Center Concludes Its Academic Year with Gil Hovav’s Inspiring Lecture

The Center concluded its activities for this academic year and its International Identity Seminar with a real treat – an inspiring, humorous and instructive lecture delivered by Gil Hovav, great grandson of the reviver of the Hebrew Language, Eliezer Ben Yehuda. Hovav, an author and television personality, shared the personal family stories that are behind one of the greatest cultural achievements of the modern era.

The Identity Seminar, which began in May, engaged students with the “big questions” Israeli society faces through field trips and discussions. Among other destinations, the students visited the Sea of Galilee and Gan Hashlosha, Kibbutz Lohamei Ha-Getaot and the Beit Shean National Park.

The program was attended by 25 international students from diverse disciplines and countries, including India, Peru, South Sudan, Italy, Poland, Britain, Ethiopia, Mexico, South Korea, the United States, Argentina, Kenya, Slovakia, Canada, China, Germany and Guatemala. Mauricio Robles Cortes, a Security and Diplomacy Master’s student from Mexico, said that the trips and discussions were a “great experience” that enabled him and others to gain a “broader perspective of Israel which cannot be understood without knowing the historical places we visited.”

Another student, Uwar Mathew Donato from South Sudan, noted that the seminar trips provided him the opportunity to learn more about Jewish history and about the different voices that define Jewish identity in modern times.