Expanding UK Campus Network’s Conference Tackles Anti-Semitism
Representatives of campus-based Chabad-Lubavitch centers throughout the United Kingdom gathered for their fourth-annual conference, reflecting on the rapid growth in the number of campuses represented and deriving strategies for further strengthening Jewish life on campus and dealing with the challenge of an upsurge in anti-Semitism at some universities.
Chabad of Bloomsbury, directed by Rabbi Yisroel and Devora Lew, served as the conference’s host center. Joining the gathering for the first time were the directors of the newly-established campus Chabad House in Manchester.
Rabbi Eli Brackman, chairman of Chabad on Campus UK and director of Chabad of Oxford, pronounced the conference to be a “tremendous success,” asserting that it would invigorate further efforts to reach the United Kingdom’s estimated 10,000 Jewish students.
“Every year, the conference becomes more and more formal,” laughed Yisroel Lew, whose programs serve Jewish students at King’s College, the London School of Economics, University College, the University of London, the University of Westminster, City University and other regional schools. “In its first year, there were only five of us.”
In the last few years, Chabad on Campus UK has grown exponentially, a point reiterated by various speakers at the conference, including Rabbi Nachman Sudak, regional director of Chabad-Lubavitch in the United Kingdom, and two of the earliest emissaries to work with students in the realm, Rabbi Naftali Loewenthal, who also serves as a professor of Hebrew and Jewish Studies at University College of London, and Rabbi Shmuel Lew, director of the Lubavitch House School in London.
Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, vice chairman of Merkos L’Inyonei Chinuch, the educational arm of Chabad-Lubavitch, used his keynote speech to push for even more growth, in both the number of campuses reached and the number of students touched at each campus. He invoked teachings of the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory, to stress the importance of constant improvement.
“A Chasid is not someone who stands still,” said Kotlarsky. “Rather, he is constantly moving forward.”
Philanthropist David Slager, who first encountered Chabad on Campus as a student at Oxford University in the early 1990s and has since become a pillar behind the organization’s expansion in the United Kingdom, told attendees that they were literally transforming lives.
Chabad Houses, he said, “are building the foundations of a UK Jewish revolution.”
Among the issues discussed at the conference was keeping a balance between family and campus commitments.
“You have to recognize that family is central to success,” stressed Loewenthal. “It’s one of the unique aspects of Chabad on Campus that students feel that they’re part of your family. That’s when the most impact is made.”
Turning to the more sobering topic of anti-Semitism, the conference focused on recent incidents of intimidation directed at Jewish students, including when a visiting lecturer at one campus called pro-Israel students “Nazis.”
“There is a strong anti-Israel agenda from many of the speakers brought onto campuses, and oftentimes, it spirals into anti-Semitism,” asserted Brackman.
What was needed, concluded the group, were more initiatives to strengthen students’ collective Jewish pride and more opportunities to network with university administrations. Ultimately, said Brackman, universities should not be providing official backing of those with a history of incitement.
“There is a thin line between free speech and hate speech,” the rabbi said grimly.
“The conference was very successful,” commented Rabbi Yossy Gordon, executive vice president of the New York-based Chabad on Campus International Foundation, a sister organization to its counterpart in the United Kingdom. “The agenda was powerful, and will only serve to fuel the continued surge in Jewish life on UK campuses.”
Yisroel Lew agreed.
“The most important thing about the whole conference is that we came together to give each other strength,” he said. “We’re all in this together.”
