On December 27, after eight months of rocket fire from Palestinian militants into southern Israel, the Israeli Defense Force began an offensive targeting Hamas forces in the Gaza Strip. While many on campus have been quick to take strong sides for or against in response to the Gaza incursion, 28 University students, after spending 10 days in Israel in early January, found it impossible to choose sides.
Sponsored by Taglit-Birthright Israel, the trip offered participants the opportunity to visit one of the most fiercely contested regions in the world. The experience, students report, had a major impact on their view of the conflict.
“I actually met Israelis, some of whom were serving in the military or had just served,” said Michael Pernick ’10. “They were people just like us – 19, 20, 21 year olds – and wonderful people.  I became friends with them and it gave me a more personal aspect of this impersonal, violent situation.”
Many think the Birthright trips, funded by Israeli and Jewish corporations and philanthropists, aim to propagandize young Jews; most students on the trip, however, felt that they were left to form their own opinions.
“The company that we went with was not so much trying to push an agenda as encouraging us to come to our own conclusions,” said Rachel Berkowitz ’09, who led the trip with Avi Smith ’09.
Due to the controversy regarding the conflict with Gaza, trip members were even more likely to be exposed to opposing viewpoints.
“The conflict with Hamas made everyone want to talk more candidly about Israeli conflict,” said Yannick LeJacq ’11.  “The trip was a little less controlled because of that; they couldn’t really stop people from speaking against some of Israel’s actions.”
Some of the students’ experiences provoked criticism of Israel’s offensive actions.
“When I spoke with Israeli citizens, it seemed as though morality was not an issue,” said Nathaniel Leich ‘12. “What were they placing before these human [Palestinian] lives?  It almost seemed like it was just the pride of their country.”
Berkowitz recalled visiting a kibbutz—a communally run farm—and listening to a right-wing Israeli man assert that Israel was undeniably correct in attacking the Gaza Strip.
“He said, ‘We have to respond and we can’t give up land,’” Berkowitz recalled.  “It was not so much the content of what he said as the way in which he got angry that struck me.”
Other instances led students to sympathize with Israel’s position. When visiting the cemetery of famous Zionist Theodore Herzl, the group met an Israeli father who, despite losing his son, maintained a very patriotic view of his country.
“Of course, losing family is the most painful thing in the world, but the father told us everyone who moves to and lives in Israel knows it’s part of what it means to be an Israeli,” said Katherine Yagle ‘12.  “His other children still fight in the military and are very patriotic.”
LeJacq had a similar experience when the group visited northern Israel and saw the hostility in the land at the border.

“I saw that when you’re a small, isolated country surrounded by countries who contest your legitimacy, you just want to protect yourself to the best of your ability,” LeJacq said.  “It didn’t make me more pro-Israel, but it made me understand why Israeli politics have been so aggressive.”
A trip to Yad Vashem, the Israeli Holocaust Museum, also influenced student opinion.  The architecture of the museum – rooms branching off from a long, dark tunnel that opens to a view of Jerusalem – is designed to suggest that Israel is the ultimate solution to the Holocaust and the homeland for the Jews.
“The museum showed me that Jews see Israel today as a place of protection, that they feel alienated and threatened by the rest of the world,” said Leich.  “The Israeli mentality has been really influenced by their history, which means that they see things out of perspective and can sometimes overlook the killing of all these innocent Palestinians.”
Ultimately, the trip did not so much divide students as much as it enriched their general perspective on the conflicts in the Middle East.
“The trip has made me much more critical of both sides,” said Yannick LeJacq ’11.  “I don’t think either has a clean slate; both sides have gotten the other’s hands dirty in some way. Now I just have a more nuanced view.”
Berkowitz emphasized the importance of awareness and sensitivity in the Wesleyan community when it comes to this multifaceted issue.
“We all have a different background, but we are coming together to mourn [the casualties],” Berkowitz said.  “I respect the fact that this is not my conflict – I am not an Israeli and I am not a Palestinian – but we are all saddened by this.”