Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Hebrew University of Jerusalem | |
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האוניברסיטה העברית בירושלים | |
Established | 1918 |
Type | Public |
President | Prof. Menahem Ben-Sasson |
Rector | Prof. Sarah Stroumsa |
Academic staff | 1,200 |
Students | 22,000 |
Undergraduates | 12,000 |
Postgraduates | 10,000 |
Location | Jerusalem, Israel |
Nickname | Hebrew U, HUJI |
Website | www.huji.ac.il |
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Hebrew: האוניברסיטה העברית בירושלים, (ha-Universita ha-Ivrit B'irushalayim); Arabic: الجامعة العبرية في القدس (al-Ǧāmiʻah al-ʻIbriyyah fil-Quds); abbreviated HUJI) is Israel's oldest University. The Hebrew University has three campuses in Jerusalem and one in Rehovot.[1] The First Board of Governors included Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud, Martin Buber, and Chaim Weizmann. Four of Israel's prime ministers are alumni of the Hebrew University. In the last decade, seven graduates of the University received the Nobel Prize and the Fields Medal. In the Academic Ranking of World Universities index, Hebrew University is the top university in Israel and among the world's 100 top universities.[2] The world's largest Jewish studies library is located on its Edmond J. Safra Givat Ram campus.[citation needed] In 2010, The Scientist ranked the Hebrew University 5th in the international category of Best Places to Work in Academia.[3]
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[edit] History
One of the visions of the Zionist movement was the establishment of a Jewish university in the Land of Israel. Founding a university was proposed as far back as 1884 in the Kattowitz (Katowice) conference of the Hovevei Zion society. A major supporter of the idea was Albert Einstein, who bequeathed his papers and his literary estate to the university. The cornerstone for the university was laid in 1918. Seven years later, on April 1, 1925, the Hebrew University campus on Mount Scopus was opened at a gala ceremony attended by the leaders of the Jewish world, distinguished scholars and public figures, and British dignitaries, including the Earl of Balfour, Viscount Allenby and Sir Herbert Samuel. The University's first Chancellor was Judah Magnes.
By 1947, the University had become a large research and teaching institution. Plans for a medical school were approved in May 1949, and in November 1949, a faculty of law was inaugurated. In 1952, it was announced that the agricultural institute founded by the University in 1940 would become a full-fledged faculty.[4]
During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the Arabs repeatedly attacked convoys moving between the Israeli-controlled section of Jerusalem and the University.[5] The leader of the Arab forces in Jerusalem, Abdul Kader Husseini, threatened to blow up the University and Hadassah Hospital "if the Jews continued to use them as bases for attacks."[6] After the Hadassah medical convoy massacre, in which 79 doctors and nurses were murdered, the Mount Scopus campus was cut off from Jewish Jerusalem.[7] When the Jordanian government reneged on the 1949 Armistice Agreements and refused Israeli access to Mount Scopus, a new campus was built at Givat Ram in western Jerusalem and completed in 1958. In the interim, classes were held in 40 different buildings around the city.[8]
The Terra Sancta building in Rehavia, rented from the Franciscan Custodians of the Latin Holy Places, was also used for this purpose.[9] A few years later, together with the Hadassah Medical Organization, a medical science campus was built in the south-west Jerusalem neighborhood of Ein Kerem. By the beginning of 1967, the students numbered 12,500, spread among the two campuses in Jerusalem and the agricultural faculty in Rehovot. After the unification of Jerusalem, following the Six-Day War of June 1967, the University was able to return to Mount Scopus, which was rebuilt. In 1981 the construction work was completed, and Mount Scopus again became the main campus of the University.
[edit] Campuses
[edit] Mount Scopus
Mount Scopus (Hebrew: Har HaTzofim הר הצופים), in the north-eastern part of Jerusalem, is home to the Faculties of Humanities, Social Sciences, Law, Jerusalem School of Business Administration, Bearwald School of Social Work, Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace, Rothberg International School and Mandel Institute of Jewish Studies The land on Mt. Scopus was purchased before World War I from Sir John Gray-Hill, along with the Gray-Hill mansion.[10] The master plan for the university was designed by Patrick Geddes and his son-in-law, Frank Mears in December 1919. Only three buildings of this original design were built: The Wolfson National Library, the Mathematics Institute and the Physics Institute.[10]
[edit] Edmond J. Safra, Givat Ram
The Givat Ram campus, named for Edmond Safra, is the home of the Faculty of Science including the Einstein Institute of Mathematics; the Institute of Advanced Studies, the Center for the Study of Rationality, as well as the Jewish National and University Library.
[edit] Ein Kerem
The Faculties of Medicine and Dental Medicine are located at the south-western Jerusalem Ein Kerem campus alongside the Hadassah-University Medical Center.
[edit] Rehovot
The Robert H. Smith Faculty of Agriculture, Food and the Environment[11] and the Koret School of Veterinary Medicine[12] are located in the city of Rehovot in the coastal plain. The Faculty was established in 1942 and the School of Veterinary Medicine opened in 1985. These are the only institutions of higher learning in Israel that offer both teaching and research programs in their respective fields.
[edit] Libraries
The Jewish National and University Library is the central and largest library of the Hebrew University and one of the most impressive book and manuscript collections in the world. It is also the oldest section of the university. Founded in 1892 as a world center for the preservation of books relating to Jewish thought and culture, it assumed the additional functions of a general university library in 1920. Its collections of Hebraica and Judaica are the largest in the world. It houses all materials published in Israel, and attempts to acquire all materials published in the world related to the country. It possesses over five million books and thousands of items in special sections, many of which are unique. Among these are the Albert Einstein Archives, Hebrew manuscripts department, Eran Laor map collection, Edelstein science collection, Gershom Scholem collection, and a collection of Maimonides' manuscripts and early writings.
In his will, Albert Einstein left the Hebrew University his personal papers and the intellectual copyright to them, as well as the right to use his image. The Albert Einstein Archives contain some 55,000 items.[13]
In addition to the National Library, the Hebrew University operates subject-based libraries on its campuses, among them the Avraham Harman Science Library, Safra, Givat Ram; Mathematics and Computer Science Library, Safra, Givat Ram; Earth Sciences Library, Safra, Givat Ram; Muriel and Philip I. Berman National Medical Library, Ein Kerem; Central Library of Agricultural Science, Rehovot; Bloomfield Library for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Mt. Scopus; Bernard G. Segal Law Library Center, Mt. Scopus; Emery and Claire Yass Library of the Institute of Archaeology, Mt. Scopus; Moses Leavitt Library of Social Work, Mt. Scopus; Zalman Aranne Central Education Library, Mt. Scopus; Library of the Rothberg School for International Students, Mt. Scopus; Roberta and Stanley Bogen Library of the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace, Mt. Scopus; and the Steven Spielberg Jewish Film Archive. The Hebrew University libraries and their web catalogs can be accessed through the HUJI Library Authority portal.
[edit] Arab-Israel conflict
On July 31, 2002, an Arab painter, part of a Hamas terrorist cell, detonated a bomb during the lunch hour at the University's "Frank Sinatra" cafeteria when it was crowded with staff and students. Nine people — five Israelis, three Americans, and one citizen with dual French-American citizenship — were murdered and more than 70 wounded. World leaders, including Kofi Annan, President Bush, and the President of the European Union issued statements of condemnation.[14][15]
[edit] Distinguished faculty
- Lydia Aran, scholar of Buddhism
- Robert Aumann, 2005 Nobel Prize laureate for Economics
- Yishai Bar, law
- Yehoshua Bar-Hillel, linguistics
- Yaacov Bar-Siman-Tov, international relations
- Aharon Barak, former President of the Israeli Supreme Court
- Yehuda Bauer, Holocaust history
- Jacob Bekenstein, physics
- Ernst David Bergmann, chairman of Israeli Atomic Energy Commission
- Martin Buber, religion & Jewish philosophy
- Ilan Chet, agricultural biotechnology
- Shmuel Eisenstadt, sociology
- Menachem Elon, former Deputy President of the Israeli Supreme Court
- Adolf Abraham Halevi Fraenkel, mathematics
- Hillel Furstenberg, mathematics
- Asher Dan Grunis, Supreme Court Justice
- Louis Guttman, social sciences and statistics
- Ephraim Halevy, Mossad chief
- Daniel Kahneman, 2002 Nobel Prize laureate for Economics
- Ruth Kark, geography of (Eretz) Israel
- Aharon Katzir, chemistry
- David Kazhdan, mathematics
- Baruch Kimmerling, sociology
- Ruth Lapidoth, law
- Ruth Lawrence, mathematics
- Yeshayahu Leibowitz, biochemistry and Jewish philosophy
- Avigdor Levontin, law
- Amia Lieblich, psychology
- Joram Lindenstrauss, mathematics
- Elon Lindenstrauss, mathematics, laureate of the 2010 Fields Medal
- Avishai Margalit, philosophy Israel Prize Winner
- Amihai Mazar, archaeology, Israel Prize Winner
- Benjamin Mazar. archaeologist, Israel Prize Winner, former University president and rector
- George Mosse, history
- Amnon Netzer, Jewish Studies and history
- Ehud Netzer, archaeology
- Mordechai Nisan, social science
- Dan Pagis
- Nurit Peled-Elhanan, education
- Joshua Prawer, history
- Michael O. Rabin, computer science and mathematics
- Giulio Racah, physics
- Frances Raday, law
- Mordechai Rotenberg, social work
- Gershom Scholem, Jewish mysticism
- Eliezer Schweid, Jewish philosophy
- Saharon Shelah, mathematics
- Zeev Sternhell, political science
- Hayim Tadmor, Assyriology
- Jacob Talmon, history
- Amos Tversky, psychology
- Claude Vigée, French literature
- Avi Wigderson, computer science and mathematics
- Joseph Yahalom, Hebrew poetry
- Hanna Yablonka, Holocaust history
- S. Yizhar, writer
[edit] Notable alumni
- Nobel Prize laureates: Daniel Kahneman (economics 2002), David Gross (physics 2004), Aaron Ciechanover and Avram Hershko (chemistry 2004), Robert Aumann (economics 2005), and Ada Yonath (chemistry 2009).
- Fields Medal laureate: Elon Lindenstrauss (2010)
- Presidents of Israel: Ephraim Katzir, Yitzhak Navon, Moshe Katsav
- Prime Ministers of Israel: Ehud Barak, Ariel Sharon, Ehud Olmert
- Supreme Court Justices: Aharon Barak, Dorit Beinisch, Menachem Elon, Elyakim Rubinstein, Meir Shamgar, Jacob Turkel, Yitzhak Zamir
- Members of the Knesset: Colette Avital, Yael Dayan, Taleb el-Sana, Dalia Itzik, Roman Bronfman, David Rotem, Ahmed Tibi, Avigdor Lieberman, Dov Khenin, Danny Danon, Shulamit Aloni, Rachel Adato, Ze'ev Elkin, Roni Bar-On, Ze'ev Bielski, Yohanan Plesner, David Rotem, Reuven Rivlin, Yuval Steinitz, Dan Meridor, Yisrael Katz, Jamal Zahalka, Shai Hermesh, Zvulun Orlev, Taleb el-Sana, Menachem Ben-Sasson, Ya'akov Ne'eman, Geulah Cohen
- Foreign service: Naomi Ben-Ami, Gabriela Shalev
- Sports and culture: Yochanan Vollach, Natalie Portman, Itzik Kornfein, Adin Talbar
- Archaeologists: Ruth Amiran, Trude Dothan, Aren Maeir, Benjamin Mazar, Amihai Mazar, Eilat Mazar, Yigael Yadin
- Activists: Elie Yossef
- Journalists: Khaled Abu Toameh, Ron Ben-Yishai, Nahum Barnea, Zvi Yehezkeli, Sayed Kashua, Amira Hass, Akiva Eldar, Yossi Melman, Meron Benvenisti, Tom Segev, Haviv Rettig, Dan Margalit, Ya'akov Ahimeir, Michael Bar-Zohar, David Witzthum, Haim Gouri, Ehud Yaari, Amos Kenan, Boaz Evron
- Writers: Yehuda Amichai, Aharon Appelfeld, Elias Chacour, Yael Dayan, David Grossman, Batya Gur, Shifra Horn, Amos Oz, A. B. Yehoshua, Amnon Jackont, Amalia Kahana-Carmon, Yehoshua Kenaz.
- Academics: Ahron Bregman, Uri Davis, Gerson Goldhaber, Igal Talmi, Haim Harari, Joshua Jortner, Alexander Levitzki, Efraim Karsh, Asa Kasher, Walter Laqueur, Avishai Margalit, Dana Olmert, Miri Rubin, Ada Yonath, Amit Schejter, Benjamin Elazari Volcani
- Lawyers: Elias Khoury, Menachem Mazuz, Ya'akov Ne'eman, Malcolm Shaw
- Theologian: Fr Malachi Martin, Yigal Arnon
- Physicist: David Gross, Igal Talmi, Haim Harari, Amikam Aharoni
- Chemists: Renata Reisfeld, Aaron Barkatt
- Business: Léo Apotheker (CEO of Hewlett-Packard), Orit Gadiesh (Chairman of Bain & Company), Dina Dublon (Board member of Microsoft, Accenture and PepsiCo), Gil Shwed (CEO and chairman Check Point Software Technologies), Eli Hurvitz (CEO 1976-2002 Teva Pharmaceuticals)
- Mathematicians: Rami Grossberg (1986), Joram Lindenstrauss (1962), Moshe Machover (1962), Saharon Shelah (1969), Oded Schramm (1987)
[edit] Rankings
In the 2010 QS World University Rankings[16] the Hebrew University of Jerusalem was ranked the top university in Israel and 109th overall in the world. Its subject rankings were: 175th in Arts & Humanities, 164th in Engineering & IT, 136th in Life Sciences & Biomedicine, 84th in Natural Sciences, and 131st in Social Sciences. According to Academic Ranking of World Universities[17] of the same year, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem was ranked the top university in Israel, 5th in Asia/Pacific and 72nd in the world.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ The Hebrew University of Jerusalem – About
- ^ Academic Ranking of World Universities 2009, published by Shanghai Jiao Tong University in 2009.
- ^ http://www.the-scientist.com/fragments/bptw/2010/academia/bptw-academia-top.jsp
- ^ The subversives on the hill – Haaretz – Israel News
- ^ The Palestine Post, 14 April 1948, p. 3
- ^ 'Husseini Threatens Hadassah', The Palestine Post, 18 March 1948, p. 1
- ^ Victims of Hadassah massacre to be memorialized, Judy Siegel-Itzkovich, Jerusalem Post, April 7, 2008.
- ^ [1]
- ^ Jerusalem: Architecture in the British Mandate Period
- ^ a b Architectural Orientalism in the Hebrew University, Diana Dolev
- ^ Faculty of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Quality Sciences
- ^ Koret School of Veterinary Medicine
- ^ Albert Einstein's bequest to the Hebrew University
- ^ HUJI Memorial Pages
- ^ Terrorist bombing at Hebrew University cafeteria
- ^ "QS World University Rankings 2010 Results". http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-university-rankings/2010/results.
- ^ "ARWU 2010 Results". http://www.arwu.org/ARWU2010.jsp.
[edit] External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Hebrew University of Jerusalem |
- Hebrew University web site
- The Mandel Institute of Jewish Studies web site
- Einstein Archives at the Hebrew University
- Hebrew University Technology Transfer company – An article
- The British Friends of The Hebrew University (BFHU)
- Ancient and Premodern Law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem
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