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The Jewish Sport Report: How a Jewish lawyer became baseball’s favorite ‘Pitching Ninja’

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Happy Friday, Jewish sports fans! We’re kvelling over this story from our friends at the New York Jewish Week — about a newlywed couple who celebrated their wedding during a game at Yankee Stadium.

“I grew up in a home where, I think, the two pillars were Judaism and the New York Yankees,” said Maya Rosen. “When we thought about where to do sheva brachot, there was just no other place.”

Read the charming story right here.

How Rob Friedman became the “Pitching Ninja”

Rob Friedman, left, interviews three-time Cy Young Award winner Clayton Kershaw at MLB’s 2023 All-Star Weekend in Seattle. (Courtesy of Rob Friedman)

Rob Friedman never meant to become famous.

A Jewish lawyer who co-founded a tech company in the late ’90s, Friedman became obsessed with the art of pitching when he coached his son’s youth baseball teams.

Friedman started tweeting clips of pitchers back in 2014 with the hope of sharing his love of pitching with the world. The world noticed.

Fast forward to 2023, and Friedman’s multimedia brand “Pitching Ninja” has amassed over a million followers across social media. Friedman can be seen offering pitching analysis on numerous TV networks and, perhaps most impressively, MLB pitchers themselves turn to him for advice.

“There are days I wake up and I’m like, how the heck did I get that lucky to do this?” Friedman told me. “This is so cool.”

Read more about the “Pitching Ninja” right here.

Halftime report

MOVING ON UP. Israeli goalkeeper Daniel Peretz has signed a long-term contract with F.C. Bayern Munich, the German powerhouse with a rich Jewish history of its own.

ICYMI. Pro tip: Don’t tick off a UFC fighter. Natan Levy, the third Israeli to ever compete in the Ultimate Fighting Championship, challenged an online troll who supports Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes to a fight. It went about how you’d expect.

ANALYZE THIS. Super Bowl champion Julian Edelman will join Fox’s NFL coverage this season. The former New England Patriot, who retired in 2021, worked as an analyst on another show for the past two years.

ON FIRE. Oakland Athletics rookie Zack Gelof continues to rake — the second baseman has 40 hits and 10 homers through his first 35 games. He’s already setting records for the A’s.

PERSPECTIVE. When Bill Silvers tried playing pickleball for the first time, it didn’t go well. Just 10 minutes into playing, Silvers suffered a spinal cord injury that left him paralyzed. As he overcame the accident, Silvers drew inspiration from his parents, who survived the Holocaust. Here’s his story.

RESPECT. When soccer superstar Lionel Messi joined the MLS’ Inter Miami this year, Jewish player DeAndre Yedlin understandably relinquished his role as the team’s captain. But when the club won the Leagues Cup this week, Messi made a gracious gesture to his predecessor. Check it out.

MAZEL TOV. Tennis GOAT Serena Williams and her husband Alexis Ohanian welcomed their second baby this week, and gave her a beautiful Hebrew name.

Jared Armstrong hopes to use basketball to make a change

Jared Armstrong, right, playing professional basketball in Israel. (Courtesy of Jared Armstrong)

Jared Armstrong, the Jewish basketball player who made headlines with his fight for Israeli citizenship last year, is preparing to head back to Israel for his second season as a pro basketball player.

Before he leaves the United States, he’s using his platform for another issue he’s passionate about: promoting Black-Jewish relations.

This Sunday in Philadelphia, Armstrong is hosting a free basketball clinic for middle schoolers.

“With a rich history of Black and Jewish relations, and kind of where we’re at in society, it’s only right that we come closer together,” Armstrong told me. “I thought it would be great to do that starting from the youngest age and up.”

More on his new project here.

Jews in sports to watch this weekend

IN BASEBALL…

Atlanta Braves ace Max Fried takes the mound against the San Francisco Giants for the second weekend in a row. He and teammate Kevin Pillar will face Joc Pederson Saturday at 4:05 p.m. ET. The Milwaukee Brewers and slugger Rowdy Tellez, who returned this week after missing six weeks with an injury, face the San Diego Padres this weekend. The Los Angeles Angels and reliever Kenny Rosenberg, who was just recalled from the minors, take on the New York Mets.

IN SOCCER…

Manor Solomon and the Tottenham Hotspurs play Bournemouth Saturday at 7:30 a.m. ET, while Matt Turner and Nottingham Forest match up against Man United Saturday at 10 a.m. ET. Daniel Peretz could join his new club Bayern Munich for their game against Augsburg on Sunday at 11:30 a.m. ET.

IN GOLF…

Max Homa, who finished fifth in last week’s BMW Championship, is in Atlanta this weekend for the Tour Championship, the culminating event of the PGA Tour Playoffs for the FedEx Cup.

IN FOOTBALL…

It’s the final week of the NFL preseason! Catch Jake Curhan and the Seattle Seahawks against AJ Dillon and the Green Bay Packers Saturday at 1 p.m. ET. Greg Joseph and his Minnesota Vikings play the Arizona Cardinals at the same time.

IN RACING…

The Formula One summer break is over, and Jewish Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll is in ninth place with 47 points. The Dutch Grand Prix is Sunday at 9 a.m. ET.

The stars are out in the Hamptons

Tennis star Diego Schwartzman at Maccabi USA’s clinic, Aug. 20, 2023. (Courtesy of Maccabi USA)

Jewish-Argentine tennis star Diego Schwartzman joined Maccabi USA for a tennis clinic and Q&A in the Hamptons last weekend. Here he is showing a young player how it’s done.


The post The Jewish Sport Report: How a Jewish lawyer became baseball’s favorite ‘Pitching Ninja’ appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

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John Fetterman Signals ‘Enthusiastic’ Support for Pro-Israel Trump Cabinet Picks

US Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) gives an interview in his office in the Russell Senate Office Building in Washington, DC, Jan. 18, 2024. Photo: Rod Lamkey / CNP/Sipa USA for NY Post via Reuters Connect

US Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) expressed excitement about the incoming Trump administration’s seemingly pro-Israel posture, suggesting that he will seek bipartisan opportunities to advance policies that favor the Jewish state. 

During an appearance on “Fox News Sunday” with host Shannon Bream, Fetterman reiterated that he wants Israel to continue its ongoing wars in Gaza and Lebanon until it decimates the Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist groups. The senator also praised the foreign policy selections for US President-elect Donald Trump’s cabinet, predicting that the incoming administration will allow Israel to continue its “progress” in thwarting neighboring Iran-backed terrorist groups. 

“In terms of the incoming administration, I like what I see in terms of being very, very strong pro-Israel,” Fetterman said. 

Fetterman affirmed that he will continue his vocal support for Israel when the Trump administration takes office in January. 

And when the administration will change, my vote and voice won’t change either, and that’s going to follow Israel,” Fetterman said, lauding the “magnificent” efforts of the Jewish state to secure peace in the Middle East by fighting against Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran.

Though Fetterman campaigned as a progressive, he has emerged as a staunch ally of Israel in the year following Hamas’s Oct. 7 terrorist attacks. Fetterman has repeatedly condemned anti-Israel voices within his own party in the US Congress, as well as elite universities for tolerating what he has characterized as antisemitic and anti-Israel hate speech on their campuses.

Fetterman praised Trump’s selection of Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) to serve as the next secretary of state, stating that he will “enthusiastically vote yes” for the Florida Republican. The Pennsylvania Democrat signaled that he’s open to voting for several of Trump’s cabinet picks, claiming that he’s not going to “pre-hate” any of the candidates the president-elect has put forward without engaging in conversation with them. 

Fetterman also took a swipe at his Democratic colleagues for expressing an increasingly adversarial stance toward Israel. He asserted that Israels military campaign against Hamas in Gaza was “very just” and touted his repeated refusals to support a “ceasefire” between the Jewish state and the terrorist group, praising Israel for having effectively “eliminated and broken” Hamas, Hezbollah, and their backers in Iran. 

“For me it’s about standing on the side of democracy, and I was very supportive about that aid, and I don’t understand [why] the other side would now stop the delivering [of] that kind of aid,” Fetterman said, referencing efforts by some fellow Democrats to cut off US military assistance to Israel.

The senator added that it “was a pleasure” to vote “a big no” on three measures advanced and spearheaded last week by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) to impose an arms embargo on Israel. 

“I don;t understand why anybody would bring that to the floor, but hey, if they want to go down you know [81 to 19] that’s up to you,” Fetterman stated.

The post John Fetterman Signals ‘Enthusiastic’ Support for Pro-Israel Trump Cabinet Picks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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DePaul University Enabled Violent Attacks and Brain Injury on Jewish Students

DePaul University Law School. Photo: ajay_suresh/Wikimedia Commons.

My name is Brooke Goldstein. I am the founder and executive director of The Lawfare Project, and the founder of the #EndJewHatred civil rights movement. I have dedicated my career to upholding the legal rights of the Jewish people, a fight that is all the more pressing after the wave of Jew-hatred unleashed in America and around the world following the Hamas terrorist attacks of October 7, 2023.

In 2021, a few years before October 7, a Jewish student identified a major problem at DePaul University. She went public about “a long history of antisemitism on DePaul’s campus … without DePaul doing anything really substantive to address this situation.”

In a clear call for action, she said that, “DePaul, as an administration and as a university, doesn’t fully understand what is required for Jewish students in particular to feel safe in their campus community.”

The unprecedented wave of hatred launched against Jews and Israelis at DePaul University over the past year is a direct result of the administration’s failure — not just to help its Jewish community feel safe, but to actually keep its Jewish students safe.

Jew-hatred has become systematized in higher education, and we are now seeing the consequences playing out on campuses across the country — including at DePaul University.

Radicalized agitators who openly support foreign terrorist organizations target Jewish students with calls for their genocide.

“From the river to the sea” is a call for genocide.

“Globalize the intifada” is a call for worldwide violent attacks on Jews, like we see in the streets of New York City and Amsterdam, and on campus here at DePaul.

Jews are dehumanized, deprived of the right to openly express their identity, and the civil rights of Jewish students are ignored and violated — their minority status disregarded, and the harm and violence they endure is minimized. All of this is unacceptable.

Max Long emigrated to Israel from Boston in 2015. He served in the Israel Defense Forces, and, when he was released from the reserves, enrolled at DePaul University in March of this year. After seeing the pervasive atmosphere of antisemitism and anti-Israel rhetoric on campus, he was inspired to use his voice and personal experience to empower and educate his classmates about antisemitism, and about the war against Palestinian terrorism in Gaza.

Michael Kaminsky is a junior who came to DePaul from Buffalo Grove, IL. He, too, has been inspired to use his voice and experience to empower and educate the community about antisemitism, and about Jewish identity. He is a founding member of DePaul’s chapter of Students Supporting Israel, a StandWithUs Emerson fellow, and a proud member of AEPi.

Max and Michael are proud and empowered advocates for Jewish civil rights. They are loud voices for the indigenous rights of the Jewish people in their indigenous homeland — Israel.

On November 6, Jew-haters decided to silence their voices. Two masked men violently attacked Max and Michael with such force that Max suffered a brain injury and Michael suffered a fracture and lacerations.

Max and Michael were doing what they have done many times before — exercising their right to peacefully express themselves and their views, and engage with passersby.

This attack happened in the plain sight of a DePaul public safety officer, who did nothing to intervene. The officer had an opportunity to stop the attack, but did nothing to help Max and Michael.

But it gets worse.

The university was well aware of multiple threats against Max and Michael, just as it was aware of the campus climate of hate targeting Jews. But it did nothing. It failed to protect its students, even when a violent attack was unfolding in front of one of its public safety officers. This cannot be tolerated.

We cannot be silent in the face of intolerance and injustice. This is why The Lawfare Project represents Max and Michael — to demand justice, to ensure that their rights are protected, and to make sure that what they experienced is not experienced by any other Jewish student at DePaul University.

Even now, their attackers remain at large. We demand that the Chicago Police Department use every tool at its disposal to arrest those responsible, and that they be prosecuted for the hate crime they committed, to the full extent of the law. We need to impose meaningful consequences on antisemitic hate crimes to deter future attacks, and to send the clear message that our society rejects this extremist hate and violence.

As for the university, our attorneys are reviewing all options, including legal options, to make sure that the school is accountable not just to Max and Michael for this attack, but to all Jewish students who are under daily threat of similar attacks.

We are here to make sure that DePaul does the right thing, and will take whatever action is necessary to do so.

Jew-hatred has no place at DePaul, or on any college campus. We are demanding action from the school — as all decent people should.

Max and Michael are not alone. Our Jewish students on campus are not alone. We are all here for them, and we will make sure that their rights are protected and upheld.

Brooke Goldstein is the founder and executive director of The Lawfare Project and the founder of the End Jew Hatred movement. She is also an author, award-winning, filmmaker, and regular news television commentator. 

The post DePaul University Enabled Violent Attacks and Brain Injury on Jewish Students first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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UK Will Arrest Netanyahu With ‘Due Process’ if He Visits, Foreign Secretary Says

Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy leaves Downing Street, following the results of the election, in London, Britain, July 5, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Toby Melville

Britain would follow due process if Benjamin Netanyahu visited the UK, foreign minister David Lammy said on Monday, when asked if London would fulfill the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant against the Israeli prime minister.

“We are signatories to the Rome Statute, we have always been committed to our obligations under international law and international humanitarian law,” Lammy told reporters at a G7 meeting in Italy.

“Of course, if there were to be such a visit to the UK, there would be a court process and due process would be followed in relation to those issues.”

The post UK Will Arrest Netanyahu With ‘Due Process’ if He Visits, Foreign Secretary Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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