Hillel, the Jewish group of the campus, is flourishing and torn by the conflict

It was the night of the chicken offers in Yale’s Hillel chapter, the Jewish student group, and the basement dining room was full of turbulent and hungry students attracted by chicken and fried Kosher cheese tanks.

Some students kissed Mezuza coming. Others were not even Jews, but they came for food and the company, a sign of pluralism that Hillel – the organization of the dominant Jewish campus in the United States – says that it embraces.

Yet under the surface, there were signs of tension, after months of divisive protests on the campus during the war in Gaza. A silent question hanging in the air, several students said: “Which side are you on?”

Few American organizations have been touched by clashes on war as Hillel. The movement, founded in 1923 at the University of Illinois, now has chapters in 850 college and university all over the world, from highly selective private schools such as Yale to great state universities such as Texas A&M. The Hillel movement, including Hillel International and Chapters of the Hillel campus, obtained $ 200 million in 2023, received by tens of thousands of donors.

The Hillel centers are where university students go to cement their sense of Jewish identity or to find out. His slogan is “all types of Jew” and aims to be welcoming for everyone.

But while the conflict in Gaza continues, some Jewish students believe that Hillel is not critical of the conduct of the Israeli government war and too defensive in support of Zionism, a belief in the law of Jews to a Jewish state in their ancestral land of Israel.

Hillel, for his part, is not sorry. “Hillel as an institution has been and remains engaged in support of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, which satisfies the right of Jewish self -determination in an ancestral homeland,” said Adam Lehman, CEO of Hillel, in an interview.

The shock of the Hamas attack of 7 October 2023, against Israel, has moved many Jewish students to explore what it means to be Jewish, fueling significant growth in the interest for Hillel on campuses around the world. During the school year of 2023-24, when the conflict in the Middle East intensified, a record of 180,000 students participated in Hillel’s activities at least once, 12,000 more than the previous year, according to the organization. There has also been an increase in the number of “super-utters”, which have visited Hillel at least six times.

In the last year and half, however, the solidarity that has been provided by that identity is broken.

The cracks can be felt in public life and synagogues. And the division between the Jews more generally is taking place among the Jews on the campus, since some complain that Hillel is too aligned with Israel, while others say that it is too open to Israel’s critics.

Many students have difficulty divorcing Hillel completely, especially at this moment when they may not feel safely expressing their faith and Jewish outside their community.

Some students, such as Emanuelle Sippy, an elderly from Princeton, are looking for a middle ground. It still goes to Hillel for prayer services, meals and lessons. But in the search for a more congenial left -wing political environment, it has also contributed to reviving a small rival group, the alliance of Jewish progressives, on its campus.

“There is a group of people – close friends, people who respect and admire – who are fighting battles within these institutions like Hillel,” he said. “They could present themselves to events. Hillel could count them. It doesn’t mean they have no criticism.”

This is not the first time that there is a schism among Hillel students.

Harvard students launched a Open Hillel Movement in 2012, for protest against the policy of the parent organization against collaboration with anti-Israeli groups. In December 2013, students of Swarthmore Hillel declared the first chapter “Open Hillel” of the nation, swearing to promote an open investigation, regardless of ideology.

The current ideological division seems more clear, since the protests of the campus in favor and against Israel have led to arrests, suspensions and causes. When it comes to the Hillel campus, “many students do not feel comfortable for political reasons,” said Danya Dubrow-Compaina, senior and co-founder of Yale Jews to cease fire.

There is also a growing gap of generation. In a PEW survey conducted in February 2024, 38 % of adults under the age of 30 said that Israel’s reasons for the struggle with the struggle were valid, down 41 % two years earlier. This is confronted with 78 percent of people in the age of 65 who said the same, with different points compared to the previous survey.

Elijah Bacal, a second year who is an organizer for the Yale Jews for ceased the fire, said that the institutional leadership of the Slifka center, as is known Hillel of Yale, was slow to adapt.

“I think there is a true, honestly, just like a touchness,” Bacal said.

Hillel is still one of the first places that Jewish students go when they arrive on the campus, to meet others, do their homework and enjoy a meal with friends.

“I was looking for a place where my intellectual life would not be calmed in class, but poured into a wider community,” said Medad Lyton, an elderly from Yale.

After October 7, he said, “he heard a strong sense of people.” A rim in Slifka helped him to connect with others to express his pain. “It’s a kind of second home for me,” said the center.

Nile Fox, Junior at Washington University in St. Louis, was raised in a religious Jewish family and searched for Hillel as soon as he arrived on the campus. After October 7, Hillel was his “rock”, he said.

“It was really useful to know that every time I feel uncomfortable I have a place where I was supported and loved, no matter what,” said Mrs. Fox.

Other students are dismayed from what they perceive as the acritical opinion of Israel by Hillel in the face of a complicated and morally stimulating reality.

Some students oppose the Hillel houses flying over the Israeli flag, who see as a symbol of a nation that, from the point of view of Mrs. Sippy, has committed war crimes.

Uri Cohen, executive director of the Yale’s Slifka Center, says that the flag represents Hillel values.

“There are some who do not come because it crosses a line for them, and there are many who come,” Cohen said. “Slifka is very clear. We are a Zionist institution. We are not also checking anyone’s credentials at the door.”

In January, Yale Hillel hosted a speech by Naftali Bennett, a former Israeli army command, defense minister and prime minister, who was once considered a protecto by Benjamin Netanyahu, current Prime Minister Israel. Many Jewish students opposed Bennett’s Falco politics.

(At a time following the Harvard Business School, Bennett joked about the fact that he would give a winging exploding to people who did not agree with him, according to Harvard Crimson.)

Mr. Bacal, the organizer of Yale Jews to cease the fire, helped to conduct a peaceful protest against Mr. Bennett in the hall of the Slifka center. He did not contest the right of Mr. Bennett to speak, said Bacal, but did not see why the event had been held in a spiritual place, a chapel in which the students went to pray and which contained an ark with a Torah.

“I think it is a real shame, because the Jewish community to college should welcome and represent all the Jews on the campus to the best of its skills, it doesn’t matter where they come from,” he said.

Another student, Netanel Crispe, an elderly person, said he objected not to the speaker but to Hillel who allowed the protest against him. Crispe said that the Slifka staff prevented him and many others from shooting the protest.

He criticized Yale Hillel for trying to “play on both sides in a way that does not reflect the fundamental values”.

Cohen, director of Slifka, defended the invitation that the center has extended to Mr. Bennett, noting that his speech attracted 300 people in a space that contained only 100. “We did it from our love for Israel and our love for Zionism and the opportunity to give access to our students to an influential leader in the world,” he said.

To illustrate the Hillel dilemma, Mr. Bacal, the leader of the protest, recalled how honored to guide Shabbat’s services for the first time. His parents came to the city to be there and his friends attended. But it took place around the period of the Naftali Bennett event and one of his friends remained far away for protest.

He told Mr. Bacal that he did not feel comfortable to enter Slifka that week. “I understand it totally,” Bacal said.

Alain Delaquerière, Susan C. Beachy AND Sheelagh McNeill Research contribution.