RSS
How students and teachers feel about AI in the Jewish classroom
This article was produced as part of JTA’s Teen Journalism Fellowship, a program that works with Jewish teens around the world to report on issues that affect their lives.
(JTA) — ChatGPT. Google AI. Microsoft Azure. Scribe. Dall-E2 – all different names for generative artificial intelligence software that is forcing educators to examine how technology affects students’ lives. Jewish educators and rabbis are going a step further and looking at AI through a Jewish lens and considering its effects on the overall Jewish educational experiences.
“The Torah tells us that we’re made in the image of God, so how could AI or Chat GPT and that sort of realm reflect the divine image?” said Rabbi Erin Binder, a leader of the religious school and youth leader at Rockdale Temple in Cincinnati, Ohio, told JTA. “Because there’s no sense of God or spirituality or relationship or connection in the world of AI.”
This relationship between God and Jewish education is just part of the debate over whether AI belongs in Jewish learning institutions. Educators worry that students will use AI as a shortcut to real problem-solving, or that typing a prompt into a website will undermine the traditional face-to-face learning of the Jewish study hall.
Generative artificial intelligence technology generates answers to questions by culling large sets of data, then creating a response — anything from an essay to a painting to an equation to a line of computer code — by learning from patterns and mimicking human-like responses. It’s become a resource for students who need to complete assignments — sometimes as a helpful research tool, and sometimes as a cheat. For Jewish educators who consider the student-teacher relationship as a key part of studying rabbinic literature, AI poses a disruption to Jewish culture and traditions.
While Rockdale’s Binder has used AI to create summer merchandise logo ideas to place on sunglasses for her students, she does not trust it in a learning setting — especially when it comes to students’ preparing their b’mitvah and d’var Torah speeches. “I don’t know that it has a place in a learning setting for young people,” said Binder. “Because part of what we want them to do is to think creatively and to come to these ideas on their own.”
Student-teacher Noam Lahyna works with first- to third-graders at Adeth Israel Congregation’s religious school in Cincinnati, Ohio. (Noam Lahynai)
She has not yet spoken to her students about the use of AI in the synagogue setting. She trusts her students understand that AI can assist or inspire, but would not fulfill the purpose of their task to teach about the Torah.
This is not the view all students take, however. Maya Jaffee, a teen congregant at Rockdale Temple, sees how AI could be an extension of her Judaic education. The “pursuit of knowledge is what Judaism is all about,” Jaffee, 16, said. She hasn’t used AI yet but hasn’t ruled it out. “I think it would just help me deepen my Jewish identity, deepen in a powerful way,” she said. Jaffee is thinking about using AI to help her include more prayers in her day, as there are limited resources to support her that are not based in Christianity.
When JTA asked ChatGPT to create a prayer schedule, it provided five prayers that could be used throughout the day, including the times to say each prayer and the reason each prayer is said. The AI advised the user that observant Jews may follow different customs and more accurate information would be better found from a religious authority or a local synagogue.
Other students believe that AI will have little impact specific to the Jewish community. Eden Kraus, 15, another teen congregant at Rockdale Temple, heard about AI being used in her synagogue when a teacher was absent and the substitute needed to make a last-minute lesson plan for their students. Kraus was not part of that classroom, but sees the value of AI as a tool for teachers. Otherwise, Kraus, who attends a public school, doesn’t feel any impact at her Jewish education since her religious school does not assign writing or homework.
School administrators across the United States have implemented changes in their classrooms to ensure students use AI with integrity, as well as safely. Rachel Lebwohl, technology director at The Leffell School, a Jewish day school in Hartsdale, New York, said her school created forms and policies for the 2023-24 school year, to set expectations and safety regulations for students using AI.
Students over 13 are asked to sign a Responsible Use Agreement statement that quotes a passage from the Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 31a: “That which is hateful to you do not do to another; that is the entire Torah, and the rest is its interpretation. Go study.” The form says that academic excellence requires students to value their learning as well as their critical and creative thinking abilities. Under those terms, students will not use AI platforms for academic assignments without permission from teachers. It also states that if using AI in the classroom, students will fact-check all information they receive and understand that AIs are prone to errors and misinformation.
Younger students are restricted from AI entirely.
“One thing about Jewish education is that you have a beit midrash kind of concept and you have one-on-one learning. And I think that is human-to-human at its best,” said The Leffell School’s Lebwohl. Beit midrash, or study hall, emphasizes learning classic texts in pairs and group settings. “I would never want to see that become diluted because there is technology out there that looks and feels like it is equivalent,” she said.
However, education professional Samantha Vinokor-Meinrath sees the potential of AI to enhance Jewish education. As senior director of Knowledge, Ideas and Learning at the New York-based Jewish Education Project, she encourages educators to embrace AI. The connection between the two was the focus of last spring’s Jewish Futures Conference, which she runs.
Samantha Vinokor-Meinrath at the Jewish Futures Conference last spring, which focused on AI in Jewish education. (Courtesy)
“I think we’re at a really exciting moment where Jewish education is seeing all the possibilities that AI can offer,” she said. She suggests teachers explore how AIs could help teachers run their classrooms more efficiently.
Vinokor-Meinrath leans into the teaching moments AI can provide. When she asked an AI graphics generator to show her a Jewish woman, it provided her with a stereotypical image of a woman with curly brown hair and a large nose. She considers this a chance to talk about the powers of stereotypes and how current algorithms, often based on real-world biases, see Jewish women, and what could be done to change the way AI perceives and provides images about the Jewish community.
“When we think about how technology is learning the ways of the world and what it means to look Jewish and to be Jewish, what do we have to do to be able to think critically when we use it and not just take what an artificial intelligence says Jewish looks like at face value?” Vinokor-Meinrath said.
Student-teacher Noam Lahynai, 15, has not seen the effects of AI during her work with first- to third-graders at Adeth Israel Congregation’s religious school in Cincinnati, Ohio. Due to their age, they have limited access to the internet. However, Lahynai has told her students about the expectation that they not use online tools such as Google on their Hebrew assignments; this rule extends into using AIs. She sees AI as a tool to enhance current learning and understanding, but not as an exclusive tool for learning. “I think that people should think about it as a tool to help expand understanding,” she said, while remaining aware that “it might not give all the information and everything that they need.”
Lahynai’s students have not used AIs in her class, however she has seen a camp peer relying on AIs to create his b’nai mitzvah speech. Last June, while at camp, Lahynai and other campers noticed that a b’nai mitzvah speech by a fellow camper sounded impersonal. Later when the camper was questioned by peers, he confessed to using AI to create his speech. Camp administrators and staff did not give any form of repercussion to the camper.
Lahynai saw this moment as impersonal and lazy, feeling that the camper had been disrespectful for turning to AI to write his speech. “He didn’t take the time to think about the meaning behind it,” she says. “He kind of like disrespected the whole thing.”
Despite the potential for abuse, Vinokor-Meinrath remains upbeat about the effects the technology will have on the Jewish educational community. “So much of what Jewish education looks like today was designed for a previous generation that we’ve in some ways been able to adapt and update,” she said. “When we think about the Jewish future, we’re really trying to plan for tomorrow’s learners today. And I think AI is a tremendous way to think about tomorrow, today.”
—
The post How students and teachers feel about AI in the Jewish classroom appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
RSS
Turkish Delegation Visits Syria After Deal Between Damascus and Kurdish Forces
Syrian army personnel travel in a military vehicle as they head towards Latakia to join the fight against the fighters linked to Syria’s ousted leader Bashar al-Assad, in Aleppo, Syria, March 7, 2025. REUTERS/Mahmoud Hassano
A high-level Turkish delegation visited Syria after Damascus’ new government reached a deal with Kurdish forces, the Foreign Ministry said Thursday.
According to local media reports, Turkey’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, Defense Minister Yaşar Güler, and the head of Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization, Ibrahim Kalın, are expected to meet with their Syrian counterparts as well as Damascus’ President Ahmed al-Sharaa.
During this meeting, they are expected to discuss the recent clashes between supporters of the ousted Assad regime and government forces, as well as the recent deal signed between Syria’s new Islamist-led government — backed by Turkey — and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militant group.
Under the new deal between the Kurdish-led, US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the Syrian government, the SDF will be integrated into Damascus’ institutions. In exchange, the agreement gives the Syrian government control over SDF-held civilian and military sites in the northeast region of the country, including border crossings, an airport, and oil and gas fields.
Turkey has long considered the SDF, which controls much of northeastern Syria, a terrorist group due to its alleged links with the PKK, which has been waging an insurgency war against the Turkish state for the past 40 years.
Since the fall of the Assad regime last year, Ankara has emerged as a key foreign ally of the new Syrian government, pledging to assist in rebuilding the country and training its armed forces. It has also repeatedly demanded that the YPG militia – which leads the SDF – disarm, disband, and expel its foreign fighters from Syria.
While Turkey welcomed the recent deal between the SDF and Damascus, it also said that it would need to see its implementation to ensure the YPG does not join Syrian state institutions or security forces as a bloc.
On Wednesday, a Turkish Defense Ministry official said that attacks on Kurdish militants in Syria were still ongoing, highlighting Turkey’s determination to fight against terrorism.
“There’s no change in our expectations for an end to terrorist activities in Syria, for terrorists to lay down their weapons, and for foreign terrorists to be removed from Syria,” a Turkish Defense Ministry source told the Turkish newspaper Daily Sabah.
“We’ll see how the agreement is implemented in the field,” the source is quoted as saying. “We will closely follow its positive or negative consequences.”
The United States also welcomed the recent ceasefire deal between the SDF and Damascus, with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio saying that Washington supports a political transition in Syria that ensures a reliable and non-sectarian governance structure to prevent further conflict.
In late January, al-Sharaa became Damascus’s transitional president after leading a rebel campaign that ousted Assad, whose Iran-backed rule had strained ties with the Arab world during the nearly 14-year Syrian war.
According to an announcement by the military command that led the offensive against Assad, Sharaa was given the authority to form a temporary legislative council for the transitional period and to suspend the country’s constitution.
The collapse of Assad’s regime was the result of an offensive spearheaded by Sharaa’s Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group, a former al-Qaeda affiliate.
This week, al-Sharaa signed Syria’s constitutional declaration that will be enforced throughout a five-year transitional period.
Since Assad’s fall, the new Syrian government has sought to strengthen ties with Arab and Western leaders. Damascus’s new diplomatic relationships reflect a distancing from its previous allies, Iran and Russia.
The new Syrian government appears focused on reassuring the West and working to get sanctions lifted, which date back to 1979 when the US labeled Syria a state sponsor of terrorism and were significantly increased following Assad’s violent response to the anti-government protests.
The Assad regime’s brutal crackdown on opposition protests in 2011 sparked the Syrian civil war, during which Syria was suspended from the Arab League for more than a decade.
The post Turkish Delegation Visits Syria After Deal Between Damascus and Kurdish Forces first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Oscar-Winning Jewish Director-Actor Jesse Eisenberg Gets Polish Citizenship After Filming ‘A Real Pain’ in Poland
Jesse Eisenberg holding his Polish citizenship certificate presented to him by President Andrzej Duda during a ceremony at the Polish Mission to the United Nations in New York on March 4, 2025. Photo: Marek Borawski/KPRP/Cover Images via Reuters Connect
Actor and director Jesse Eisenberg recently received Polish citizenship after filming in the Eastern European country the Oscar-winning drama “A Real Pain,” which is about two cousins who go on a Jewish heritage tour through Poland to learn about their family history.
Polish President Andrzej Duda presented Eisenberg with the citizenship certificate during a ceremony at the Polish Mission to the United Nations in New York on March 4. “I want to express my happiness, and the happiness of my compatriots, that we have a new citizen,” said Duda. “I am pleased that people from around the world remember their origins, that their ancestors came from Poland, and want to connect with our country.” Eisenberg, whose has family ties to Poland and the Holocaust, said receiving Polish citizenship is “an honor of a lifetime” and something he had been interested in pursuing for two decades.
“While we were filming ‘A Real Pain’ in Poland, and I was walking the streets and starting to get a little more comfortable in the country, it occurred to me that my family lived in this place for far longer than we lived in New York,” he said at the ceremony. “And of course of the history ended so tragically, but in addition to that, is the tragedy that my family didn’t feel any connection anymore to Poland. And that saddened me and confirmed to me that I really wanted to try to reconnect as much as possible. I really hope this amazing honor is the first step in me on behalf of my family reconnecting to this beautiful country.”
Eisenberg revealed last year that he had applied for Polish citizenship. The Oscar winner told the Polish broadcaster TVN at the time that he feels a deep connection to Poland and wants to help improve Polish-Jewish relations. His wife and the mother of his son, Anna Strout, also has family roots in Poland. The “Social Network” star first visited Poland in 2007. He said last year that much of “A Real Pain” is based on his family’s personal history. His ancestors hailed from the town of Krasnystaw in southeast Poland and many of his family members died in the Holocaust. Last year, the town council of Krasnystaw awarded him honorary local citizenship. His great-aunt Doris fled Poland for the United States in 1938. She died in 2019 at the age of 106.
“I became obsessed with my family’s history during the war when I was 19 years old,” Eisenberg said in 2020. “I would see my aunt every week — she died last year at 106 … She was born in Poland and then when she was about nine she came to America … I became really fascinated and it was interesting for me as an American teenager to have some connection to something that was so much more historically relevant than my own life.”
“A Real Pain” tells the fictional story of two American-Jewish cousins – played by Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin – who reconnect to participate in a Jewish heritage tour in Poland to learn more about their Jewish roots and the Holocaust following the death of their grandmother, who was a Holocaust survivor. The movie was filmed in Poland and included scenes at the former Nazi concentration camp of Majdanek, the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising memorial. “A Real Pain” features a scene that was even filmed in the small apartment that Eisenberg’s family fled from during World War II.
Eisenberg wrote, directed, produced and starred in “A Real Pain.” He has won a number of awards for the film, including a BAFTA and Independent Spirit Award, both for best original screenplay, and the Culkin has taken home several honors this season for best supporting actor, including an Academy Award, Golden Globe, Critics Choice Award, BAFTA and Screen Actors Guild Award.
Eisenberg has starred in and wrote other projects that have ties to Poland or the Holocaust, including the 2020 war drama “Resistance” and his 2013 play “The Revisionist.”
The post Oscar-Winning Jewish Director-Actor Jesse Eisenberg Gets Polish Citizenship After Filming ‘A Real Pain’ in Poland first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Israel Slams UN Report Charging IDF with Sexual Violence in Gaza
Delegates react to the results during the United Nations General Assembly vote on a draft resolution that would recognize the Palestinians as qualified to become a full UN member, in New York City, US, May 10, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz
Israel has been accused of committing “genocidal acts” and employing sexual violence as a weapon of war in a new report published Thursday by a United Nations commission. The report drew sharp criticism from Israel, which dismissed it as an antisemitic blood libel, while Hamas welcomed its findings.
“Israeli authorities have destroyed in part the reproductive capacity of the Palestinians in Gaza as a group, including by imposing measures intended to prevent births, one of the categories of genocidal acts in the Rome Statute and the Genocide Convention,” the report by the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry stated.
It also accused Israeli security forces of using forced public stripping and sexual assault as a punitive measure in Gaza.
The report, citing testimonies from Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, alleges that civilians were stripped of their clothing in public, sometimes without gender separation. Israel’s permanent mission to the UN in Geneva has rejected the allegations, calling them unfounded and based on uncorroborated sources.
“In a shameless attempt to incriminate the IDF and manufacture the illusion of ‘systematic’ use of [sexual and gender-based violence], the [Commission of Inquiry] deliberately adopts a lower level of corroboration in its report, which allowed it to include information from second-hand single uncorroborated sources,” the mission said in a statement.
Israeli officials say the Commission of Inquiry has applied different standards in evaluating evidence against Israel compared to its assessment of Hamas’ actions on October 7, when it only included corroborated information.
The COI last year released another report last year saying it had “not been able to independently verify” allegations of rape citing “a lack of access to victims, witnesses and crime sites and the obstruction of its investigations by the Israeli authorities.”
It’s three members are Navi Pillay, who orchestrated both the discredited Goldstone Report and the Durban II Zionism is Racism conference and who routinely denounces “apartheid” Israel; UN Special Rapporteur Miloon Kothari who questioned the influence of the “Jewish lobby” and Israel’s right to be a UN member state; and Chris Sidoti, who said accusations of antisemitism are “thrown around like rice at a wedding”.
“All of the people on that commission have expressed hostile views and prejudicial views to Israel, even prior to serving on the commission,”Anne Herzberg, Legal Advisor and UN Representative for NGO Monitor, told The Algemeiner.
“The staffing is completely secret. There’s no way to even know who is writing the reports, how they’re gathering the evidence. So this COI has no credibility.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu slammed the report and the UN Human Rights Council, calling it “an antisemitic, rotten, terrorist-supporting, and irrelevant body.”
“Instead of focusing on the crimes against humanity and war crimes committed by the Hamas terrorist organization in the worst massacre committed against the Jewish people since the Holocaust, the UN is once again choosing to attack Israel with false accusations, including unfounded accusations of sexual violence,” Netanyahu said.
Cochav Elkayam-Levy, who heads the Civil Commission on October 7th Crimes by Hamas against Women and Children, said the report followed many other instances drawing “a false comparison between Israel and Hamas, especially in the context of sexual violence.”
“Sadly, this pattern has repeated itself across various UN bodies since October 7th. This moral comparison is painful and wrong because its purpose is to establish false historical narratives and inflicts irreparable harm both on the victims and on justice,” she said.
Herzberg said the COI was “a main vector of atrocity denial and inversion.”
“Since October 7, the COI has outrageously accused Israel of committing crimes against humanity in Gaza while refusing to say the same about Hamas. It also downplayed the mass sexual violence committed on October 7 against Israeli women and girls, while now issuing an entire report dedicated to defaming the IDF with the false claim of perpetrating systematic gender-based violence against Palestinians,” Herzberg said.
The report will likely be exploited by the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, and provide fuel for campaigns by the BDS movement against Israel, Herzberg said. She expressed her hope that the Trump administration would defund the UNHRC in the near future. “It should never have been established in the first place,” she said.
The Hamas terror group welcomed the report, saying it confirmed Israel’s “genocidal” campaign against Palestinians. Hamas spokesperson Hazem Qassem told AFP, “The UN’s investigation report on Israel’s genocidal acts against the Palestinian people confirms what has happened on the ground: genocide and violations of all humanitarian and legal standards.
The post Israel Slams UN Report Charging IDF with Sexual Violence in Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
You must be logged in to post a comment Login