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Hockey player removed from U of Michigan team after vandalism outside Jewish center
(JTA) — A hockey player at the University of Michigan has been removed from the team after being implicated, along with another varsity athlete, in an incident of anti-LGBTQ vandalism outside a campus Jewish center.
The announcement last week by the elite hockey team, which said sophomore Johnny Druskinis had been removed “for violating team rules,” came more than a month after the incident, which occurred on Aug. 22.
It also came weeks after the two perpetrators — Druskinis and sophomore women’s lacrosse player Megan Minturn — made a public apology in front of 350 people at a Shabbat dinner in the Jewish Resource Center, the building whose sidewalk they had defaced. The center has declined to press charges against the students, and has indicated that it does not want to see the students face further punishment.
“As far as the JRC is concerned, these students aren’t bad people and certainly don’t need to have their lives ruined,” read a statement by the center that was posted this week, in the days following the hockey team’s announcement. “While they made a poor choice, they sincerely apologized, and we have high confidence they won’t repeat such actions ever again.”
According to surveillance video and photos circulated by the Ann Arbor Police Department, the vandals, one male and one female, spray-painted male genitalia and a homophobic slur on the sidewalk outside the center, a hub for the Orthodox outreach group Olami. The female perpetrator also spray-painted her initials. Earlier reports on social media that they had tagged the building with antisemitic imagery were incorrect, the Jewish Resource Center said.
Soon after the incident, the university’s president, Santa Ono, condemned the vandalism, noting that it came shortly after a Jewish fraternity at the school was spray-painted with a swastika.
“We strongly denounce this act of vandalism and all antisemitic acts. These incidents are in direct conflict with the university’s deeply held values of respect and inclusion and have no place within our community,” Ono said, according to CBS Detroit. “We are proud of our thriving Jewish life in Ann Arbor and on our campus.”
The two athletes’ identities were later verified by the student newspaper, the Michigan Daily, which reported that the perpetrators had contacted the Jewish Resource Center soon after the incident, seeking to apologize, and did so at a Sept. 8 Shabbat dinner. During the apology, students present told the Daily, the athletes said they had been intoxicated at the time and asked for forgiveness.
“Obviously, apologies can be faked, but from what I saw, it seemed genuine,” sophomore Sarah Ostad told the Daily. She added that, while the rabbis at the Jewish Resource Center appeared ready to forgive the students’ actions, “I don’t know if I feel like that. And I don’t think most people feel like that.”
In September, after the identity of the perpetrators began circulating on social media, the university announced that Druskinis had been removed from the hockey team. But university officials have not been forthcoming with more information.
A spokesperson for the university’s athletic department did not provide details to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency regarding the decision or share a copy of the team’s rules. The hockey coach declined to address the issue at a recent press conference. Ann Arbor police also announced that the perpetrators had been identified, but did not confirm wether they were Druskinis and Minturn. University officials have likewise not commented on Minturn’s status on the women’s lacrosse team, and did not respond to JTA requests for comment on her.
The Jewish Resource Center also did not respond to JTA requests for comment. But its statement noted that the themes of the Jewish holiday season concern “judgment” as well as “understanding and forgiveness.”
“We feel continued news coverage of this incident is unwarranted and unfortunate,” the JRC statement said. “From our perspective, it was put to rest weeks ago.”
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UN Security Council Meets on Iran as Russia, China Push for a Ceasefire
Members of the Security Council cast a vote during a United Nations Security Council meeting on the 3rd anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine at UN headquarters in New York, US, Feb. 24, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/David Dee Delgado
The U.N. Security Council met on Sunday to discuss US strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites as Russia, China and Pakistan proposed the 15-member body adopt a resolution calling for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in the Middle East.
It was not immediately clear when it could be put to a vote. The three countries circulated the draft text, said diplomats, and asked members to share their comments by Monday evening. A resolution needs at least nine votes in favor and no vetoes by the United States, France, Britain, Russia or China to pass.
The US is likely to oppose the draft resolution, seen by Reuters, which also condemns attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites and facilities. The text does not name the United States or Israel.
“The bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities by the United States marks a perilous turn in a region that is already reeling,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Security Council on Sunday. “We now risk descending into a rathole of retaliation after retaliation.”
“We must act – immediately and decisively – to halt the fighting and return to serious, sustained negotiations on the Iran nuclear program,” Guterres said.
The world awaited Iran’s response on Sunday after President Donald Trump said the US had “obliterated” Tehran’s key nuclear sites, joining Israel in the biggest Western military action against the Islamic Republic since its 1979 revolution.
U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi told the Security Council that while craters were visible at Iran’s enrichment site buried into a mountain at Fordow, “no one – including the IAEA – is in a position to assess the underground damage.”
Grossi said entrances to tunnels used for the storage of enriched material appear to have been hit at Iran’s sprawling Isfahan nuclear complex, while the fuel enrichment plant at Natanz has been struck again.
“Iran has informed the IAEA there has been no increase in off-site radiation levels at all three sites,” said Grossi, who heads the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Iran requested the U.N. Security Council meeting, calling on the 15-member body “to address this blatant and unlawful act of aggression, to condemn it in the strongest possible terms.”
Israel‘s U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon said in a statement on Sunday that the U.S. and Israel “do not deserve any condemnation, but rather an expression of appreciation and gratitude for making the world a safer place.”
Danon told reporters before the council meeting that it was still early when it came to assessing the impact of the U.S. strikes. When asked if Israel was pursuing regime change in Iran, Danon said: “That’s for the Iranian people to decide, not for us.”
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Israel Rejects Critical EU Report Ahead of Ministers’ Meeting
FILE PHOTO: Smoke rises from Gaza after an explosion, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, June 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen/File Photo
Israel has rejected a European Union report saying it may be breaching human rights obligations in Gaza and the West Bank as a “moral and methodological failure,” according to a document seen by Reuters on Sunday.
The note, sent to EU officials ahead of a foreign ministers’ meeting on Monday, said the report by the bloc’s diplomatic service failed to consider Israel’s challenges and was based on inaccurate information.
“The Foreign Ministry of the State of Israel rejects the document … and finds it to be a complete moral and methodological failure,” the note said, adding that it should be dismissed entirely.
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Pope Leo Urges International Diplomacy to Prevent ‘Irreparable Abyss’
FILE PHOTO: Pope Leo XIV holds a Jubilee audience on the occasion of the Jubilee of Sport, at St. Peter’s Basilica, at the Vatican June 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Yara Nardi/File Photo
Pope Leo on Sunday said the international community must strive to avoid war that risks opening an “irreparable abyss,” and that diplomacy should take the place of conflict.
US forces struck Iran’s three main nuclear sites overnight, joining an Israeli assault in a major new escalation of conflict in the Middle East as Tehran vowed to defend itself.
“Every member of the international community has a moral responsibility: to stop the tragedy of war before it becomes an irreparable abyss,” Pope Leo said during his weekly prayer with pilgrims.
“No armed victory can compensate for the pain of mothers, the fear of children, the stolen future. Let diplomacy silence the weapons, let nations chart their future with peace efforts, not with violence and bloody conflicts,” he added.
“In this dramatic scenario, which includes Israel and Palestine, the daily suffering of the population, especially in Gaza and other territories, risks being forgotten, where the need for adequate humanitarian support is becoming increasingly urgent,” Pope Leo said.
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