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A Summer of Uncertainty: The Impact on Birthright Israel’s Summer 2025 Cohort
Topic:
Principal Investigators:
Graham Wright, Leonard Saxe, Micha Rieser, Shahar Hecht, Samantha Shortall
Study Date:
2025
Source:
Birthright Israel, Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies, and the Steinhardt Social Research Institute at Brandeis University
Key Findings:
Participants entered with unusually high baseline engagement: Compared to pre–October 7 cohorts, summer 2025 participants were more likely to have strong Jewish backgrounds, prior Israel experience, and higher pre-trip connection to Israel (53% “very connected”).
Political composition shifted: 42% identified as conservative (up sharply from 2023), while the share identifying as liberal declined.
Strong positive program impact despite crisis conditions:
Connection to Israel increased significantly (53% → 74%), while no change occurred among nonparticipants.
Knowledge about Israel increased across multiple domains, especially where baseline knowledge was lowest.
The importance of being Jewish increased, particularly among politically liberal participants.
Participants’ connection to Jewish life was maintained, while nonparticipants experienced declines over the same period.
Sense of responsibility toward other Jews and Israel increased.
Effects held even for highly engaged participants: Birthright continued to produce gains among those with Jewish day school backgrounds and high prior engagement, though effects were generally stronger among less-engaged participants.
Program impact in a deteriorating environment:
Nonparticipants became less connected to Jewish identity and (among liberals) less connected to Israel over the same period—making Birthright’s effect partly protective (preventing decline) rather than only additive.Experience remained highly positive despite disruption:
Even though 31% of participants were evacuated during the Israel–Iran war, most rated the trip as highly meaningful and among the best experiences of their lives.
Methodology:
The study is based on two surveys of U.S. applicants to Birthright Israel’s summer 2025 trips, including both participants and applicants who did not attend. A pre-trip survey (N=2,285) was conducted shortly before departure, and a post-trip survey (N=1,384) was conducted three to four months later. The researchers use a quasi-experimental design, comparing changes over time between participants and nonparticipants (difference-in-differences) to estimate the program’s impact on attitudes toward Israel, Jewish identity, knowledge, and community connection. Weighting adjustments were applied to account for response bias.