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Faculty of Jewish Studies ן Bar-Ilan University The Israel and Golda Koschitzky Department of Jewish History and Contemporary Jewry Department Newsletter no. October 2014 From the Department Chair New Faculty lived in this fascinating and understudied environment. Prof. Yaron Harel Member: Since having completed The 2013-2014 academic Beyond Expulsion, I have year saw the department’s Dr. Debra Kaplan been engaged in a variety activities reach new D e b r a of research projects. I have heights. During this year, K a p l a n written several articles the Graduate Program comes to about Jewish women and for Contemporary Jewry Bar Ilan economics, about Jewish was incorporated into the after nine autobiographical texts, department, and all of the years at and about Jews and the program’s faculty were Ye s h i v a Reformation. I am working integrated into our faculty. University on a book about Jewish This expanded the areas of research and study in New charity in three German that the department can offer its students. The Y o r k , cities, which explores the department is now officially “The Israel and where she various socio-economic and Golda Koschitzky Department of Jewish History held the Dr. Pinkhos Churgin gendered hierarchies within and Contemporary Jewry”. Memorial Chair in Jewish Jewish communities. The The department hosted four major conferences History. She recently directed research has been awarded over this year, three of them international. the undergraduate program grants from the Hadassah- These conferences were attended by important in Jewish history at Yeshiva Brandeis Institute and the scholars from Israel and the world. This College. Debra made aliyah National Endowment for the undoubtedly helps solidify the department’s in August 2014 with her Humanities. place in the center of the contemporary research husband Donny Ebenstein, And what about your wider of Jewish history. who works in conflict interests? The four new faculty members that were resolution, mediation, and I am also active in various hired last year have been integrated into the negotiation, and with her organizations that bring department, and we have all been able to three sons, Avishai (8), Noam history to the larger public. I see their considerable contribution to the (6), and Elitzur (almost 3). have served on the Academic department in research and in teaching. In this A native New Yorker, Debra Advisory Council of the coming year we will be joined by Dr. Debra received her BA in History Center for Jewish History in Kaplan, an expert on Medieval and Early Modern from Barnard College, and New York for five years, on Ashkenazi Jewish communities. Dr. Kaplan her MA and PhD from the the Advisory Board of the comes to us from Yeshiva University, and we are University of Pennsylvania. Early Modern Workshop for certain that she will be a significant addition to We spoke to Debra briefly 9 years, and I am involved our department. about her move to Israel in an international research We continued to award our graduate students and to Bar-Ilan: group that seeks to digitize with scholarships and prizes. For the first time Debra, tell us a little about pinkassim. I find it exciting this year, several students received additional your research and teaching to share my research with aid that enabled them to travel to conferences so far. my students and with the or to visit archives abroad. We also aided I am a social historian who general public. For me, students who wished to enhance their research studies daily life in pre- this is an essential part of abilities by learning languages and methods for modern Ashkenaz. My first what scholars do, and I look oral documentation. book, Beyond Expulsion: Jews, forward to doing this in Israel, This year saw the inauguration of our M.A. Christians, and Reformation where Jewish history and program for teachers. This, together with an Strasbourg (Stanford all its complexity forms an advertising campaign, has brought about a University Press, 2011) important part of intellectual significant rise in applications for our M.A. and explores Jewish-Christian and cultural life. PhD programs. Our undergraduate enrolment is relations in Strasbourg, a How are you and your still low, a problem that we share with all of the city in which Jews were family preparing for your departments of Humanities and Jewish Studies. banned from residence for upcoming aliyah? We have joined a forum of history departments approximately four hundred My family is thrilled to be from several universities which will seek to years. Through archival making aliyah. We will be address this problem. research, I discovered that living in Jerusalem. I am I wish to thank the outgoing Rector, Prof. Haim notwithstanding this official very much looking forward Taitelbaum, who has supported our department policy, the Jews who lived to teaching at Bar Ilan, throughout his term and has done all that he in the Alsatian countryside and to contributing to the could to help us to grow and prosper. I wish to entered Strasbourg on a daily department’s offerings in extend my blessings to the new Rector, Prof. basis, where they interacted medieval, early modern, and Miri Faust, who as vice-rector spared no effort with Christians in a variety social history. to help our department and was always ready of ways. The book is being to assist. translated into Hebrew and Thank you. We wish you The department’s proper functioning depends is forthcoming from Merkaz much success in this next on the close cooperation between the faculty Zalman Shazar. I am excited stage in your career, and of and our hardworking administrative staff. We to reach a Hebrew-speaking course hope that you and also wish to thank the Koschitzky family, audience, and to expose your family have an easy whose contribution to the department’s growth new readers to the daily klitah in your new home. and development has been invaluable. experiences of Jews who The Israel and Golda Koschitzky Department of Jewish History and Contemporary Jewry ן Faculty of Jewish Studies ן Bar-Ilan University Post-Doctoral Fellows This year our department had the privilege of hosting two post-doctoral fellows. We attribute great importance to the addition of these scholars to our academic environment as they provide inspiration for our students and enrich all of us with their research. Dr. Olena Bagno-Moldavsky Dr. Yuval Haruvi completed his dissertation on the rabbinic elite spent the 2013-14 academic th th year as a post-doc in the of Tunis in the 19 and 20 centuries at Tel Aviv department after completing University, under the guidance of Prof. Yaron her PhD dissertation on the Zur and Prof. Shalom Ratzabi. His academic political culture of Russian work focuses on the rabbinic elites, especially speaking Jews and the natives in Islamic countries, and the ways in which they in Ukraine, Germany and dealt with modernization and secularization. Israel under the supervision During his time at Bar-Ilan under the guidance of Prof. Michal Shamir at Tel of Prof. Yaron Harel, Dr. Haruvi researched the Aviv University. In 2011 she received the best affair that developed around the will of Rabbi dissertation award from the Israeli Political Science Nissim Shamama, which had a huge impact Association. In her summary of the year spent with on the rabbinic world in the second half of the our department she wrote: 19th century. The research project is based on I am thankful to the Inter-University Academic halakhic rulings made at the time and archival Partnership, the Head of the department Prof. material. Additionally, Dr. Haruvi participated in Yaron Harel, the academic and administrative a research group in Bar-Ilan’s faculty of law on staff that enabled me to spend the year in the “halakhic attitudes to Gentile Department of Jewish History. The guidance and realities: governmental and attitude of Prof. Moshe Rosman were invaluable for legal institutions”. Dr. Haruvi my integration in the university. is also active in the project Being trained in political science, I particularly for the documentation enjoyed research seminars in Jewish history. These of Jewish communities seminars helped me to acquire new perspectives in Islamic countries at Tel on the workings of culture, construction, and social Aviv University’s faculty of function of individual and group memories. humanities. I am leaving the department with an impression that it consists of brilliant scholars, who manage to sustain a strong, vibrant and successful academic organism, very dynamic and susceptible to new trends. The conference on World War II veterans Peretz Family Installs Torah Scroll that was initiated and hosted by the department in June 2014 was the outcome of this dynamism In a festive and enthusiasm to rediscover less-known areas procession and of Jewish history. The conference hosted scholars, ceremony held politicians, community activists and veterans. All on 26 March had the chance to present their version of the 2014, a new history of WWII, while overall the event illuminated Sefer Torah was how immigrant experiences of veterans and installed in the community activists influence the history that old synagogue they choose to preserve in memoirs and physical in the Schliefer artifacts. building on campus. The scroll was donated During this year, I co-authored a paper on the effect of diversity in human networks on tolerance by the department alumnus Dr. Moshe Peretz, toward political and social “others” (forthcoming president of the “Peretz Bonei Hanegev” in Political Behaviour). My manuscript on Diversity, construction company, who attended the event Nationalism and Immigration in Ukraine, Germany with his family. This was the second Sefer Torah and Israel approaches completion, and a new donated to the university by Dr.

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