The Helen Diller Institute for Jewish Law and Israel Studies has announced its inaugural minor in Israel studies at the University of California, Berkeley, the leading public university in the country.
Since its founding in 2011, the Helen Diller Institute has brought excellence to the field of Israel studies by sponsoring more than 100 courses, coordinating experiential learning programs in Israel, and bringing professors from Israel’s top universities to teach at Berkeley during their sabbatical years. The addition of the Israel Studies Minor offers students an institutionalized path to gaining an expertise in Israel studies.
“The launch of the Israel studies minor is the culmination of more than a decade of dedicated teaching, programming, and scholarship to engage students in the rigorous study of Israel at the top public university in the country,” says Executive Director Rebecca Golbert.
Sponsoring the Israel studies minor is a key part of the Institute’s vision to bring a rigorous academic lens to the study of Israel at an elite public university. The minor reflects the rich and multidisciplinary nature of the academic field of Israel studies, intersecting the social sciences and humanities as well as law, business, science and technology. The Helen Diller Institute’s experiential learning programs in Israel are also essential to its vision for the minor, linking the study of Israel with on-the-ground learning.
While the minor has been in development for a long time, its announcement comes at a time when American campuses have become a flashpoint around the Israel-Hamas War. Acknowledging UC Berkeley’s at-times fraught discourse around Israel, Faculty Co-Director Ron Hassner adds, “If in the past, students and scholars interested in Israel might have avoided Berkeley due to its reputation, this minor firmly establishes Berkeley as a campus students must attend, from far and wide, precisely because of its fantastic reputation in Israel studies.”
Students can begin earning credits towards the minor in the fall semester.