Meeting of the Minerva Fellowship Committee and the current German and Israeli Minerva Fellows in Berlin in spring 2025
On the occasion of the spring meeting of the Minerva Fellowship Committee, also the current German and Israeli Minerva Fellowship holders were invited to meet in Berlin at the Max Planck Society's conference centre, the Harnack House.
The Minerva Foundation had organized a varied programme for the Minerva Fellows and the committee members. The programme began with a joint lunch at Harnack House, followed by a guided tour through historic Berlin-Dahlem. Our two knowledgeable guides Dr. Susanne Kiewitz and Julian Schellong led the group through the science campus and shared many interesting facts about the Jewish researchers of the Max Planck Society's predecessor, the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, before the Nazi era and their fate while the dictatorship and the holocaust.
Interesting stops included the present-day Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society, the Richard-Willstätter House, the Hahn-Meitner Building of the Free University and the Max Planck Institute, which was originally built for Albert Einstein at the time before he emigrated.
Afterwards, there were interesting lectures at the Harnack House, in which selected fellows presented their research to the audience and took it to a journey from sustainable energy research (Dr. Johannes Bartl) to science communication (Dr. Yael Barel), from Judaism and the 20th-century catholic renewal (Dr. Silvana Kandel Lamdan) to “literary rag picking” (Dr. Gai Farchi) and a presentation about art dealing with memory in lost landscapes (Dr. Alma Itzhaky). During a varied dinner, these were able to be discussed in more depth with the other fellows and the German and Israeli members of the committee.
The following day offered another highlight: while the members of the committee were busy discussing the newly submitted applications for the fellowship programme, the fellows went to the Israeli embassy.
Michael Baror (Director of the Scientific and Economic Affairs Department at the Israeli Embassy), Merav Horsandi (Minister Counsellor, Foreign Policy Advisor at the Israeli Embassy) and Nizar Amer (Minister Counsellor for Domestic Affairs at the Israeli Embassy) received the fellows at a round table. After a small brunch, Hannah Dannel and Gila Baumöhl (Institute for New Social Sculpture) presented their current research project on German-Israeli relations in the fields of culture and science.
The following day, the programme culminated in a final highlight: the Federal Ministry of Education and Research invited to a ceremony on the banks of the Spree to mark the 60th anniversary of German-Israeli diplomatic relations and 50 years of scientific and technological cooperation.
In addition to Minister Cem Özdemir, Dr Alon Stopel, Chairman of the Board of the Israeli Innovation Authority, Menahem Ben-Sasson, Chancellor of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Israeli Ambassador Ron Prosor, MPG President Patrick Cramer also gave a keynote speech and portrayed his perspective of a success story on German-Israeli research cooperation. The work of the Minerva Foundation in the context of this cooperation was particularly highlighted. The speakers emphasized several times how important and fundamental the work of the foundation is in the context of German-Israeli scientific relations.
This statement was reinforced by a poster exhibition during the event, which showed individual Minerva Fellows and how this cooperation paved their future path in science. The Joint Declaration of Intent, signed by Ambassador Ron Prosor and Cem Özdemir, also sent a strong signal to the scientific community. The importance of the Minerva Foundation as one of the core collaborations for scientific cooperation with Israel was a fundamental point that both parties unanimously endorsed.
