Clad in Jewish fraternity jerseys, the brothers of Alpha Epsilon Pi and Zeta Beta Tau walked confidently across the University of Missouri campus in the weeks after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, undaunted by anti-Zionist protests and “From the River to the Sea” signs.
Demonstrations against Israel were roiling U.S. colleges, including Mizzou in Columbia and Washington University in St. Louis. Some Jewish students felt afraid amid pro-Palestinian marches and surging antisemitism. But for many Jewish Greeks at both universities, alarm quickly shifted to resolve.
Fraternity and sorority members leaned on one another for strength, safety and support. And from the anguish of Oct. 7, students and Greek life executives said, a new generation of Jewish campus leaders was forged.
“There’s been this feeling that we can all lean on each other, be there for each other, and step up,” said Brian Schenberg, 20, a Mizzou junior from Chesterfield who served as AEPi’s chapter president last year. “We didn’t know what was coming our way or where we might encounter antisemitism after Oct. 7. So to be able to carry our house’s Jewish values and implement them, with our non-Jewish members standing right there treating it as if they were Jewish, that’s been pretty cool.”
Schenberg said he hasn’t experienced visible antisemitism on campus, but “knowing how to walk down the street to class if somebody were to say something to you, it’s definitely a factor that Jewish Greek students have to think about and keep in the back of our heads.”
In interviews with the Jewish Light, more than half a dozen Jewish Greeks at Mizzou and WashU said their college experiences were indelibly shaped by the Oct. 7 attacks, Hamas’s war with Israel and the ensuing wave of antisemitism still affecting college campuses.
Jewish Greek students as advocates
The challenges faced by area Jewish fraternities and sororities post-Oct. 7 are unprecedented, according to Jewish Greek experts, students and organization leaders.
In response, many Greeks at Mizzou and WashU have taken on Jewish advocacy roles, working to fight discrimination, protect civil rights and boost support for Israel. Others have focused on promoting Jewish inclusion in broader campus life.
“Students today are having to spend a great deal of their time explaining who and what they are after Oct. 7, and having to defend being Jewish,” Bonnie Wunsch, executive director of Jewish sorority AEPhi, said of the national climate for Jewish college students. “So being someplace and calling someplace home (in a fraternity or sorority), where you can be yourself and don’t have to explain who you are, is certainly beneficial.”
One of WashU’s newest campus Jewish leaders, freshman AEPi member Dagan Ohana, said he feels at ease in Greek life due to his chapter’s solidarity with Israel. Having lived in Israel as a child, Ohana doesn’t shy away from difficult conversations with students who express anti-Israel or anti-Jewish views. Dialogue, he believes, can affect their thinking and educate the uninformed.
“When I’m having a conversation with someone about Israel, it’s not my goal to convince them – it’s more to make sure that they’re educated,” said Ohana, 18. “If they’re educated on the issue and they still believe the way they want to believe, that’s totally fine with me. It’s important to help people learn more about the situation and give them accurate information. It makes a difference.”
Jewish Greeks at Mizzou and WashU said their work promoting Jewish representation on campus feels more important since the Oct. 7 attacks, in which terrorists killed about 1,200 Israelis and took 251 hostages.
AEPi, ZBT and AEPhi members said they are building wider understanding of Judaism through philanthropic work and community service events, including Oct. 7 anniversary gatherings and fundraisers for the sick and needy. AEPi at Mizzou raises more than $100,000 annually for cancer research.
“We try to help however we can,” AEPi’s Schenberg said.
Working closely with campus Chabad and Hillel chapters, several students have found new purpose as Hillel Greek life ambassadors in the wake of Oct. 7. One such student is Mizzou ZBT member David Sternfeld, 18, who said images of slaughtered Israelis on Oct. 7 and antisemitic protests beginning that same week had a profound effect on his life and advocacy work.
A high school senior in Charleston, S.C., during the attacks, Sternfeld committed himself to finding a college and fraternity in which he’d feel safe. At ZBT, he quickly forged bonds with Jewish and non-Jewish members alike, connections deepened by his outreach work with Hillel.
Sternfeld’s efforts have paid off in new alliances with non-Jews and more dialogue among students of different backgrounds, he said.
“A lot of the time, we’ll have some of our non-Jewish guys in ZBT just pop into Hillel events, which is really great to experience,” said Sternfeld, his chapter’s director of risk management and wellness, as well as a Hillel Greek life ambassador. “It’s really cool because they’ll ask us questions about Judaism, and I’ll be able to talk to them about my religion and kind of share my perspective on things.
“I think getting people involved Jewishly, even if they’re not Jewish, that’s really my big goal. It’s been really special being able to have these experiences together after Oct. 7.”
Jewish sorority membership grows post-Oct. 7
Jewish sorority members also say their college experience has changed dramatically since Oct. 7. Horrified by Hamas’ use of sexual violence during the attacks, AEPhi sisters have supported and protected one another while stepping up their pro-Israel advocacy.
“There’s been an increase [nationally] in women wanting a Jewish sorority on campus, because they want that safety net,” AEPhi’s Wunsch said. “Post-Oct. 7, many women have a heightened sense of their Jewish identity, and this gives them the opportunity to explore that in a safe place and feel comfortable.”
Lauren Marlowe, a sophomore AEPhi at WashU and member of the Hillel Advisory Board, said the terror wrought Oct. 7 “definitely gave me the kickstart I needed to get more involved in Israel advocacy and Jewish life on campus.”
“It reinforced that I really do want to contribute and do my part in making sure that these important issues are being talked about,” said Marlowe, who wears her yellow ribbon on campus in solidarity with the Israeli hostages in Gaza. “The ribbon helps me find solidarity with the women [hostages] there. Some are my age, and it’s very hard to watch the news and imagine what is happening to them.”
Marlowe and other Jewish Greeks stressed that the antisemitism and anti-Israeli actions targeting Jews on other campuses have been worse than anything they’ve experienced at Mizzou or WU.
“There are college campuses where they’re attacking Jewish fraternities and sororities, where people are camping outside because they believe that the 19- to 21-year-olds living in that house are the reason there’s a war going on in the Middle East, which is just an absurd thing to think about,” Marlowe said. “I’m very lucky that if I wanted to walk out in my AEPhi letters, nobody would say anything. Depending on what school you go to, it would be a bigger deal.”
Jewish Greek system born from being banned
The Anti-Defamation League gave WashU a B in its 2024 Campus Antisemitism Report Card, crediting the school with doing more to fight antisemitism than most universities.
ADL officials said a student group called Resist WashU has held anti-Israel rallies, walkouts and called for university divestment from Israel. In November 2023, an anti-Israel art display on campus featured paintings with the lines: “Zionism kills” and “Zionism f—ing kills people.” When anti-Israel protesters failed to disperse from a campus encampment in April 2024, law enforcement made 100 arrests and three police officers reported significant injuries, ADL reported.
At Mizzou, police said a female student destroyed a campus display for Israeli hostages in November 2023. Anti-Israel protesters on campus have used phrases and imagery deemed antisemitic by the ADL and held marches to City Hall in Columbia. Mizzou did not receive a grade on ADL’s report card.
Despite occasional encounters with anti-Israel students, Jewish Greeks at Mizzou and WashU said they feel free to express their Judaism and organizational affiliations, in contrast with generations of their predecessors.
Shira Kohn, a historian of the Jewish Greek system, said Jews were excluded from fraternities and sororities for decades, barred by “gentlemen’s agreements” denying them membership. When universities set quotas limiting Jewish admissions in the 1920s, several non-Jewish fraternities and sororities added or reaffirmed constitutional language codifying their Jewish exclusion policies or else established unwritten bans.
Jewish students responded by forming their own fraternities and sororities: ZBT, originally a Zionist youth society in New York City, formed in 1898. Jews excluded from fraternities at New York University founded AEPi in 1913, while Jewish women founded AEPhi at Barnard College in 1909.
Jewish women banned from other resident spaces lived in their sorority houses, while Jewish fraternity members worked with the ADL to counter antisemitic conspiracies. In the face of widespread hiring discrimination, Jewish Greeks forged lifelong social networks and helped one another get jobs.
Universities generally allowed Jewish organizations to participate in Greek life and Panhellenic councils, including WU’s, since “they could attract Jewish students and get tuition dollars and, if the students had their own fraternity or sorority house, the university no longer had to worry about housing them with non-Jewish students,” said Kohn, who is at work on a book about Jewish sororities and civil rights in post-World War II America.
“You can almost think of it as a form of separate but equal for the Jewish students on campus,” Kohn said, adding that African American fraternities and sororities were barred from Panhellenic councils.
Greek chapter acceptance expands for all
Today, Jewish fraternities and sororities are open to students of any faith and background. Conversely, Greek organizations with predominantly non-Jewish memberships all accept Jews, and often include at least a few Jewish chapter members at schools with large Jewish populations.
In addition to AEPi, ZBT and AEPhi, Jewish students across the U.S. frequently rush Sigma Delta Tau, a historically Jewish sorority, and Sigma Alpha Mu, a historically Jewish fraternity commonly known as Sammy. SDT and Sammy do not have chapters at Mizzou or WashU.
There are no Jewish Greek organizations at the University of Missouri–St. Louis, an UMSL spokesperson said.
AEPhi’s Wunsch, 64, said her options for joining a sorority were limited when she graduated from high school in 1979.
“I could be sure that at many schools, if I had gone to them, I would not have been able to join anything other than a Jewish sorority,” the Emory University graduate said. “The antisemitism might not have been as blatant as it is today, but there was more segregation.”
Protesters’ exclusion of Jews on some campuses after Oct. 7 echoed past antisemitic exclusions, Wunsch said, but “there’s no question we’re living in unprecedented times.”
At most colleges, students had no issues walking across campus wearing Jewish fraternity or sorority letters pre-Oct. 7. That changed after the attacks, said ZBT Chief Executive Officer Libby Anderson, who grew up in Moscow Mills, Mo.
“As Jewish students, and wearing their Greek letters on top of that, some of our students were frightened to leave their chapter houses” on some campuses, Anderson said. “They were frightened to go anywhere, even to the dining hall.”
Jewish students in predominantly non-Jewish Greek organizations have also faced challenges, several of them said. They are fighting antisemitism by educating members of their own organizations about Jewish religion, history and culture.
Maggie Zurn, a Mizzou freshman, recalled being shocked to learn some of her sisters in the Alpha Chi Omega, a predominantly non-Jewish sorority, had never met a Jewish person.
“The first time I told one of my sisters that I was Jewish, she was just like, ‘Wait, so you don’t celebrate Christmas?’ because they had never met a Jew,” said Zurn, 19, who serves as a Hillel Greek life ambassador and sits on Hillel’s Jewish Student Organization board. “Some of them don’t really know what ‘Jewish’ means or what Judaism is, so I had to educate myself better on how to explain Jewish beliefs and culture.”
Chi O, as the sorority is commonly known, has shown public solidarity with its Jewish members since Oct. 7, speaking forcefully against antisemitism. Zurn said it can feel isolating as a Jewish student at times, but she’s proud of the small contingent of Jewish sisters boosting representation in traditionally non-Jewish settings.
“You read all of these stories about hatred for Jews, about (antisemitic acts by) Kanye West and Elon Musk, and it’s kind of overwhelming,” Zurn said. “It’s nice to know that there are other Jews who feel similarly to you, and places where you can wear your Star of David and just forget that you’re different.”
Spending on student safety skyrockets
With a new crop of students rushing Jewish fraternities and sororities last fall, Jewish Greeks at Mizzou and WashU appear to be thriving. But that’s not the case on all campuses, Greek life leaders said.
Some ZBT chapters have seen challenges with recruitment due to anti-Israel protests, parental concerns and the need for extra security measures during parts of the recruitment process, said ZBT’s Anderson, who is also an AEPhi sister and Mizzou grad.
ZBT chapters had to ensure members were safe and that “prospective members felt comfortable coming into our houses and joining a Jewish fraternity, where that quite possibly means they will now have a target on their back from pro-Palestinian protesters,” she said.
The 2023-2024 ADL annual report on anti-Israel activism on U.S. campuses tallied 2,637 anti-Israel incidents of assault, vandalism, harassment, protests and divestment resolutions from June 1, 2023, to May 31, 2024, a 628% increase in those categories compared to the same period in 2022-2023.
AEPi national partnered with the ADL in 2023 to launch the AEPi Antisemitism Response Center, which includes a centralized system for reporting and tracking antisemitic incidents on college campuses. The center, which also trains students on how to fight antisemitism, has engaged with 150,000 students so far through its work, according to AEPi.
Nationally, Anderson said she frequently encountered situations in which universities failed to investigate student reports of antisemitism after Oct. 7.
“The feel we were getting was that universities were so afraid of violating freedom of speech that they weren’t protecting the rights of the people being attacked,” Anderson said.
As a result of threats facing Jewish students, security expenditures for Jewish Greek organizations have been immense, Jewish Greek leaders said.
“What we spent post-Oct. 7 on security increases for our chapters was astronomical in some places, but we were quick to do what was needed,” said Wunsch of AEPhi.
WashU’s AEPhi chapter does not have a sorority house on campus and so it faces less complex security challenges. The sorority is the largest at WashU with 130 members, Wunsch said. The AEPhi chapter at Mizzou is now defunct.
AEPi has fraternity houses at both Mizzou and WU, while ZBT has a house at Mizzou. The ZBT house at WashU was recently torn down with the intent of building a new structure, Anderson said.
With anti-Israel protesters still active on many U.S. campuses, Jewish Greek leaders said they are continually monitoring campus activities, teaming up with Jewish Community Centers and Jewish Federations to share information, and working law enforcement to keep members safe.
“No one else in the United States has to pay millions and millions of dollars so it is safe for their children to go to school and to worship,” Anderson said, quoting a past ZBT national president.
Even as Jewish fraternities and sororities continue to be targets of protests on some U.S. campuses, the organizations are playing an indispensable role in American Jewish life, experts said.
There are few places Jewish college kids can find such meaningful camaraderie, or have as much fun, as a Jewish Greek chapter.
“I think that if you are feeling pressure of campus or societal antisemitism, it’s really helpful to feel like you are a part of something, that people see you as a brother or a sister, and that you feel like you are part of something uniquely Jewish,” Kohn, the historian, said.
