This week, I had the opportunity to interview Racheli Marom, the University of Arizona’s Hillel Fellow, about her experiences as part of UA’s Jewish community.

How did you end up as the University of Arizona Hillel’s Israel Fellow?

I was about to finish school at the Hebrew University, and I was looking for something interesting to do right after school. I was checking into options related to informal education connected to Jewish education, and then I saw this opportunity and thought I’d give it a try. I wasn’t even thinking about coming to the States. I had thought about finding a community in Europe, actually. But then after I went through the long process of interviewing, they recommended that I go to a university in the States. So I learned about Hillel, and this is basically how I got here. As it turned out, it was a perfect match.

In what ways do you think college is different in the United States than in Israel?

First of all, let’s start with the students. In Israel, people start school as undergraduates around the same time that people start graduate school here. A very common time for people to start school in Israel is between the ages of 23 to 25, because they go to the army, they work and save money, and then they take trips to different places around the world. So by the time they get to university, students are in a different phase of life than in the United States. Here, it’s an immediate continuation from high school. So for freshmen, it’s like high school, but much cooler because they have the independence to do what they want. The maturity level is very different.

What do you feel most interests the students you’ve met regarding Israel? What are they most curious about?

More cultural stuff, as opposed to politics. Nightlife, clubs, music, cool stuff to do in Israel. If something big happens, like the war in Lebanon, people would like to talk about that sometimes. I’m talking about the University of Arizona students that I meet; it could be different from university to university. I think that this university specifically is not a very political place generally, and this also affects how most people view Israel. People are interested in going to Israel on birthright or studying abroad in Israel, and they are very interested in the experiential point of view.

On many college campuses today, Zionism and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are important and highly debated issues. How have you found the political climate on this campus related to these issues?

I think that the UA is not a political campus. I think students are generally apathetic in terms of politics, not just in regard to Israel, but also in terms of internal politics. You can see more political activity now because of the elections, but generally politics are not that big. From what I’ve seen last year, most of what I would call the anti-Israel activities on campus weren’t initiated by students, but rather by certain authorities at the university, especially professors. I think that there are also students here who are politically active against Israel, but not too many. Once in a while there is a rally or something like that, but it is generally very low-key, often involving the same group of students over and over. I don’t think they attract much interest beyond this immediate group of students. Generally I think the situation here is pretty good.

What upcoming events are you currently planning that you are particularly excited about?

For next semester, we are putting together Israel Week. Every day, from Friday night until the following Thursday night, we will feature a different big event, and all the events are going to be really wonderful and unique. Even though it was my initiative, I really wanted students to be involved. We didn’t see so many students proactive in terms of organizing Israel-related events. We have a few student groups, but it wasn’t happening on a very large scale. So I sent e-mails to Hillel and to everyone I know saying I wanted to put a committee together, and right now we have a committee of 18 people. Many of them are people who weren’t involved before but wanted to get involved somehow. It’s a very talented group of people, and they’re all very excited about it. We meet twice a week, and every time we meet, I leave the room thinking, “Wow, this is incredible.� These people really want to see Israel events on campus, and they think that Israel should be on the map. When I leave the room after these really good meetings, where everyone is really into getting out and doing things, I feel like that’s something. The planning is going on right now, and Israel Week will take place during the last week of February. It has been a great experience for me and for all of the students involved.