A Generation Steps Forward: Inside the Birthright Israel Excel Summit

Last week, 500 Birthright Israel Excel Fellows from around the world gathered at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York for the Excelerate26 Summit. To understand why this weekend mattered, you first need to understand who was in that room and what brought them there.

Who Was In That Room

Birthright Israel Excel Fellows are students from Harvard, Stanford, Penn, Cambridge, Oxford, and many other outstanding universities. Their business careers span investment banking, venture capital and private equity, as well as tech engineering, product development, and everything in between. Their initiation into Birthright Israel Excel included prestigious summer internships at companies like Goldman Sachs, NVIDIA, General Motors, and some of Israel's most exciting startups.

Today, they work at some of the most impressive Fortune 500 companies and emerging technology companies around the world. They are founders of unicorn companies. They came from Brazil, France, South Africa, Australia, Germany, Azerbaijan, and a dozen other countries.

Here are just a few of the Fellows who attended. Ben Birnbaum is a Founder and Partner at Keyframe Capital, financing the energy transition and large-scale climate infrastructure. Ryan Eisenman is the Founder and CEO of Arch, a technology platform helping investors manage private market investments. David Cohen, from the Executive Cohort, is a Partner at Collaborative Funds. These are founders and investors building extraordinary companies and funds that are shaping industries. They are choosing to do so as proud Jewish leaders.

But their careers only tell part of the story. These are people who understand that ambition and responsibility are inseparable — that the same drive that takes you to the top of your field is the drive that compels you to stand up for your people, to represent them with dignity, and to use your seat at the table for something truly meaningful.

Three Days

On Friday night, Fellows who had flown in from across the globe sat down together for Shabbat dinner, reuniting as one community. By Saturday night, one of their own — Justin Koolik, Birthright Israel Excel class of 2023 and a contestant on this season's American Idol — led the entire room in Havdalah.

On Saturday, Jason Lupatkin, Excel class of 2011 and now CIO at Thiel Macro, delivered a keynote that showed every Fellow exactly what the path forward looks like, fifteen years after his own summer in Tel Aviv. He challenged them to use their influence to build bridges that make the world better for the entire Jewish community. David Schenker, former Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, offered a clear-eyed and urgent view of the region and what this moment demands of the next generation of Jewish leaders. Sam Zussman, CEO of BSE Global, led a session focused not on what Jewish leadership looks like when the stakes are highest.

On Sunday, Robert Kraft and Sheryl Sandberg showed up because this community has earned that kind of attention. Kraft called on every Fellow to refuse to accept a world where hatred is normalized, and to step forward as the generation that fights back with pride, purpose, and action. Sandberg challenged every Fellow to lead with their Jewish identity front and center — not as an afterthought, but as a source of strength.

What Birthright Israel Excel Does

These Fellows arrived in Israel as talented students with big careers ahead of them. Birthright Israel Excel gave them something their résumés couldn't: a deep, personal connection to Israel, to the Jewish people, and to a global network of peers who share their ambition and their values.

Each Global Fellow is paired one-on-one with an Israeli peer Fellow. They take three weekend trips across Israel together. Twice a week, a curated speaker series brings them face to face with leaders from Israeli business, technology, and government. The summer ends. The community doesn't.

After their internships, Fellows join a lifelong global network built around professional development, Jewish identity, and Israel engagement. They go on to launch companies, make investments, and build careers — all while staying deeply connected to each other and to the Jewish people.

What Comes Next

Before the weekend ended, the Fellows launched the Chai Club — a giving circle through which they personally committed to funding the next generation of Fellows. This wasn't on the agenda. The Fellows took it upon themselves to ensure that the opportunities they had been given would be available to the Jewish students who come after them. That is what it looks like when a generation steps forward.

Every Birthright Israel Excel Fellow in that room traces their path back to one trip. One summer. One decision someone made to invest in a young Jewish student they might never meet. Our donors lit a fuse, and last weekend, in that room, we saw what it ignites.

Birthright Israel Excel is a lifelong global business fellowship that identifies and cultivates the next generation of Jewish business leaders. Learn more at birthrightisraelexcel.com.