I was one of the students who signed the letter in the April 6 Student that criticized Hillel's past practice of bringing politically biased speakers to campus. These sentiments have set off a controversy in the editorial section of The Student, and several Hillel members have since responded.

Joshua Stein '08, Hillel's social chair, wrote a response in the April 13 Student claiming that Hillel's purpose is "not to accommodate every Jew; it is to accommodate every Jew who wants to be Jewish and do Jewish things." He called on Jewish solidarity, conflating being "pro-Jewish" with being "pro-Israel," and he wrote that "it is 'doing Jewish' to allow a fellow Jew to speak on the difficulties of dealing with an enduring conflict in his homeland." Yet the "fellow Jew" to whom Stein referred, Israeli army spokesperson Jacob Dallal, was more than simply a Jew discussing Israeli difficulties. He was a mouthpiece for the Israeli military, and his talk was arguably biased to the point of misrepresenting what were, according to Human Rights Watch, war crimes committed by the Israeli army upon Palestinian civilians.

I consider myself to be a Jew who "wants to be Jewish and do Jewish things." I was raised Jewish, had a Bat Mitzvah and was actually on the Hillel e-board my freshman year. After graduating from Amherst, I hope to spend a year with Avodah, an organization centered upon Jewish faith and social justice. Yet I have felt alienated from Judaism at Amherst, due in large part to a lack of political tolerance I've found within organized Judaism here. Stein implies that this makes me less of a Jew and thus not part of Hillel's target audience. He uses political beliefs to define and measure Jewishness, much like those who condemn political activists as "un-American" for disagreeing with Bush administration policies. Perhaps Joshua Stein is "comfortable" that Hillel has upheld its responsibility to "provide the cultural and/or practicing Jew the opportunity to continue doing so during his or her college years." We who have been asked to make a choice between our identities as Jews and our political and moral values feel far less comfortable with the situation.

Hilary Palevsky '07, Hillel's president, mentioned past Jewish speakers who represented "diverse views" in her letter, published in the April 13 Student. While I respectfully disagree with Palevsky that the speakers brought by Hillel in years past presented views more "diverse" than those of army spokesperson Dallal, I welcome the plan to have a balanced panel of Amherst professors discuss the issues of Israel and Palestine. I take it as a hopeful sign that Hillel and the campus as a whole will be able to foster a more open and informed dialogue on these issues than they have in the past.

Sarah Sorscher '05