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Nelson Cruz and other Hispanic MLB players visit Israel to promote Christian-Jewish relations
TEL AVIV (JTA) — On a recent Monday, the owner of a restaurant here captivated a group of 14 lunch patrons with stories of her life before and after moving to Israel from Ethiopia as a youngster. A family visiting from New York approached from another table, and the adult son asked if he could pose for pictures with some of the members of the big group.
After the group had left to walk to the shore nearby, the restaurant’s owner learned that she had just hosted a group of professional athletes and their entourage. She briefly considered running after them for a photo herself.
“I wish I’d known who they were,” she said.
The athletes — Nelson Cruz, Cesar Hernandez and Jeimer Candelario, all Major League Baseball players in the United States — were surprised by what they learned at lunch, too. For instance, they had not known of the existence of Black Jews, including the thousands of Ethiopians living in Israel.
The players and their significant others were brought to Israel for a week by the Philos Project, a U.S.-based nonprofit organization that promotes Christian relations with Israel and other Middle Eastern countries. It was the organization’s first delegation to Israel involving Hispanic athletes, said Jesse Rojo, the Philos Project’s director of Hispanic affairs. The group toured Christian sites in Jerusalem and the Galilee and ran a baseball clinic for Jewish and non-Jewish youth in Raanana.
The visit also aimed to “proactively” combat antisemitism, Rojo said, “to show our baseball players that they can make a difference, not wait for someone to come out with an antisemitic tweet to do something.” The trip was organized well in advance of the recent antisemitism controversies involving American celebrities such as rapper Kanye West and NBA star Kyrie Irving.
But the players also expressed eagerness to learn about Israel and to impart their experiences upon returning to their homelands of the Dominican Republic and Venezuela — and to MLB clubhouses.
Cruz, from the Dominican Republic, is 39th on the MLB’s all-time home run list with 459. He hit only 10 homers this year and is 42 years old, but he said he’s hopeful a team will sign him to a contract for 2023. Hernandez, a second baseman who is also now a free agent, hails from Venezuela and is a former Gold Glove winner, earned for being named the best defender at his position in the American League. Candelario, born in New York but raised in the Dominican Republic, is also looking for a new team after playing six seasons at third base for the Detroit Tigers. Cruz and Hernandez played together on the Washington Nationals this past season.
On a minibus, before it set out for a day of touring, Cruz led a prayer of gratitude as everyone along for the ride bowed their heads. Members of the group uttered “amen” responses throughout. In Jaffa, Candelario expressed excitement at learning that the Bible’s Jonah had departed by ship from the ancient city’s port before being swallowed by a huge fish. At lunch, Candelario led the table in grace.
In separate interviews, each of the three visiting players said he had never heard anti-Jewish or anti-Israel views expressed by relatives, friends or acquaintances. Most of their compatriots, they said, think that Israel is constantly under enemy attack, a view they added was dispelled by their experience traveling around the country and feeling safe.
All attributed pro-Israel inclinations to their strong Christian beliefs, including regularly attending church services. They cited their mothers as devout women who raised them with Bible stories.
“We love God and the word of God. This is the land of our fathers,” said Candelario. “Whoever blesses Israel will be blessed,” he said, paraphrasing God’s promise to Abraham.
Rojo is organizing a charity softball game in the Dominican Republic between Dominican and Jewish-American MLB players in the coastal town of Susua — which was founded by refugees of Nazism who established still-operating dairy and sliced-meat factories. Funds raised through the event will pay to renovate both a baseball field and the town’s synagogue and to commemorate the Jewish immigrants’ roles in Susua’s history, Rojo said.
Cruz is trying to recruit fellow Dominican players to come on subsequent Israel trips and to play in next year’s Susua event. Superstar outfielder Juan Soto, Cruz’s former teammate on the Washington Nationals, considered participating in the recent delegation, but he reversed course after being traded mid-season to San Diego, Cruz said. Cruz also hopes to persuade the retired legends Albert Pujols and Manny Ramirez to come to Israel, too.
Back home, “we’ll share this experience, and definitely more players will be motivated to come,” Cruz said.
“Anyone who’s an opinion-maker from such countries helps us,” said Jonathan Peled, the Israeli foreign ministry’s deputy director general for Latin America. “They become ambassadors of good [will]. Whether a pastor, an athlete, a performer, a YouTuber – on every visit to Israel, there’s nothing like firsthand observation to see Israel in a more balanced, positive manner and less distorted.”
Jeimer Candelario, a third baseman for the Detroit Tigers, interacts with children at the Raanana field. (Nico Andre’ Duran)
Israel enjoys good relations throughout Latin America, with Venezuela an exception after it broke off diplomatic relations with the Jewish state in 2009, Peled said. “But we hope that [ties] will be renewed soon,” he said.
Venezuela, the Dominican Republic and Israel, coincidentally, will be competing (along with Puerto Rico and Nicaragua) in the same group at the upcoming World Baseball Classic, to be held in Miami in March. The teams will feature large contingents of major leaguers, with Israel’s roster consisting mainly of American Jews.
Baseball is not a top sport in Israel, but Team Israel’s periodic success on the world stage has helped promote the game. The Raanana site — dedicated in memory of Massachusetts native Ezra Schwartz, who was killed in a 2019 terrorist attack in Israel — is one of only a handful of baseball fields in the country. Other notable ones are at Kibbutz Gezer, in Tel Aviv’s Yarkon Park, and at the Baptist Village complex in Petach Tikvah.
At the group lunch, Hernandez said that he “would live here” in Israel in the off-season if he could obtain a visa. He was asked whether he meant it.
“Yeah, because it’s the Jesus country,” Hernandez said. “I asked my wife, and she said yes.”
Sitting beside him at the restaurant, Gabriela Hernandez nodded.
“Yes,” she said, “because of the significance it has for us.”
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The post Nelson Cruz and other Hispanic MLB players visit Israel to promote Christian-Jewish relations appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Australia to Hold Wide-Ranging Inquiry Into Antisemitism After Bondi Attack
An Australian flag sits amongst floral tributes honoring the victims of a shooting at Jewish holiday celebration on Sunday at Bondi Beach, in Sydney, Australia, Dec. 16, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Hollie Adams
Australia will hold a Royal Commission inquiry into the Bondi Beach mass shooting in which 15 were killed, the country’s most powerful public inquiry, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Thursday.
The mass shooting at a Jewish Hanukkah celebration at Sydney’s famed Bondi Beach on Dec. 14 shocked a country with strict gun laws and fueled calls for tougher controls and stronger action against antisemitism.
Police say the alleged father and son perpetrators were inspired by the Islamic State terrorist group.
Albanese said the Royal Commission, a government inquiry which can compel people to give evidence, will be led by retired judge Virginia Bell.
It will consider the events of the shooting as well as antisemitism and social cohesion in Australia, and is expected to report its findings by December this year.
“This Royal Commission is the right format, the right duration and the right terms of reference to deliver the right outcome for our national unity and our national security,” Albanese told a news conference on Thursday.
Albanese had initially resisted calls to set up a Royal Commission, saying the process would take years, which attracted criticism from Jewish groups and victims’ families who urged him to reconsider.
“I’ve taken the time to reflect, to meet with leaders in the Jewish community, and most importantly, I’ve met with many of the families of victims and survivors of that horrific attack,” Albanese said.
The government last month announced an independent review into law enforcement agencies that will assess whether authorities could have taken additional steps to prevent the attack.
That review, which will examine whether existing laws or information gaps stopped police and security agencies from acting against the alleged attackers, will now be folded into the Royal Commission, Albanese said. It is expected to report its findings in April.
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Amnesty International Refuses to Admit That Hamas Wants to Kill All Jews and Annihilate Israel
Illustration with the logo of Amnesty International on the vest of an observer of a demonstration in Paris, France, Paris, on Dec. 11, 2021. Photo: Xose Bouzas / Hans Lucas via Reuters Connect
In its nearly 200-page report on the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, “Targeting Civilians: Murder, Hostage-Taking and Other Violations by Palestinian Armed Groups in Israel and Gaza,” Amnesty International omitted years of statements by Hamas leaders and language from its charter demonstrating genocidal intent against Jews.
This omission renders Amnesty’s account of the Oct. 7, 2023, attack fundamentally flawed — because it disregards strong evidence of Hamas’ genocidal intent and distorts both the nature of the massacre and Israel’s response.
According to the former Deputy Director of Amnesty’s now defunct Israel branch, Yariv Mohar, this report on Hamas’ attack was delayed by eight months. It had already been nearly finalized by the same time the organization released its December 2024 report, titled, “‘You Feel Like You Are Subhuman’: Israel’s Genocide Against Palestinians in Gaza.”
The organization, according to Mohar, told Israeli staff that the two reports would be published within weeks of one another.
According to Mohar, Amnesty delayed the Hamas report to keep the focus on Gaza, fearing that highlighting Hamas’ atrocities would undermine efforts to end the war. Mohar added that this was driven by a belief that Western audiences prefer a simplified moral narrative, and also because of Amnesty’s fear of backlash from its ultra-radical activist base.
Notably, the non-profit’s substantially longer Gaza report in 2024 used several out-of-context and debunked quotes by Israeli leaders to portray them as having genocidal intent.
Conversely, Amnesty’s treatment of Hamas sharply downplays the terror group’s own explicit ideology and objectives.
Hamas’ charter calls for the complete destruction of Israel as a condition for the liberation of Palestine, achieved through holy war (jihad). The charter specifically states that Hamas’ “struggle” is “against the Jews.”
This charter was never renounced by any of Hamas’ leaders, who have consistently called for the destruction of Israel and the Jewish people in speeches before Oct. 7, 2023, and afterwards, pledging to commit the same atrocities in the future until Israel meets its demise.
Slain Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was recorded in Apr. 2018, saying, “We will take down the border [with Israel] and we will tear out their hearts from their bodies,” in reference to Israelis.
“Seven million Palestinians outside — enough warming up — you have Jews with you in every place. You should attack every Jew possible in all the world and kill them,” official Fathi Hammad said in July 2019. Hammad, in May 2021, called on Jerusalemites to “cut off the heads of the Jews with knives.”
Official Ghazi Hamad, on Oct. 24, 2023, declared that Israel must be eliminated and vowed repeated October 7s: “[N]obody should blame us for the things we do. On October 7, October 10, October 1,000,000 — everything we do is justified.”
In Jan. 2024, official Bassem Na’im wrote in Al Jazeera that the October 7 attack was a “scaled-down model of the final war of liberation and the disappearance of the Zionist occupation.”
While the Amnesty report includes some quotes by Hamas officials calling on Palestinians to attack Israelis, the report fails to mention the terror group’s official statements and charter — and omits that their raison d’etre is to kill Jews and wipe out Israel.
The organization also featured statements by Mohammed Deif saying that Hamas had launched the Oct. 7 attacks to end Israel’s military occupation and “its crimes,” as well as an Oct. 7 statement by Saleh Al-Arouri, then Deputy Head of the Political Bureau of Hamas, who indicated that the aims of the attacks were the liberation of the Palestinian people, breaking the siege on Gaza, stopping settlement expansion, and freeing Palestinian prisoners from Israeli prisons.
The quotes chosen by Amnesty to be featured in the report indicate that Hamas carried out the massacre for political and nationalist purposes. That is not true.
This cherry-picking sanitizes Hamas’ true motives, which are documented, consistent, and official, and leads readers to misunderstand why the massacre occurred.
Hamas’ 1988 charter describes its struggle against Jews as “extremely wide-ranging and grave” and calls on the Arab and Islamic world to support jihad against these “enemies.” It argues that Israel’s Jewish character contradicts Islam and must therefore be eliminated.
Without acknowledging Hamas’ ideology and intent, Amnesty’s legal conclusions — especially its accusations against Israel — rest on incomplete information.
October 7, 2023, was not merely a tactical or political attack, but part of an openly stated campaign to eliminate Israel. By omitting this context, Amnesty undermines its own account of October 7 and produces an unsound report.
Darcie Grunblatt is a US Media Researcher for CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America).
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Israel Is Not a Cause to Me, It Is My Compass
People stand outside the International Criminal Court (ICC) as the United States is considering imposing sanctions as soon as this week against the entire International Criminal Court, in The Hague, Netherlands, Sept. 22, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw
I am a pro-Israel advocate in the Netherlands with Jewish roots, and my connection to Israel is not ideologically fashionable or politically convenient.
My connection to Israel is personal, inherited, and lived. Israel has shaped my identity since childhood, long before hashtags, before October 7, and before defending Israel became socially dangerous in Europe again.
On my father’s side, my family came from Poland. They fled rising antisemitism, passed through what is now the Czech Republic, and eventually ended up in the Netherlands around 1900. On my mother’s side, the story is fragmented and partly lost by design. My grandfather was involved in resistance work during World War II, and secrecy was a survival strategy that carried over long after the war ended.
When my parents later lived in the Middle East, they voluntarily assisted Israeli intelligence. They could move freely because of a white card, and they chose to help. That choice mattered. It shaped how I was raised and what I understood early on: Israel was never an abstract state to me. It was a responsibility.
For many years, Israel viewed the Netherlands as an ally. In hindsight, that belief was painfully naïve. The historical record tells a far more uncomfortable story.
During the Nazi occupation, only a tiny fraction of the Dutch population actively resisted. Roughly 45,000 people, about half a percent, were engaged in active resistance. Even using a broad definition, only around five percent could be considered supporters of resistance. At the same time, approximately 425,000 people were investigated for collaboration. The rest of the population largely chose silence. They looked away as Jews were rounded up, deported, and murdered. Some actively helped the occupiers. Most did nothing.
That history reveals a national instinct that never truly disappeared. After October 7, the mask finally slipped. The genie came out of the bottle, and what followed was an explosion of antisemitism, often disguised as “anti-Zionism” — because open antisemitism is officially forbidden in the Netherlands. What spread through society did so faster and more aggressively than any virus I have ever witnessed.
For me, the consequences were immediate and deeply personal. Walking through Amsterdam became a nightmare. People recognized me from weekly Israel support actions and felt emboldened to curse, threaten, and intimidate me. I refused to hide my Star of David necklace, but I watched others quietly tuck away their Jewish symbols for safety. That image still haunts me.
I lost my job shortly after October 7. On November 3, 2023, I was asked a seemingly innocent question at work: “What is your favorite vacation destination?” I answered honestly: Israel. That answer cost me my livelihood.
As I searched for new work, recruiters demanded that I shut down my LinkedIn company page, which at the time had around 90,000 followers. The reason was obvious. I refused. As a result, my chances of employment collapsed. I was rejected repeatedly — and explicitly — because of my visible pro-Israel stance.
Because my company was registered at my home address, the harassment followed me there. Eggs were thrown against my windows. A dead pigeon was left at my door in a bag. I received threats, online and offline, telling me I would be gassed.
These were not anonymous global trolls. This was my reality in the Netherlands.
Social media platforms, especially LinkedIn under Microsoft’s ownership, played a disgraceful role. Pro-Israel voices and Jewish advocates who spoke factual truths were targeted, restricted, or silenced, while open Nazi rhetoric, incitement, and fabricated “Pallywood” narratives were allowed to spread with impunity. The message was clear: Jewish safety and truth were expendable.
The years since 2023 have taken a severe toll on my mental health. Depression, exhaustion, and a deep alienation from Dutch society became constants. At the same time, my longing for Israel intensified. Eventually, I made a decision that felt inevitable: I would try to live and work for Israel full time. I began the Aliyah process, believing that my commitment, experience, and lifelong dedication would matter.
They did not.
Because I can only provide indirect proof of my Jewish roots, and because I refuse to convert to Judaism for the wrong reasons, my path to Aliyah has been blocked. The Jewish Agency declined to consider special circumstances. I wrote letters to the President’s office, to the Prime Minister, and to other officials. I reached out again and again.
From the Israeli side, I received silence. No response. No explanation. Only closed doors.
That silence broke something in me. Not because I feel entitled, but because I know, without arrogance, that I could contribute more to Israel than many others. I am not driven by religion; I have none. I am not driven by political camps or prejudices. I am driven by loyalty, truth, and responsibility.
Israel is not a trend to me. It is not negotiable. It is not conditional. It is my priority, always. Even when the world turns hostile. Even when allies reveal themselves to be illusions. Even when the doors I knock on remain closed.
I will not stop standing with Israel. History has taught me what silence does. I refuse to repeat it.
Sabine Sterk is CEO of Time To Stand Up For Israel.