Student villages are an educational interface to consolidate Israeli settlement Encyclopedia

Student villages are youth gatherings that often include young people in the twenties of their ages, including lane and graduates from the national service, combining academic education and community participation. These villages provide students with a low cost, and close to educational institutions, in addition to scholarships, in exchange for volunteering in the local community, so they become part of its social fabric. In many cases, they choose to stay in the assembly after completing their studies.

Students’ roles in these villages are not limited to the educational or volunteer side, but also include direct security and agricultural tasks. The scholarships that they receive are conditional on engaging in the activities of the settlement service, from agriculture and grazing to the assignment of night guard attacks.

Facility and establishment

The idea of ​​student villages in Israel was launched at the beginning of the 21st century, and it soon expanded and became a phenomenon rooted in settlement society, and many of its graduates raised the new generation inside the settlements, while new student villages continued at an accelerated pace, in the cables and moshavat, and extended and included cities and local councils.

From two articles in Kibbutz “Ashlim”, the two leaked soldiers Danny Glixburg and the paint of the “Ilim” association in 2002, and this initiative later turned into the first student villages in Israel.

After two decades of establishment, the association had more than 20 villages, and it turned into a complex for graduates in the Galilee, the Negev and the Born, and included approximately 1,200 students who volunteer regularly, and its data indicate that about 46% of these students choose stability in those areas after completing their university studies.

Settlement

Israel has developed these villages to be a tool to consolidate its settlement project. It is presented with an attractive educational and social interface, but in essence it is used to plant Israeli population gatherings in the heart of the occupied Palestinian territories.

It is attracted to it specific groups of students, especially graduates of religious schools and universities, and are granted facilities in housing, study and work within these villages. Despite its official description as “temporary”, it quickly turns into a permanent settlement nucleus supported by infrastructure, services and military units for protection.

Financing

The settlement student villages project received wide government support, and these villages were classified in the Knesset as “border gatherings” for security reasons, and include more than 60 locations from the Jordan Valley to the cover of Gaza and Wadi Araba.

The government allocated 74 million shekels (about one million dollars) in 2023 to support them, as well as financing the ministries of education and agriculture, local authorities and sponsor institutions such as the National Lottery Project and the Jewish National Fund.

Zionist organizations such as “M Traso” also promote these villages as “an opportunity to combine study and Zionist life, to prepare a generation committed to a long -term settlement project.

Field jobs for students

Students’ roles in these villages are not limited to the educational or volunteer side, but also include direct security and agricultural tasks.

The scholarships they receive are conditional on the enrollment in the activities of the settlement service, from agriculture and grazing to night guard attacks.

Thus, the student turns from a temporary resident into a “guardian of the guard”, which contributes to protecting and expanding the outposts.

Unnamed goals

Student villages embody an approach based on harnessing youth energies to revive abandoned buildings, and turn them into student entities that carry societal features and serve the Zionist project.

However, the basic goal exceeds the declared development dimension, and is the formation of a long -term settlement nuclei that allows stability and supports geographical expansion, which makes it a strategic mechanism within the total structure of the settlement project.

The idea is based on converting students into “settlers”, living in their studies years in carefully selected areas, so they practice a life that seems normal, but their presence serves a deeper purpose, which is to stabilize control over the land and impose a difficult reality that is difficult to retreat.

Israeli reports indicate that the students of these villages are participating in protecting emerging pastoral farms, including Bani Kidm, Tasan Keda, and the compassion of Ashtua and Ashail.

Indeed, some students revealed to the Haaretz newspaper that part of the scholarship hours is devoted to guarding cows coming from settlements such as Etamar.

In 2018, the Kidma Association obtained about 3.8 million shekels (1.13 million dollars) from the Ministries of Education and Agriculture and local authorities, to finance these activities that are presented with the “agricultural volunteering” interface.

The Israeli Ministry of Agriculture describes these villages as “national programs to protect agricultural lands” even outside the Green Line, while the Kidma Association defines them as a “starting base for permanent settlement” and establishing a new community core.

Sponsoric settlement institutions

It was founded by activist Terra El Cohen in 2013, and the association identified itself through its official website, as a non -profit organization founded by young people with the aim of “reviving the value of Zionist settlement in the twenty -first century.”

The association adopts a speech based on building youth frameworks that enhance “self -realization”, by returning to the values ​​of “linking to the land and society.”

Despite this social discourse, the association implements wide settlement projects, most of which exceed the green line separating the territories occupied in 1948 and those occupied in 1967.

Its headquarters is located in the settlement of His Excellency Afraim in the occupied West Bank, and from which it expanded and set up 8 student villages in the West Bank and two villages in the Gaza and Galilee cover, including more than 250 students.

In light of the criticisms it faces from Israeli left -wing circles, “Kidma” has significant government and financial support, as its financing exceeded 5.4 million shekels ($ 1.6 million) in 2019, and formed a funded settlement model marketed with an educational and social interface, similar to the “Ayalim” association.

• Ayalim Association

The Ayalim Association was established in 2002, by the two soldiers, a paint of paint and Danny Glexberg, who employed their demobilization grant from the Israeli army in buying two small articles and put them in the Ashhalim settlement in the Negev.

Since then, the association has expanded and has established more than 22 student villages, graduates complexes, and a new settlement nuclei, annually attracting hundreds of male and female students who choose to settle in the Negev and Galilee.

Ayalim links its activity to what it calls “the message of Ben Gurion and the Zionist project”, and defines itself as a platform that brings together students, volunteers, families and former graduates, within the framework of a clear strategic goal that is to consolidate settlement and expand its patch in the areas of the parties.

• Totler Haaretz movement

Similar to “Kidma” and “Ayalim”, Tottralet Haaretz presents itself as a youth movement of a social nature, but it is also devoted to settlement by establishing student villages supported by scholarships and residential aid.

Since 2012, the movement has established student societies in about 16 regions, including the Kiryat of Shamouna, Tiberia, Safed, Al -Bald, Jerusalem and Demona, under the slogan “We are here to stay”, and these villages have turned into a permanent population nuclei, which are supported and funded as part of the long -term settlement project.

Attracting and marketing

The settlement societies run organized propaganda campaigns through social media, to highlight music, sports and cultural events to market an attractive image of youth away from scenes of violence or direct confiscation of land. Each village has its own pages.

The Ayalim Association opened a new village in the settlement of Al -Mutlaq, describing it as “the new house”, and stressed that the settlement represents a national duty to protect the borders. As for the Kidma Association, some villages were directly linked to the army, by displaying pictures of reserve soldiers who fought in the Gaza Strip participating in its activities.