A visit to the Jerusalem College of Technology disproves ultra-Orthodox claims that haredi young men compromise their religious lifestyle if they earn an academic degree while also studying Torah, and subsequently serve in the Israel Defense Forces.
JCT’s new technical haredi hesder yeshiva, an offshoot of Beit Midrash Derech Chaim, is geared toward haredi students who combine Torah learning, academic studies, and then military service. At JCT, their mornings and evenings are spent diligently studying Torah, the Talmud, and their values, while the afternoons are dedicated to academic subjects.
Launched last year, it began small but has seen a 30% increase in enrollment, so the number of students who will enlist in the military will also grow. Students can obtain degrees in the fields of electrical engineering, software engineering, electro-optics engineering, computer science, business management, nursing, pharmacy, accounting, and business administration.
A total of 46% of JCT students, male and female, are haredim – a figure that has risen by 50% in the last 12 years.
In addition, there are thousands of National-Religious male students, all of whom serve in the IDF; haredi women who earn degrees at the Lustig Campus in Ramat Gan and at the Tevunah Campus in Jerusalem; and Orthodox women who have done National Service and study at Machon Tal.
Established in 1990, Machon Tal is Israel’s first women-only engineering and technology college. Its advanced academic programs for women from across the religious spectrum equip students with the knowledge and skills necessary to attain leading positions in the competitive fields of science, business, hi-tech, and nursing.
JCT IS nicknamed “Machon Lev” for Prof. Ze’ev Lev (William Low), an Israeli physicist who – after being educated in Europe, Canada, and the US, and having lost his parents and sister in the Holocaust – became one of Israel’s leading scientists and educators.
He was born in Vienna to a hassidic family who moved to Berlin. In 1938, at the age of 16, as the Nazi threat increased, he was able to leave Germany to study at England’s famed Gateshead Yeshiva, thereby avoiding the fate of the other members of his immediate family.
Having decided to enter the academic world rather than become a rabbi like his grandfather, he obtained a scholarship to Queen’s University in Ontario and graduated with honors. He then received his advanced degrees at New York’s Columbia University, where he studied with Nobel Prize physics laureate Isidor (Israel) Isaac Rabi.
He moved to Israel in 1950 with his wife, Dvora, adopting his grandfather’s name, Ze’ev, and changing his last name to Lev. He became a worldwide expert in paramagnetic resonance at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and his research led to the development of microwave and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) devices.
In 1969, he decided that there was a great need for a college in Jerusalem that taught advanced scientific study alongside advanced Torah study. Lev, who was awarded the Israel Prize in exact sciences in 1962 and led JCT as its first president for a decade, died in 2004.
Despite initial resistance from many rabbis and educators, the institution he started had about a dozen students in a small apartment in the capital’s Bayit Vagan neighborhood. Now in the city’s Givat Mordechai quarter, it boasts 17,000 male and female graduates and is recognized as the third-top engineering school in Israel, even though it’s a college and not a university.
All JCT students – Modern Orthodox and haredi, men and women alike – have options for graduate studies. Students in JCT’s International Program for English Speakers can earn any degree offered by the college. That program, which started with 16 students, now has more than 160 degree-seeking students. Some 20% of them are haredi.
The site of the National-Religious women’s campus, called Machon Tal, is a rented building in the city’s Givat Shaul neighborhood, where it is home to the majority of Selma Jelenick Nursing School students. Its graduates have received the highest grades of any nursing school in the country. Machon Tal’s computer science department is also top-ranked.
But the rented space is crowded and inadequate, leading JCT’s leadership to plan a NIS 500 million campus for women, adjacent to the men’s campus in Givat Mordechai, which is due to open in 2028. It’s one of the largest building projects being carried out in Jerusalem.
Known for their innovation, JCT graduates have launched more than 120 start-ups; and in the past 12 years, alumni have earned 11 prestigious Israel Defense Prizes. The prize, established by David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister and defense minister, recognizes the contribution of research and development personnel to Israel’s security.
JCT alumni have led teams that developed tunnel-detection systems, anti-ballistic missile (Arrow), anti-rocket (Iron Dome), anti-drone, and cruise missile (Iron Beam) technologies.
JCT’s Schreiber LevTech Entrepreneurship Center offers a range of programs for students to get their feet wet and gain valuable experience in the real world of entrepreneurship; thousands of students have taken part in their hackathons.
Since the start of the Oct. 7 war, JCT has hosted evacuee families and provided financial support to 850 student-reservists and their families.
Prof. Avi Domb: The new head of JCT
ZE’EV LEV was succeeded by five presidents: Prof. Yitzhak (Ernst) Nebenzahl (Israel’s state comptroller); physicist Zvi Weinberger; electro-optics engineer Prof. Joseph Bodenheimer; mathematician and Torah scholar Prof. Noah Dana-Picard; and chemist and nanotechnology Prof. Chaim Sukenik, who just completed 12 years in the position.
Sukenik, who was raised in Miami and came on aliyah with his wife, Shelli, in 1995, completed his undergraduate studies at Yeshiva University in New York and his doctorate at the California Institute of Technology.
After spending a year as a National Science Foundation postdoctoral research fellow at the University of California at Los Angeles, he took a faculty position at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, was a visiting scientist at the Weizmann Institute of Science, and a Fulbright Scholar at Hebrew University.
Last week, Sukenik’s colleagues, friends, and students met on campus to mark the achievement of his long service since 2013, during which he oversaw the opening of eight new bachelor’s degrees and four master’s degrees.
Sukenik – who had been brought in from the outside (the chemistry faculty at Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan) and never had an administrative background – joked that JCT staffers were probably nervous about his taking the top job.
“I learned of the school’s history and was enchanted. I read articles by Prof. Lev. I felt it was important for me to do something important for Jewish people. JCT has a special atmosphere of devotion to Jewish values, creativity, and innovation. Everybody helped me to adjust.”
He gave an example of the hard decisions he had to make during years of financial pressure and war. At first, very few women studied electro-optics – the branch of electrical engineering, electronic engineering, materials science, and material physics involving components, electronic devices such as lasers, laser diodes, LEDs, and waveguides that operate by the propagation and interaction of light with various tailored materials.
However, he decided to go ahead with the expensive field. Now there are 23 women studying it, and they and those who preceded them are contributing greatly to the nation’s defense and scientific achievements.
“I am concluding a period of work alongside excellent people, partners in the vision and mission,” Sukenik said. “I am grateful for the privilege of leading JCT, an institution that trains the future generation of scientists and engineers, whose uniqueness lies in being Torah-observant scientists.”
Now it’s up to another outsider, Prof. Avi Domb, to lead JCT. He has extensive experience in academia and industry. Throughout his career, he has held senior positions at Hebrew University and leading research institutions in the US.
Previously, he headed the forensic science division of the Israel Police and served as president of Jerusalem’s Azrieli College of Engineering, which is situated across the street from JCT.
Domb has a strong background in developing medications and other chemical technologies. He will need all his expertise to mix the various sectors studying at JCT, to ensure that the institution produces the next generation of National-Religious, ultra-Orthodox, male, and female scientists and other professionals.
“I am privileged and excited to join JCT, an institution that combines academic and scientific excellence with Torah studies and Jewish values,” he said.
“I have encountered many JCT alumni during my career, both in the healthcare system, where many alumni hold senior positions, and in the defense industry, where JCT graduates lead some of the nation’s most cutting-edge and critical projects.
“The connection between Torah and science is one of my core values. I look forward to leading JCT to continued growth and impact in science, industry, and Israeli society.”