaning and a sense of commitment to that which is greater than you – namely community, kedushah, and obligation in a Divine context- without apology or dumbing down, then perhaps you have a chance.

    It is the dumbing down, the divorce of content and meaning from action, the playing to the lowest common denominator to get people just to say they are proud to be Jewish that led us to the challenges we face today.