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Why are there so many Jewish sports halls of fame?
(JTA) — On one wall of the dining hall at the Indiana University Hillel sit 36 framed photographs of Jewish alumni who have made an impact in the sports industry, from athletes to executives. It’s the IU Jewish Sports Wall of Fame.
One of those pictures is of Josh Rawitch, who has had a long career as an executive in baseball. At first, Rawitch told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, he questioned whether he was truly worthy of being honored alongside fellow Hoosiers like Mark Cuban, the billionaire businessman and owner of the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, and Ted Kluszewski, a four-time All-Star with the MLB’s Cincinnati Reds in the 1950s.
But then Rawitch thought about the location of the wall, and who it might impact.
“You’re going to have young people, 18, 19 years old, walking in there looking at the wall, seeing all these people who are up there who have gone on to do significant things in the industry,” Rawitch said. “That’s actually pretty cool. That actually inspires them. If I was 18 and I’d have walked in and that wall had been there when I was a freshman, I would have thought, ‘that’s really cool.’ I would love to be like one of those people someday.”
Rawitch knows a thing or two about halls of fame: He’s the president of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, New York. He said institutions like the one he leads are important “repositories for history.”
“I think having a hall of fame of any kind in any city essentially does two things — it honors people who are really good at what they do, and it documents the history of what’s gone on in that industry,” he said.
The Indiana University Jewish Sports Wall of Fame, located in the dining hall at Indiana University Hillel. (Courtesy)
The display that honors Rawitch in Bloomington is just one of many halls, walls and exhibits across the United States and the world — many of them small — that honor Jewish greatness in sports. From Southern California to Philadelphia, St. Louis to Washington, D.C., similar organizations and institutions recognize Jewish athletes, coaches, executives, media members and beyond.
Why so many?
“We want to call attention to that because of the antisemitic trope that Jews are not good soldiers, farmers or athletes. We need to overcome that,” said Jed Margolis, who runs the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in Israel, which has honored over 400 athletes since 1981 and is housed in Netanya after being founded in the United States. “It’s simply not true. And telling the stories out there will help inspire people and lay to rest some of those falsehoods which I think are important to overcome.”
In the fight against antisemitism, Steve Rosenberg, who chairs the Philadelphia Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, said “the best defense is a good offense.” The Philadelphia hall, which inducted its first class in 1997 and has moved locations multiple times, has 183 total inductees, including former NFL tight end Brent Novoselsky and longtime 76ers broadcaster Marc Zumoff.
“We shine the light on the great accomplishments of Jews in sports. And we need to do more of that in the world,” Rosenberg said.
Rosenberg added that he thinks there should be even more halls of fame, for Jewish actors, architects, poets and so on, “so that we can celebrate our accomplishments, not in the way that we pat ourselves on the back, but that we can talk about all the great things that we do as a people.”
For Craig Neuman, the chief programming officer at the St. Louis Jewish Community Center, a key feature of Jewish culture is the sense of connection Jews feel when they discover that a celebrity is Jewish. That sense of pride is clear in the work Neuman does with the St. Louis Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, which has its own hallway at the JCC.
“I can’t imagine any other place in the world where you would say, ‘I feel connected to this other country, or these other people, by sheer virtue of our religion,’” Neuman said. “There’s some pride that’s involved with that.”
Like the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame seeks to recognize the most elite athletes — Jewish world record holders, Olympians and the like. Or, as Margolis put it: “We’re looking for the best of the best: the Hank Greenbergs, the Mark Spitzes, people like that.”
Jed Margolis, left, with former Israeli basketball star Mickey Berkowitz, back center, and his family, at the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in Netanya, Israel. (Courtesy of the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame)
At the local halls of fame, the criteria are different. Rawitch likened it to the dynamic between national versus state and local politics.
“As the National Baseball Hall of Fame, I think it’s pretty clear that we are honoring the absolute greatest who ever played or worked within the game of baseball nationally,” Rawitch said. “Clearly, that should be harder to get into than, say, the California Baseball Hall of Fame or the New York Baseball Hall of Fame. But I don’t think it should diminish if you’re a recipient of that. It should be an honor for anybody who’s named to any sort of hall or wall of fame.”
Inclusivity is central to the local halls of fame.
“I think we want to, on some level, send a message that says, ‘hey, just because you’re not in Cooperstown doesn’t mean that you didn’t have an impact in the world, on your sport, in your community,’” said Neuman.
But that doesn’t mean the standards for entry aren’t high. In fact, in St. Louis, candidates for induction must possess more than just athletic accomplishments — there’s also the “mensch factor.”
“When you are in a position where people might look up to you because of some accomplishments, and whether it’s because you’re an athlete, or you’re a politician, or a lawyer or whatever the profession that puts you in the public’s eye, there’s a certain responsibility that comes along with that,” said Neuman. “It’s a great example to set that, yeah, this guy was a great baseball player, but he was also a great human being as well.”
The St. Louis Jewish Sports Hall of Fame has 84 members inducted across eight classes dating back to 1992 — including Chicago Cubs ace Ken Holtzman and basketball legend Nancy Lieberman. The last group was enshrined in 2018.
Many of those inductees represent more than the typical professional sports — baseball, basketball, football, soccer and hockey. There are racquetball and handball players, even a hot air balloonist. (Whether that counted as a sport was a topic of debate for the selection committee.)
In Philadelphia, a similar conversation was held around whether poker should qualify — in that case, poker was allowed, but it turned out the candidate in question wasn’t actually Jewish.
For Rosenberg, recognizing people from a diverse range of sports is an important part of the work, especially as he works to engage younger members of the community.
“I want the young people, particularly the young Jews, to know that there’s a place for you, no matter if you’re a golfer, a swimmer, a gymnast, a baseball player, whatever you want to do, that you can go on to achieve greatness and that greatness will be recognized,” Rosenberg said.
He added that very few people stop by the hall of fame.
“The reality is, if I stood at the hall of fame on any given day, people that are coming in just to see the hall of fame, we couldn’t get a minyan,” Rosenberg said, referencing Judaism’s 10-person prayer quorum. “Maybe over the course of a year. But we do get the sort of incidental traffic, people that are going to the JCC for other activities.”
The Philadelphia Jewish Sports Hall of Fame. (Courtesy)
The Philadelphia hall’s journey to the JCC was not a simple one. The collection used to have a permanent space at a local YMHA, featuring typical sports artifacts like bats and jerseys. Then it moved into the Jewish federation building — until September 2021, when Hurricane Ida caused severe flooding that destroyed much of the hall of fame’s memorabilia. The current exhibit at the JCC is more two-dimensional, Rosenberg said.
One of the Philadelphia inductees is Arn Tellem, the vice chairman of the NBA’s Detroit Pistons and a longtime agent who represented A-list athletes like Kobe Bryant. Throughout the 2000s, Tellem was regularly ranked among the top agents in all of sports, and he is a member of the Southern California, Michigan and Philadelphia Jewish Sports Halls of Fame.
By the time Tellem got the call from the Philadelphia hall in 2015, he had received his fair share of recognition. But that didn’t make this honor count any less for the Philadelphia native. Rosenberg said Tellem “couldn’t wait to come” to the ceremony, bringing three tables worth of supporters with him.
“Arn Tellem isn’t doing this for recognition, or for money, or for fame,” Rosenberg said. “He has that. It means something to him.”
That sentiment seems to be shared by honorees from across the halls. Rosenberg added that he has seen some inductees moved to tears by the news. When Chris Berman, the ESPN broadcaster who has anchored the network’s flagship program “SportsCenter” since a month after it launched in 1979, was honored by the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, he was “very touched,” said Margolis.
Lauren Becker Rubin, a former star lacrosse and field hockey player at Brown University, was inducted into the Philadelphia Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 2018.
“It was a big honor for both me and my family,” Becker Rubin told JTA. “I think the connection of celebrating both the athletic achievement and the community makes it meaningful on another level.”
Becker Rubin, who is now a mental performance coach, is also a member of Brown’s athletic Hall of Fame for setting numerous school records in both sports during her college career. But being recognized by her local Jewish community was a particularly special honor, she said.
After her induction, Becker Rubin joined the hall’s board. “Celebrating positive achievements and putting out positive messages about Jewish athletes is a good counter to the negative rhetoric that is out there,” she said.
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The post Why are there so many Jewish sports halls of fame? appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Dozens of Anti-Israel Agitators Charged With Criminal Trespassing Over University of Washington Riot
Event hosted by “Super UW,” a revolutionary student organization that promotes Hamas, jihad, and anti-Zionism, in October 2023. Photo: Chin Hei Leung / SOPA Images/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
Prosecutors in King County, Washington have filed criminal trespassing charges against 33 students and non-students who illegally occupied the University of Washington’s Interdisciplinary Engineering Building (IEB) during the 2025 spring semester to pressure college officials to boycott Israel, reportedly sparing them from being held accountable for property destruction to the tune of $1 million.
“This is an important step in ensuring accountability for those who perpetrated this occupation, in addition to the suspensions that the students arrested in the building received through the student conduct process,” the University of Washington said in a statement on Tuesday. “We value free speech and expression but also must continue to be a campus community where dangerous, unlawful actions are not tolerated.”
It added, “We appreciate the hard work by the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, UW police, and law enforcement partners who investigated a complex case involving a large number of individuals.”
As previously reported by The Algemeiner, a pro-Hamas student group calling itself “Super UW” raided the IEB in May and refused to leave unless school officials acceded to its demand to terminate the institution’s partnerships with The Boeing Company, whose armaments manufacturing the students identified as a resource aiding Israel’s war to eradicate the Hamas terror group from Gaza.
“We are taking this building amidst the current and renewed wave of the student intifada, following the uprising of student action for Palestine after the heroic victory of Al-Aqsa Flood on October 7th,” the group said in a manifesto, referring to Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel. “The University of Washington is a direct partner in the genocide of the Palestinian people through its allegiance to its partnership with Boeing. Boeing manufactures the F-15 fighter jets, Apache helicopters, Hellfire missiles, and 500-pound bombs which israel [sic] uses to murder entire Palestinian families and destroy Palestinian homes, schools, and mosques.”
The illegal demonstration involved students establishing blockades near the building using bike racks and chairs, burning trash — while setting off sizable fires — that they then left unattended, and calling for violence against the police. Law enforcement officers eventually entered the building equipped with riot gear, including helmets and batons, and proceeded to arrest 33 protesters who later received charges for trespassing, property destruction, disorderly conduct, and conspiracy to commit all three, according to law enforcement statements at the time.
The defendants have been charged by the Kings County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, which has not explained its decision to decline to prosecute the full range of alleged crimes committed in May.
The cohort is not the first to evade the severest possible penalties for demonstrations that escalated to a riot.
On Monday, a New York state judge overturned disciplinary sanctions imposed on a group of anti-Israel protesters who illegally occupied Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall and interned janitorial staff while destroying property to protest the Israel-Hamas war.
Twenty-two current and former students, all of whom contested their punishments anonymously, may soon walk away without being held accountable following Judge Gerald Lebovits’s ruling that Columbia’s actions were “arbitrary and capricious.” Lebovits went further, citing the students’ concealment of their identities with masks and keffiyeh scarves as evidence that the university lacked evidence to determine that they were actually in Hamilton Hall despite that they had been arrested on the scene by the New York City Police Department (NYPD).
“In the disciplinary proceedings against the 22 Columbia students, the sole evidence that they were present in Hamilton Hall during its occupation was a report reflecting that petitioners had been arrested,” he wrote. “No evidence was offered in the disciplinary proceedings of actions taken inside Hamilton Hall by any particular student, as opposed to the conduct of the group of occupiers as a whole.”
Lebovits, after arguing that the group should not be disciplined even as he described their infractions, then argued that illegally occupying Hamilton Hall is a “decades-long tradition.”
In a statement shared with The Algemeiner on Wednesday, Columbia University noted that Lebovits’s vacating the disciplinary sanctions does not take effect for 30 days, during which time university lawyers may pursue other legal avenues.
“The order does not take effect for at least 30 days, and no student who was disciplined for the occupation of Hamilton Hall can return to campus at this time,” a university spokesperson said. “Columbia is considering all of its options, including seeking a stay of the order and appealing the decision.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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Qatar, Saudi Media Shoot Down Tucker Carlson Conspiracy as ADL Warns Iran Conflict Fueling Online Antisemitism
Tucker Carlson speaks at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana, Oct. 21, 2025. Photo: Gage Skidmore/ZUMA Press Wire via Reuters Connect
Two Arab monarchies which remain steadfast in their refusal to recognize Israel’s right to exist have nonetheless dismissed conspiratorial claim of Mossad false flag attacks against them alleged by far-right podcaster Tucker Carlson.
The dismissals of Carlson’s assertion came as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) released a new report warning that the ongoing US-Israeli military operation against Iran “triggered an immediate online surge of antisemitic, anti-Zionist, and conspiratorial commentary that spanned the ideological spectrum.”
In a Monday video, Carlson asserted that it “hasn’t been reported, but it’s a fact that last night, in Qatar and Saudi Arabia, authorities arrested Mossad agents planning on committing bombings in those countries.”
Israel’s intelligence agency reportedly played a critical role in the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in Tehran on Saturday, but there is no evidence to suggest Mossad agents were arrested this week for operations against Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
“Why would the Israelis be committing bombings in Gulf countries, which are also being attacked by Iran? Aren’t they on the same side?” Carlson asked, insisting that “Israel wants to hurt Iran, and Qatar, and the UAE, and Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain, and Oman, and Kuwait.”
Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) signed the Abraham Accords in September 2020 to normalize relations with Israel, and the three countries have enhanced ties since then.
On Tuesday, Majed Al-Ansari, a spokesman for the Qatari Foreign Ministry, responded to a reporter’s request to confirm Carlson’s claim. He refused to do so, answering he “has no information about any cells of the Israeli intelligence service Mossad at the moment.”
However, Qatar’s State Security Service separately announced the arrest of two cells it said were operating on behalf of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Then on Thursday, the Saudi Arabian state-owned Al Arabiya news outlet reported that it has “learned from its sources that claims alleging that Saudi Arabia and Qatar had arrested Mossad agents planting bombs in Gulf countries are baseless and untrue.”
Reports widely circulated this week that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman privately petitioned US President Donald Trump for months to strike Iran, a position that would align with Israel’s stated goal of trying to dismantle Iran’s military capabilities.
Carlson has previously praised Qatar and its House of Thani monarchy, which has ruled the country since 1851. The former Fox News host announced on Dec. 7, 2025, that he had purchased property in the country, and dismissed charges that Qatari funding had influenced his turn toward anti-Israel commentary, speculations which had circulated among right-wing figures and earned him the epithet “Tucker Qatarlson,” popularized by conservative talk radio host Mark Levin and former far-right Florida congressional candidate Laura Loomer.
Interviewing Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani at the Doha Forum, Carlson said, “I have been criticized as being a tool of Qatar, and I just want to say, which you already know, which is I have never taken anything from your country and don’t plan to.”
Qatar has long aligned itself with Hamas and its ideological wellspring, the Muslim Brotherhood, providing a safe haven for the leadership of both organizations. Thani’s choice to support the revolutionary Islamist group and its terrorist wing in Gaza has exacerbated tensions with Saudi Arabia and the UAE, both which regard the Brotherhood as an existential threat.
Meanwhile, on Tuesday the ADL released a report documenting how Carlson’s anti-Mossad conspiracy theory accompanied torrents of online Jew-hate. Researchers noted Carlson’s comments in particular, writing that he “further portrayed Jewish influence in the US as a hidden, malevolent force driving the country toward war through deception and ‘demonic’ control, and made unsubstantiated claims about Gulf states arresting ‘Mossad’ agents planning bombings.”
The ADL further captured how Carlson “used his response to the attacks in Iran as an opportunity to again promote the antisemitic conspiracy theory of Israeli involvement in 9/11.”
The report describes how in his Monday podcast Carlson “advanced a number of antisemitic conspiracy theories, including that Israel had foreknowledge of 9/11 and has orchestrated US involvement in other conflicts through manufactured intelligence, while framing Israel as covertly manipulating American foreign policy for its own agenda.”
Far-Right podcaster Candace Owens promoted this conspiracy theory on Tuesday when she shared a video of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu countering the charge that Israel targeted civilians, saying “you see the difference. The tyrants of Tehran target civilians. We target the tyrants of Tehran to protect civilians.”
Owens wrote on top of the video: “You murdered 3,000 Americans on 9/11. For starters.”
The ADL’s researchers spotlighted Owens’ role in boosting antisemitic voices.
“Actors like the neo-Nazi Aryan Freedom Network, right-wing online provocateur ‘Sneako,’ and controversial streamer Hasan Piker in particular appeared across multiple high-reach posts, including those amplified by figures with millions of followers, like Owens,” the report stated.
Owens also shared a deep fake image created with artificial intelligence that promoted antisemitism. The report featured a screenshot of Owens writing “Operation Epstein Fury fully explained:” to introduce a reposting of an image showing Trump wearing a white Israel hat, standing in front of two large Israeli flags, and speaking from a podium with the slogan “Operation Epstein Fury.”
The text accompanying the image, written by an account called “TooWhitetoTweet,” reads “It’s not complicated. American goyim are blowing up Iranian goyim because America is controlled by the people who call us goyim and Iran isn’t. Operation Epstein fury helps achieve Greater Epstein in the Middle East.”
“Operation Epic Fury” is the name the US has given to its military campaign against Iran. Owens’ play on words appears to be a reference to the late financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, whose Jewish heritage has been exploited as a pretext to openly express hatred toward Jews, amplifying conspiracy theories that falsely attribute the sex abuse scandal entirely to the Jewish community. Some anti-Israel voices have falsely claimed that Trump launched strikes against Iran at the behest of the Jewish state.
The ADL’s researchers documented the depth of this “Operation Epstein Fury” rebranding, finding “over 35,000 mentions and 28,000 unique authors on X by 4:00 PM ET on February 28 alone, growing to over 91,000 mentions from more than 60,000 unique authors about 48 hours later. The phrase is rapidly being weaponized by extremist actors to advance antisemitic tropes.”
On Sunday, Jonathan Greenblatt, the ADL’s CEO and national director, wrote on X: “Now the same old prejudiced voices such as Hassan Piker, Candace Owens, Stew Peters, and others with millions of followers are capitalizing on this moment to spew ugly antisemitism and spread vile conspiracy theories. You can argue about the merits of the conflict or how the campaign has been conducted, but people of goodwill can do so without resorting to antisemitism and rejecting bigots in our midst.”
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Argentine Prosecutor Seeks Indictment of 10 Suspects — Including Iran’s New IRGC Chief — in 1994 AMIA Bombing Case
People hold images of the victims of the 1994 bombing attack on the Argentine Israeli Mutual Association (AMIA) community center, marking the 30th anniversary of the attack, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, July 18, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Irina Dambrauskas
The lead prosecutor in the case of the 1994 bombing of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) Jewish community center in Buenos Aires on Wednesday requested the indictment of 10 Iranian and Lebanese nationals suspected of involvement in the deadly attack.
Among those named was Ahmad Vahidi, who on Sunday was appointed the new head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), an Iranian military force and internationally designated terrorist organization. He replaced Mohammad Pakpour, who was killed last week during the US-Israeli military campaign against Iran, which has resulted in the death of several high-ranking officials.
In 1994, Vahidi commanded the IRGC’s Quds Force, which is responsible for managing Iran’s proxies and terrorist operations abroad. Argentine President Javier Milei designated the force as a foreign terrorist organization in January, as the country’s Jewish community marked the 11th anniversary of the death of prosecutor Alberto Nisman, who investigated the AMIA bombing.
“What I asked was for authorities to move swiftly against the 10 defendants so a trial in absentia can be held as soon as possible and the public can see the evidence the Argentine state has compiled over the past 30 years,” the current Argentine prosecutor on the case, Sebastian Basso, told local news outlet Radio Mitre.
The 10 suspects set to stand trial include former Iranian and Lebanese ministers and diplomats, all of whom are subject to international arrest warrants issued by Argentina for their alleged roles in the country’s deadliest terrorist attack, which killed 85 people and wounded more than 300.
Last year, Basso — who took over the case after the 2015 murder of his predecessor, Nisman — also requested that federal Judge Daniel Rafecas issue national and international arrest warrants for Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei over his alleged involvement in the attack.
Basso’s legal action marked a significant departure from Argentina’s previous stance in the case, under which the Iranian leader was regarded as having diplomatic immunity.
Khamenei was also killed during Saturday’s US-Israeli strikes targeting senior Iranian leadership in Tehran.
Since 2006, Argentine authorities have sought the arrest of eight Iranians — including former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who died in 2017 — yet more than three decades after the deadly bombing, all suspects remain still at large.
Despite Interpol issuing red notices for their arrest, neither Iran nor Lebanon has granted their extradition, allowing the suspects to remain beyond the reach of Argentine authorities.
“It was them who carried out the attack,” Basso said. “They are puppets of Iran and both the masterminds and perpetrators behind the bombing.”
According to Basso, the investigation unit made contact in 2025 with a group of Iranian dissidents who provided inside information that helped advance the case.
“That was vital for us, because it allowed us to reconstruct what happened in Iran, understand how the regime works, and how Hezbollah was created and sustained,” the Argentine prosecutor said.
Last year, Argentina ordered, for the first time, that suspects be tried in absentia following a legal change in March that removed the requirement for defendants to be physically present in court.
Despite Argentina’s longstanding belief that Lebanon’s Shiite Hezbollah terrorist group carried out the devastating attack at Iran’s request, the 1994 bombing has never been claimed or officially solved.
Meanwhile, Tehran has consistently denied any involvement and has refused to arrest or extradite any suspects.
To this day, the decades-long investigation into the terrorist attack has been plagued by allegations of witness tampering, evidence manipulation, cover-ups, and annulled trials.
In 2006, former prosecutor Nisman formally charged Iran for orchestrating the attack and Hezbollah for carrying it out.
Nine years later, he accused former Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner — currently under house arrest on corruption charges — of attempting to cover up the crime and block efforts to extradite the suspects behind the AMIA atrocity in return for Iranian oil.
Nisman was killed later that year, and to this day, both his case and murder remain unresolved and under ongoing investigation.
The alleged cover-up was reportedly formalized through the memorandum of understanding signed in 2013 between Kirchner’s government and Iranian authorities, with the stated goal of cooperating to investigate the AMIA bombing.
However, Milei, who took office in 2023, branded Iran “an enemy” of his country last year and has expressed strong support for his country’s Jewish community and the State of Israel.