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‘Put in Ryan!’: Orthodox NBA hopeful Ryan Turell’s fanbase turns up in Detroit
DETROIT, Michigan (JTA) — Predicting the outcome of a basketball game is tricky business, but one observer prior to the start of the Motor City Cruise’s latest home game made an easy call: “There’s going to be a lot of yarmulkes here.”
As the stands at the 3,000-seat Wayne State University Fieldhouse filled up prior to the team’s Nov. 17 match-up with the Wisconsin Herd, that much soon proved accurate.
Dozens of Orthodox observers, mostly young boys, took up seats in the arena to cheer for this NBA G League team. They boogied for the dance cam, played dress-up games emceed by the team announcer during the time outs and posed with Turbo, the Cruise’s blue-haired mascot. All told, the Cruise’s Orthodox contingent made up around a fifth of the game’s total spectators — and they were certainly the loudest fans in the stands.
For them, the main draw wasn’t the team itself, which is 1-6 on the season, but its new recruit: former Yeshiva University phenom Ryan Turell, 23, who joined the team only three weeks prior and was about to take the court for his second professional home game ever.
“Put in Ryan!” the kids chanted as if they were cheering on a close friend. A grinning Turell, a Detroit Pistons-branded yarmulke perched atop of his signature golden locks, reveled in their dedication, though at various points he tried to redirect the group’s cheers to something more team-oriented: pushing them to repeat “Let’s Go Cruise” or the traditional incantation “De-fense” instead of focusing on him.
But it was clear who these kids, most of them situated in a section flanking the Cruise’s bench directly behind Turell, were there to see. When Turell first entered the game at the bottom of the first quarter, the crowd erupted in cheers. They quickly pivoted their chants to “Pass it to Ryan!” When he sank a three, they erupted.
“They listened to us, put in Ryan, and look what happened!” gushed Daniel Rodner, an 11-year-old student at the prominent local Jewish day school Yeshiva Beth Yehudah, who was at the game with classmates Chaim Indig, Chaim Tzvi Seligson and Yoni Perlman. “We’re up five points. Moral of the story: Listen to Ryan. And the crowd.”
(L-r) Yoni Perlman, Chaim Tzvi Seligson, Chaim Indig and Daniel Rodner showed up early to see Orthodox Jewish athlete Ryan Turell play for the Motor City Cruise in Detroit, Nov. 17, 2022. The four boys are classmates at Yeshiva Beth Yehudah Jewish day school in the Detroit area. (Andrew Lapin/JTA)
In contrast with the antisemitism controversy unfolding elsewhere in the NBA, as Brooklyn Nets point guard Kyrie Irving served a suspension and delivered multiple apologies after sharing antisemitic content online, an entirely different scene was playing out in Detroit: an image of Jewish joy at the thrill of having a rooting interest in the game.
“Jews love basketball. They really do,” Turell told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency after the game. “The Jewish community is incredible, them coming out and cheering me on. It really means the world to me. And it’s special, because it’s bigger than basketball.”
The Pistons franchise has recognized this opportunity, offering kosher hot dogs at their development team’s concession stand. There are plans for an upcoming Jewish Heritage Night on Dec. 4, to feature Hanukkah gelt and menorah giveaways; opportunities for Jewish day school students to high-five and stand with Pistons players during the National Anthem, and a game to be played between two local Jewish day school basketball teams at the Pistons’ practice facility. At the Herd game, staff photographers frequented the Turell fan section, framing images of cheering kippah- and tzitzit-clad children with their favorite player in the background.
It didn’t matter that the Cruise ultimately lost the game 117-105, with the Herd pulling away only in the final minutes. What mattered was that Turell scored five points and saw five minutes of play time — and, in so doing, served as an inspiration to many Orthodox youth. Some of the kids in the stands Thursday said they were fans of the Pistons, or of the NBA more generally, but nearly all of them had followed Turell since his Y.U. days.
“I think that [Jewish] people who would normally, maybe, reject basketball after listening to Kyrie Irving and hearing what he had to say, can find a bright spot with Ryan Turell,” Jonas Singer, who was attending the game with his younger brother Leo, told JTA.
The siblings recalled how they were “freaking out” when they heard Turell would be coming to Detroit: “I was dreaming of him even making the G League,” Jonas said. “And when I heard I was actually going to be able to watch him, I was going insane.”
Motor City Cruise player Ryan Turell (front, right) watches his team from the bench as his Orthodox fans cheer on the NBA G League team from the stands in Detroit, Nov. 17, 2022. (Andrew Lapin/JTA)
Turell isn’t from Detroit, but his well-documented quest to become the first-ever observant Jew to play in the NBA has captured the hearts and minds of the Motor City’s Orthodox population (which includes Gary Torgow, the chair of Detroit Pistons sponsor Huntington Bank). Local synagogues and day schools have organized group outings to see Turell play. He’s prayed with them and made a special appearance at Yeshiva Beth Yehudah’s annual fundraising dinner, which has in the past attracted sitting U.S. presidents and top state figures.
Turell credited Pistons vice chair Arn Tellem, who is Jewish, with ensuring that he had all necessary accommodations to be able to remain Sabbath-observant while he plays. The franchise has accommodated him with hotel bookings within walking distance to away games on the Sabbath and kosher meals. Turell has certainly returned the favor by providing the chance to expand into a new fanbase and score a PR coup in the process. At his Cruise debut Nov. 7, one fan, Gideon Lopatin, showed up with a homemade blonde Turell wig.
Scott Schiff, vice president of business operations for the Cruise, said social engagements for the team are up this season but that attendance numbers with Turell on the team were difficult to compare: Last season was the Cruise’s first ever and Turell has only played two home games to date. Still, Schiff said, there was “a core group of the Jewish population coming out to support him every game.”
Turell has also brought out young Jewish fans on the road, including at a game in Cleveland the following weekend, when local Jewish day schools organized a huge crowd to see him play and speak afterwards.
After the Herd game, Jewish kids mobbed Turell when he came out to sign autographs, including a basketball from Chevy Shepherd, one of the few young Jewish girls who had come out to see him play that night. (“Let’s go Ryan,” Shepherd told JTA.)
He also signed Bodner’s yarmulke, which the boy planned to show off at school the next day.
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The post ‘Put in Ryan!’: Orthodox NBA hopeful Ryan Turell’s fanbase turns up in Detroit appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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ADL retracts Tumbler Ridge shooting antisemitism claim
The ADL published and then retracted a claim that the alleged mass shooter at a school in Canada maintained a social media account with antisemitic posts, a day after it posted the erroneous information on its website.
The organization wrote Thursday at the bottom of an updated page about alleged Tumbler Ridge Secondary School shooter Jesse Van Rootselaar that it had incorrectly concluded that an X account containing the posts belonged to the alleged shooter. Nine people were killed in the shooting, including Van Rootselaar.
“A preliminary investigation uncovered an X account appearing to belong to the shooter. Upon further investigation, that X account has been found not credible. References to it have been removed,” the correction read.
Authorities in British Columbia said they could not speculate on the motive of the shooter.
The ADL, the most prominent U.S. antisemitism research and advocacy organization, had posted the claim Wednesday on its website. The Forward has reached out to the ADL for comment.
The error, from the ADL’s Center On Extremism, comes amid broader changes in the ADL’s approach.
The ADL’s original post said that on Sunday — two days before the attack — an X account connected to Van Rootselaar posted, “I need to hate jews because the zionists want me to hate jews. This benefits them, somehow.”
“The Tumbler Ridge shooter’s X profile photo also featured an image of the Christchurch shooter superimposed over a Sonnenrad, a neo-Nazi symbol, and a transgender pride flag,” the ADL wrote in the original post, referencing an antisemitic mass murder in New Zealand.
It did not link to the profile or include images of it, leaving the claim difficult to verify.
The Center On Extremism is a flagship program that has been overhauled in recent years as the organization has shifted toward a greater focus on fighting antisemitism. In September, it deleted its Glossary of Extremism, which had contained over 1,000 pages of background information on hate groups and ideologies. It said at the time that the entries were outdated.
The post ADL retracts Tumbler Ridge shooting antisemitism claim appeared first on The Forward.
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Can Trump save Israel from itself?
The Israeli government’s latest steps toward annexing the West Bank prove a dismal point: Catering to right-wing extremists has become the cabinet’s top priority — the rest of the country be damned.
In a blitz before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s White House visit this week, Finance Minister Betzalel Smotrich and Defense Minister Israel Katz announced new decisions that will reverse decades-old real estate laws preventing Jews from buying Palestinian-owned land in the West Bank; expand Israeli authority in vast swaths of that territory; and make it easier for Jewish Israelis to buy land and start new communities in or near Palestinian enclaves there, among other subtle changes.
These changes may seem like bureaucratic rejiggering. But in fact, they mark the alarming development of a deliberate strategy to incrementally expand Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank, thus killing the two-state solution once and for all.
None of this serves Israel’s best interest. New laws pushing annexation forward will jeopardize Israel’s relationship with the U.S., damage its already faltering democracy, and eradicate any moral high ground the Jewish state still retains after its devastating military campaign in Gaza.
Yet while Israel struggles with a weakened international profile, an economy still recovering from the demands of war, impending talks with Iran, internal democratic conflicts and a re-emboldened Hamas within the decimated Gaza strip, proponents of the new decisions are celebrating the disaster they herald.
“We are deepening our roots in all regions of the Land of Israel and burying the idea of a Palestinian state,” Smotrich said in a statement.
The Yesha Council — the municipal representative for all Israeli settlements, which wants to expand Israeli sovereignty over the entire West Bank — declared the government’s move was “establishing Israeli sovereignty in the territory de facto.”
Energy Minister Eli Cohen might have put it most plainly, saying the changes “actually establish a fact on the ground that there will not be a Palestinian state,” in an interview with Israel’s Army Radio.
The only emergency brake on annexation Israelis have at this moment is sitting in the White House.
Although President Donald Trump flirted with Israeli annexation early in his second-term, he has consistently opposed such moves over the last few months. Asked on Tuesday about the Israeli security cabinet’s recent decisions, Trump spoke bluntly: “I am against annexation.”
He has powerful incentives to back up that statement.
Since returning to office last year, Trump has branded himself a peacemaker who will reshape the Middle East. He aims to expand the Abraham Accords, the trademark foreign policy achievement of his first term; curb a nuclear Iran; and create peace between Israel and the Palestinians. He will not tolerate any Israeli behavior that threatens those efforts — and these West Bank moves could upend them.
Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and five other Muslim countries condemned Israel’s new laws as accelerating “illegal annexation and the displacement of the Palestinian people” — a complaint Saudi Arabia previously lodged against Israel as its reason for refusing normalization, something Trump desperately wants.
Additionally, Trump’s peace plan for Gaza hinges on creating stability in the embattled Strip and the West Bank. Most importantly, it involves a commitment to Palestinian self-determination and statehood, which these moves in the West Bank may make all but impossible to realize.
All this, as American views of Israel are only growing more antagonistic, with real-world policy changes like conditioning military aid receiving more serious consideration than previously thought possible. Israel also faces domestic consequences over this decision. It has long defended itself against accusations of apartheid by saying that it cannot grant citizenship to the millions of Palestinians in the West Bank because the Jewish state cannot afford to lose its Jewish majority. Until trusted Palestinian partners for peace emerged, the narrative went, Israel would maintain control of the territory.
This is not maintaining control of the territory; this is laying claim to it, an action that demands Israel must treat the Palestinians who live there as full citizens. It is unlikely to do so. Which means Israel’s democracy is closer than ever to crumbling. If it insists on burying the two-state solution and annexing the West Bank without giving citizenship to millions of Palestinians, any defense it had against the argument of apartheid will be gone.
What might the Israeli government hope to gain with these moves, given how extraordinarily costly they could be — and seeing that annexation is widely unpopular in Israeli society, with only about a third of Israelis supporting it?
The answer: Netanyahu is going all-in for his far-right allies. It’s not about what Israel hopes to gain; it’s about what he does.
Smotrich, Katz, and others whose radical messianic conceptions dominate their politics have for years fantasized about expanding Israel’s borders without international or domestic law interfering. Throughout the Israel-Hamas War, far-right leaders routinely spoke enthusiastically about annexing the Gaza Strip.
If Netanyahu were putting Israelis before his own political interests, he would have squashed calls for annexation long before now. But doing so would threaten his political career. Smotrich and other far-right ministers put expanding Israeli control over the West Bank as a dealbreaker when they first entered his coalition; if they leave it, his last hope at retaining power will go with them.
When it comes to choosing between power or his country, Netanyahu has shown he will always choose power. Let’s hope Trump continues to stand in his way.
The post Can Trump save Israel from itself? appeared first on The Forward.
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Iran Races to Rebuild Missile Arsenal, Israel Tests Upgraded Defenses Amid Fragile US Nuclear Talks
Iranian missiles are displayed in a park in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 31, 2026. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
As the prospect of renewed conflict looms, Iran is scrambling to restore its battered missile capabilities while Israel tests upgraded air defenses and accelerates military preparations for a potential confrontation.
Iran had 25 key sites housing long-range ballistic missile capabilities, 19 of which were struck during last June’s 12-day war, when the US and Israel bombed the regime’s nuclear facilities, according to Israel’s Channel 14.
The outlet’s latest report, drawing on satellite imagery, research by the Alma Institute for Middle Eastern Studies, and confirmations from security officials, reveals that all sites were equipped with underground infrastructure and suffered extensive surface and subterranean damage.
Yet, with the shadow of a new conflict looming, Iran has rushed to restore its shattered defense capabilities, reportedly completing some partial repairs already.
As of last month, the country’s main launch bases — whose surfaces suffered moderate to severe damage — appear to show clear signs of recovery and resumed operational activity.
Israeli officials estimate that the Islamist regime now possesses at least twice the missile arsenal it deployed in past attacks.
However, Iran’s missile launch capacity remains limited by shortages of launchers and rocket fuel, even as it reportedly works to restore these critical components as well.
As Tehran works to rebuild its strategic threat against the Jewish state amid rising regional tensions, Israel has successfully upgraded its missile defense systems and expanded its arsenal of anti-missile batteries, effectively reinforcing its deterrence capabilities.
On Wednesday, the Israeli Ministry of Defense announced a successful test of the “David’s Sling” air-defense system, designed to intercept Iranian ballistic missiles with advanced evasive capabilities.
Built on operational lessons from last year’s war, Israeli officials said the upgraded system can intercept cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, aircraft, and drones at medium and long ranges, reaching altitudes of 50 to 70 kilometers (31 to 43 miles).
From the Arrow system to the Iron Dome, Israel is bolstering its defense capabilities with extensive logistical preparations to maintain operational readiness during prolonged and intense missile attacks, the Ministry of Defense said in a statement.
At the top of the country’s operational defense pyramid is the Arrow system, a strategic, exo-atmospheric shield designed to intercept long-range ballistic missiles while they are still outside the atmosphere, neutralizing threats at a distance and preventing environmental damage or the impact of unconventional warheads
Serving as the middle layer of Israel’s missile defense, the newly upgraded David’s Sling system works alongside the Iron Dome, which protects the home front and civilian settlements.
The country is also introducing the laser system Iron Beam, or “Magen Or,” capable of intercepting missiles quickly, accurately, and more efficiently than conventional systems
These latest developments come as regional tensions escalate over Iran’s nuclear program and fragile negotiations with the United States, raising concerns about a renewed conflict in the region.
Washington and Tehran resumed negotiations last Friday in Oman, marking the first direct engagement between US and Iranian officials since nuclear talks collapsed after the 12-day war in June.
With the chances of a deal still uncertain, US President Donald Trump has simultaneously launched a massive military buildup in the Gulf, pressuring the Iranian regime to return to the negotiating table if it wants to prevent a potential conflict.
On Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with Trump to discuss the prospects of a potential nuclear agreement with Tehran and the next steps in the talks. Israeli officials have said they want any agreement with Iran to include zero enrichment of uranium, limits on ballistic missiles, and a pullback of the regime’s support for terrorist groups across the Middle East.
“There was nothing definitive reached other than I insisted that negotiations with Iran continue to see whether or not a Deal can be consummated. If it cannot, we will just have to see what the outcome will be,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social after their meeting.
“Last time Iran decided that they were better off not making a deal, they were hit with Midnight Hammer — that did not work well for them,” he continued, referring to the US operation to bomb Iranian nuclear sites in June. “Hopefully this time they will be more reasonable and responsible.”
Trump also told Axios in a Tuesday interview that he is considering deploying a second aircraft carrier strike group to the Middle East to prepare for military action if negotiations with Iran fail.
“Either we will make a deal or we will have to do something very tough like last time,” Trump said.
According to multiple media reports, Washington has set three conditions for a nuclear agreement with Iran: halting uranium enrichment, restricting the country’s ballistic missile program, and ending the regime’s support for terrorist groups and other proxies throughout the Middle East.
However, Iran has long said all three demands are unacceptable, but two Iranian officials told Reuters its Islamist, authoritarian rulers view the ballistic missile program, not uranium enrichment, as the bigger issue.
In recent days, the US has indicated it is primarily concerned with the nuclear program, leaving some observers concerned that the Trump administration will strike a deal that’s too narrow in scope.
The Iranian government has already publicly rejected any transfer of uranium out of the country and ruled out negotiations over its ballistic missile program or support for proxy forces.
Cautious optimism about diplomacy has also been shaken by reported clashes between US and Iranian forces at sea as tensions rise.
Last week, the US military said it shot down an Iranian drone that had “aggressively” approached the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln in the Arabian Sea. Hours later, forces from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) harassed a US-flagged, US-crewed merchant vessel in the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump initially threatened to intervene in Iran if the regime killed anti-government protesters who took to the streets across the country in late December and early January. However, the Iranian government proceeded to crush the protests with a brutal crackdown, reportedly killing tens of thousands of people.
The US subsequently began its military buildup in the region, and Trump called on the regime to begin negotiations.