Scholarships open to Israel

THE NAMES of the first two Israeli Rhodes Scholars are to be announced next week.

A campaign for Israeli students to be made eligible for the prestigious bursary has been going on behind the scenes for many years.

Eric Pickholz, chairman of the Weird Science Lab at Oxford University, who has long pushed for the inclusion of Israel, said: “We are ecstatic … We are also delighted that Israel will become a regular annual candidate country. This should significantly assist the UK’s academic research at the most elite level.”

The Israeli scholars will begin their courses at Oxford University in September, at the same time as the first Rhodes Scholars from Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Palestine.

When it was established in 1902, the Rhodes Trust awarded scholarships to students from English-speaking British colonies, the US and Germany.