A group of Cambridge students have recently returned from a trip to Israel organised by the Pinsker Centre, during which they met Israeli President Isaac Herzog.

The Centre invited 20 students from Oxford and Cambridge, who are involved in politics and debating societies, on a free eight-day tour of the country. Alongside Herzog, students met Israel’s deputy foreign minister Sharren Haskel and former deputy prime minister Dan Meridor.

They also attended discussions with the Palestinian Christian academic John Munayer, who is involved in interreligious activism, and the Arab-Israeli colonel Shadi Khalloul, who describes himself as a “patriotic Israeli” and advocate for “Christian Israeli – Aramaic rights”.

While visiting the site of the 7 October massacre, participants spoke to a survivor named Shalev Biton. They also met Meirav Leshem Gonen, the mother of Romi Gonen, who was held hostage by Hamas.

The Pinsker Centre previously ran yearly trips to Israel for Oxbridge students, but was unable to in 2024 due to the war in Gaza.

Formerly known as the Pinsker Centre for Zionist Education, the organisation was founded in 2016 by Elliot Miller, who told Jewish News that he hoped to “transform the way in which we promote the case for Israel on campus”.

Today, the Centre describes itself as a “a non-partisan think tank focusing on global foreign policy, especially the Middle East”. The Israel trip is similarly depicted as an opportunity “to learn about one of the most complex geopolitical conflicts in the world from a balanced, non-partisan policy perspective”.

Ifan Peredur Morgan, a master’s student at Cambridge who attended the trip, claimed that participants heard a wide range of viewpoints: “We visited the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and went close enough to Gaza that we could just about see the rubble.

“We met with Palestinians from each of these areas, and with varying opinions; and with Jewish Israelis of varying opinions. We also met with members from various minority communities (religious, ethnic) within Israel and Palestine. (Regrettably, we were not able to meet with Hamas members).”

However, the trip has received backlash from local Palestinian activists, with the Cambridge Palestine Solidarity Campaign (CPSC) arguing that the Palestinian voices on the trip failed to offer an alternative perspective.

Regarding the tour guide who showed students around the West Bank, the CPSC said: “The Palestinian journalist embraces a ‘both sides’ narrative, which ignores both the underlying structural causes of what is now a 2nd major catastrophe (Nakba) for Palestine […] and the fundamental difference between occupier and occupied”.

“The meeting with President Herzog sends a particularly alarming message, having had warrants submitted in the UK for his arrest, from groups including the Hind Rajab Foundation, for complicity in war crimes and much more,” they added.

The Pinsker Centre offers a ‘Policy Fellowship’ to around 15 students each year, who then produce articles for national media outlets, host campus events, and attend seminar days. Participants also spend three days in Washington DC, where they visit American lawmakers, and institutions such as the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC and the American Enterprise Institute.

This year, the three Policy Fellows at Cambridge are Ifan Peredur Morgan, Dan Vollborth – former Chairman of the Cambridge University Conservative Association (CUCA) – and Amar Singh Bhandal.

Bhandal told Varsity that he joined the Israel trip because “misinformation from both sides left me in some doubt as to the truth of the situation in Israel and the Palestinian territories and so I wanted to see if I could find answers for myself”.

“I had hoped for easy answers to my questions about the Middle East. In this regard I was disappointed. Day by day, even hour by hour, my mind was changed by conflicting narratives that have left me unsure about what a real solution for Israelis and Palestinians looks like,” he continued.

The trip has also received criticism from those on the left of student politics. A spokesperson for the Cambridge Young Greens told Varsity: “Given the history of the Pinsker Centre, we denounce the Israel tour as nothing but a propaganda trip.”

The University of Cambridge Left Society (UCLS) said: “Grooming the next generation of leaders with expensed dinners and plush hotels […] is both insidious and dangerous.”

Bhandal recognised that the trip was likely to receive condemnation from students on both sides of the debate, telling Varsity: “Frankly, I am focused on what Israelis and Palestinians had to say, rather than student voices in the West which are often detached from the reality on the ground.”

The Pinsker Centre said that student criticisms of the trip were “outrageous and unsubstantiated”.

One of the Centre’s main activities is arranging speaker events at UK universities. In 2022, they organised Dan Meridor’s appearance at the Cambridge Union, which was criticised in an open letter and by protesters outside the event. Other speakers they have brought to Cambridge include former White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, and former Canadian foreign minister John Baird.

In November 2023, the Centre co-ordinated an open letter signed by 10 conservative societies, including those at Cambridge and Oxford, expressing solidarity “with Israel against the horrific actions taken by Hamas terrorists,” and with “the global Jewish community during this dark time of rising antisemitism”.

The letter went on to argue that deaths of Palestinian civilians are “an inarguable tragedy, but they are a tragedy caused by the terrorists who chose to launch this senseless and barbaric attack on Israel”.

The Centre’s leadership team is dominated by Cambridge alumni. Director of Strategy Mackenzie France graduated in 2023 with a degree in history and politics, having organised Pinsker events during his studies. Meanwhile, Associate Director Ella Shattock studied English, and participated in the 2022 Israel policy trip.