Dozens of senior members of faculty at the University of Pennsylvania, including chaired professors, return home this evening after a three-day solidarity mission facilitated by tour operator Israel Destination – Yaad Yisrael. It was the first Ivy League faculty solidarity mission to Israel since the recent congressional hearing on antisemitism on college campuses and the first since the Hamas massacre on October 7.
Michael J. Kahana, Edmund and Louise Kahn Term Professor of Psychology and co-organizer of the mission said: “Academic communities are incredibly small, tight-knit families that span the globe. When the horrific trauma of October 7 struck the Israeli academic community, people awaited words of comfort from their close colleagues and friends, but for many, those words did not come.”
Peter Decherney, Edmund and Louise Kahn Term Professor of the Humanities and co-organizer of the mission said: “I was truly surprised to see how much our visit meant to our Israeli colleagues and by my own overwhelming emotional response to hearing from Israelis firsthand. I hope that our visit will inspire more university communities to move past divisive cultures and come themselves.”
During their 66-hour mission, the professors were welcomed by the President of Israel, spoke with hostage families, including Rachel Goldberg Polin, mother of hostage Hersh, and met with medical and psychological professionals treating survivors at Sheba Hospital. During their visit to Kfar Aza and Nahal Oz on the Gaza border, they were briefed by IDF soldiers, heard testimony from Yonatan Lulu Shimriz as he stood outside the ruins of his home, and ZAKA southern command head Yossi Landau, one of the first responders on October 7. On the final day of the mission, the participants visited Hostage Square in Tel Aviv and met with the family of gifted pianist Alon Ohel who was taken hostage at the Nova party.
For most, the central part of their mission was the opportunity to meet and engage with their academic colleagues at the Hebrew University, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Tel Aviv University, and the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities. The meetings allowed for a deeper mutual understanding of the challenges posed to academia by war and conflict on one side, and antisemitism and anti-Israel sentiments on the other. Discussions were held on broadening existing connections and establishing future academic collaborations.
Many of the UPenn professors, from fields as diverse as statistics, film, and orthopedics, had never met before the mission, despite working on the same campus for years, if not decades. Brought together by a common sense of mission, the professors return home with a greater understanding of how the US academic community can support their Israeli colleagues during this traumatic time, and with renewed vigor to withstand the antisemitism and anti-Israel feelings prevalent on campus.
