St. Thomas junior Nick Hiniker hopes to bring cultural acceptance and appreciation of Israel to campus through a new student group called Students Supporting Israel.

The group would host educational events about the Israeli people, cultures and history, Hiniker said. Events could range from seminars, discussions, Israeli cooking classes, to fundraising for various Israeli charities.

“It’s in response to an all-too-common environment on college campuses, an anti-Israel environment fueled by propaganda and misunderstanding about the history and culture of Israel,” Hiniker said, referring to the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement on college campuses across the U.S.

Hiniker got the idea to create a student group on campus from the original SSI, which first was created at the University of Minnesota. He and a group of about ten other students interested in joining the student group just filed to become an official chapter of the now-national and international organization. SSI now has chapters in 20 different states including Kansas, Illinois and Nebraska, and abroad in Canada and Austria.

“We feel that bringing a chapter to St. Thomas would be really helpful to the students here and help further St. Thomas’ mission statement,” Hiniker said.

SSI is open to students of all religious, socio-economic, gender and sexuality backgrounds. The organization is in the process of becoming an official student group on campus, but Hiniker said that students looking for more information and updates can visit their Facebook page, “Students Supporting Israel at the University of St. Thomas.”

Danielle Wong can be reached at wong0031@stthomas.edu.