The study, which tracks long-term outcomes of Birthright participants, found that children of participants are more likely to be raised as Jews, more likely to have had a Jewish circumcision or a baby-naming ceremony, and more likely to be enrolled in formal and informal Jewish education compared to the children of nonparticipants.

Regardless of their partner choice (whether Jewish or non-Jewish), participants are also more likely to raise children who celebrate a bar or bat mitzvah, compared to nonparticipants.

Compared to their peers who applied to Birthright but never went:

·      84% of Birthright Israel alumni are raising their children exclusively Jewish, regardless of their spouse’s background.

·      Birthright Israel alumni are 65% more likely to send their children to Jewish overnight camps.

·      Birthright Israel alumni are 44% more likely to place their children in Jewish supplementary education programs.

·      Birthright Israel alumni have a 42% higher likelihood of providing their children with informal Jewish experiences.

·      Birthright Israel alumni have a 21% higher likelihood of providing their children with formal Jewish education.

Gidi Mark, CEO of Birthright Israel, said the program “is the most powerful investment in securing the Jewish future.”

With more than 900,000 participants since the program was established in 1999, he said, “we are witnessing an intergenerational ripple effect—some may have had their bar mitzvah celebration for the first time on their Birthright Israel trip and are now raising their children to have one back home. This study proves that Birthright Israel is not just a journey; it’s a catalyst for strengthening Jewish identity, deepening connections to Jewish traditions and fostering a lifelong bond with Israel.”

‘My soul was home’

Elie and Jenn Zussman are a case in point. The two met on the very first Birthright trip offered in December 1999. Both were enrolled in same-state schools at the time—he at Emory University in Atlanta and she at the University of Georgia in Athens—and were placed on the same bus.

They married in 2006 and have two daughters: Zoe, 13, and Maya, 12. The family, who lives in Gaithersburg, Md., is planning to travel to Israel in December for Maya’s bat mitzvah on Masada, meaningful to their parents because of an early interaction between the two.

While Jenn Zussman, 45, grew up in a sizable Jewish community in Pikesville, Md., Birthright brought her to Israel for the first time.

She said being in the country reinforced her Jewish identity. “It was a complete shift in the trajectory of my life. It reinforced my time and energy around the Jewish people,” said the magazine publisher. “I knew I wanted to be part of that.”

It was, she said, her “a-ha moment.”

She has been back twice since then—in May 2019 as part of a Momentum women’s trip and again in November 2024.

As for Elie Zussman, 44, and a California native, even though he had been to Israel as a child (his father was born in British Mandatory Palestine), it was Birthright that brought him full circle.

Once there, he said, he felt “his soul was home.”

“I had to feel it and live it to be changed by it,” he said, recognizing even then that his most critical decisions were ahead of him. All these years later, the chemist, husband and father pointed out a key difference of being Jewish in America: “You have to live in the religion and see yourself in it; that is critical.”

Additional findings in the study include:

·      Birthright Israel alumni are twice as likely to feel very connected to Israel, even 20-plus years after their trip.

·      Birthright Israel alumni have a 49% higher likelihood of having a Jewish spouse.

·      Birthright Israel alumni have a 100% higher likelihood of having chaired a Jewish event.

·      Birthright Israel alumni have a 150% higher likelihood of being an officer on the board of a Jewish organization.

·      35% of Birthright Israel alumni have returned to Israel.