Comments on: Neve Gordon Is Not the Problem

By: Meir ben Avraham

Meir ben Avraham — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 00:56:05 +0000

I must agree with Shlomo Vile: the problem in Israel is less the lack of a liberal education (though the absence of a single liberal arts college in the country is a shock), but the lack of Jewish education. The difficulty is not surprising; in many ways the existence of the state seems to obviate the need for the religion. Nor is it unique; it is a central theme of Jewish history, a typical response of the B’nai Yisrael whenever they possess the land. One would have hoped that the traumas of the half-century leading up to the creation of the new state would have been enough to change this pattern at last; but evidently this is not the case.

By: Larry Selk

Larry Selk — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 21:34:16 +0000

I think the concept of a “good liberal arts university education” is ambiguous. There is the idea that the university culture should have a universalist attitude, but this is always built upon a subtext assumption that the citizens of a nation, including its professors, have primal patriotic feelings of dedication to their national well-being and to some consensus on what is vital to national identity– such as history, language, literature, national purpose, and the moral assumptions upon which the national community is built. If the intellectual leadership of a nation does not have this primal feeling, it is only a matter of time before the nation itself disintegrates.
In addition, I do not believe that one should look to the U.S. as a model for this idea of national identity. The serious internal cleavages within the U.S. on critical matters of policy such as the nation’s role in protecting global stability, or its mode of providing medical care to its population, or policies on immigration, taxation, economic regulation, scientific research, global resource protection and conservation, etc. indicate to me that the United States may not currently be presenting a viable model for the formation of public policy. Indeed, there may not be a nation in the world whose situation is similar to that of Israel. Many previously-existing models, such as Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, no longer exist.

By: Ariel Zellman

Ariel Zellman — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 13:12:50 +0000

This article is both very honest and very correct. Israel lacks real liberal arts education, its professors are often farther left than those in the US, and they are often even more detached from reality. The trick is turning these deficiencies into reform. Speaking with Israeli professors, they often bemoan the lack of real liberal arts education in Israel (whatever their political inclinations) but no one steps up to reform the system.
Part of this is institutional stasis. The Israeli university system was built on the German model, meant to turn out professionals with intense but narrow training. This is a pattern that has stuck. But it is also a lack of will. In this case, Gordis may be right that what the Israeli university system needs is more American or at least support, maybe in the form of wealthy benefactors with ambitions of building a real liberal arts educational framework. Israelis sadly are not going to do it on their own.

By: Joel Schindler

Joel Schindler — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 22:52:43 +0000

I am surprised at both Danny Gordis’s original article and some of the subsequent comments. As an American who recevied both an undergraduate and graduate degree from an Israeli University and subsequently served on the faculty of a US university, I have experienced both sides of this “academic” issue. From my perspective, the underlying issue is the lack of political will irrespective of where – US or Israeli insitutions. I have no problem with Palestinian supporters at academic institutions. My problem is that when they articulate as fact information that is not, nobody has the poltical will to stand up and say so; to publically challenge the credibility of the speaker. They are free to speak; they are not free to lie and not be challenged. Yet few are prepared to stand up at a university and call a colleague a liar. The answer is not more liberal arts colleges in Israel or the suggestion that US philanthropists pay for them. The problem facing education in Israel is much more complex and its solution is not simply more liberal arts colleges. The answer is for people to have the politcal will to stand up and say something whether it is about falsehoods perpetrated by Palestinian supporters or failures in the Israeli education system. Current members of existing academic institutions, be they the focused examples of Israeli institutions or the bastions of US liberal arts education, must have the courage to stand up and demand academic credibility from their colleagues. Being an academic does not mean you are never wrong. It also does not mean you can never challenge a colleague for being wrong. Doing so is not outside the boundries of academic credibility. Doing so is demanded of academic credibility.

By: Jack Lauber

Jack Lauber — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 22:05:03 +0000

This is an excuse for colleges to allow sedition and anarchy as a substitute for education. Gordon is Israel’s Ward Churchill, an angry radical leftist that uses his academic position to attack his country. He hides his treachery under his academic robe. We have similar problems in the west with such misguided academics who support evil people as false victims,poisoning the minds of our youth. It’s better that Israel specializes in technical subjects than expand it’s liberal political science programs. Israel doesn’t need Ward Churchills or Neve Gordon’s which threaten it’s democracy.
Freedom of speech does not mean yelling fire in a crowded theatre.

By: ketoret

ketoret — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 21:41:59 +0000

We are not educating a generation of literate Israelis. How is it that we are allowing this to happen? Is the secular/left of our policy-makers so unabashedly self-destructive? It’s hard to imagine, but just as hard to imagine is that this state of affairs simply “happened.” I suppose it was the pressure of the times, the perceived need to be entirely “function and efficiency” oriented in order to quickly produce the technocrats we needed to build a country from scratch. And once entrenched, so enshrined. Certainly the secular/left has its share of responsibility for maintaining this system, but so does the Mamlachti Dati for yielding the intellectual field of battle in order to produce religious technocrats. I mean by that, those who reduce Judaism to halachic observance, but have no understanding of the difference of worldview between the West and us. Or the similarities, for that matter. And the Mamlachti Dati doesn’t have the excuse of the secular/left, for religious technocrats are not needed to build the country.

By: G. Zone

G. Zone — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 21:08:55 +0000

While I live in far off Canada, I gather from reading articles in the Israeli press and elsewhere that the problem starts in elementary school where Zionism and love of country is not taught or respected. So, if you pile money into ‘new’ liberal arts colleges, who will populate the resulting professorial positions? More left-wingers and vilifiers of Israel! So, how can that be the solution? It would just perpetuate the problem.
An eye-opener is “The Jewish State: The Struggle for Israel’s Soul” by Yoram Hazony, but it was so disheartening and shocking that I’ve never been able to finish it!
It will take a completely new generation armed with the knowledge of Zionism, Judaism and the history of both the State and the Jewish People starting at the earliest ages before you will see a change at the higher levels of education. Quite a pity!
But, then again, I’m just a stupid Jewish Canuck viewing from afar. So, what do I know, eh?

By: J.J. Surbeck

J.J. Surbeck — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 18:58:48 +0000

I agree with Saul Goldman that Daniel Gordis himself misses the problem, but from another angle: it will take too much time to introduce the type of institutions he advocates (rightly) in Israel. In the meantime, people like Gordon will keep doing serious damage for years, vilifying the very State that allows them to live a comfortable and safe life. A better solution is needed, at least in the short term. Tema Merback’s comment points in the right direction. Look at what happens in the very US institutions of higher learning that Gordis points to as models: Palestinian propaganda reigns supreme, with the help of too many left-wing professors, on hundreds of campuses. Clearly, if there is any solution, it must be in the direction of demanding and restoring balance and fairness. In short, rigorously apply academic standards and reclaim the place from the radicals who have ruled it unopposed for too long under the guise of academic freedom. Restoring academic integrity is really what is needed, more so than building new institutions from the ground up (although both propositions are feasible). It could be done faster, and at a considerably lower cost.

By: barry blau

barry blau — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 17:21:37 +0000

IGNORANCE OF THE AMERICAN COLLEGE SCENE IS
INCREDIBLE.LIKE ISRAEL,STUDENTS ARE TAUGHT
AMERICA IS THE PROBLEM.A RACIST EXPLOITER.
KILLER OF THE INDIANS.ALL TOO MANY BELIEVE IT.
THIS IS A PROBLEM FOR ALL THE WEST.

By: William Bilek, M.D.

William Bilek, M.D. — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 17:15:55 +0000

It is exactly the mistaken thinking by those such as Mr. Seliger, who ignore or obfuscate the clear and open declarations by the Palestinian leadership that has consistently refused to accept the right of a Jewish state to exist in the Middle East. While they may accept a two-state solution, being one Palestinian Arab state, and one Arab-Jewish state, their unaltered demand for the so-called “refugees’right of return” makes it clear that this “solution” is but one stage of their “policy of stages”. And the public opinion polls that have been taken and published from the Palestinian territories show that the general population does not accept Jewish historic, political, or legal rights in the area in general, (and in Jerusalem in particular.)