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He used to think Jewish athletes were a punchline; now, he wants to help them get a proper paycheck
My favorite joke in the 1980 comedy Airplane! is, by the standards of a movie featuring a glue-inhaling Lloyd Bridges and an inflatable toy autopilot, one of its subtler gags. A passenger asks a flight attendant for some light reading; in return, she receives a pocket-sized leaflet of “famous Jewish sports legends”.
The vicious canard (just kidding, we’ve been called worse) that the so-called people of the book are ill-at-ease on the court or the gridiron contains a kernel of truth, of course. There’s a reason nearly all Jews know the names Koufax and Spitz — there are few other Jewish sports stars to choose from.
But the rapid growth of the country’s first Jewish NIL initiative, Tribe NIL, would suggest that, in the collegiate ranks at least, such stereotypes are baseless; in barely a year, it has accumulated a roster of nearly 200 athletes.
NIL, which stands for name, image and likeness, allows student-athletes to profit off of their fame and success, most often via endorsement deals requiring commercials, public appearances, paid social media posts and the like. (Here’s Arch Manning, star University of Texas quarterback, flinging a football downfield while wearing *checks notes* Warby Parker glasses.)
Until 2022, however, college athletes were barred from receiving any form of compensation for their services. So NIL initiatives — organizations that help connect students with funding opportunities — are a relatively new phenomenon. Most of the organizations bring together student-athletes with a particular unifying characteristic, usually a connection to a school or region; for instance, the University of Alabama, a college football behemoth, has two NIL initiatives, Yea Alabama and The Tuscaloosa Connection.
But Tribe is unusual in that it is not organized around geography, but around culture.
So co-founders Moses and Eitan Levine lean on a different kind of network: The Jewish professional one. “There are inherent advantages that the Jewish community has,” Moses told me over a Zoom call.
“I always joke that Jewish nepotism is a good thing,” he added.
Virtually none of Tribe’s athletes are able to command lucrative sponsorship deals, which, under the NIL system, are reserved for the very best Division I athletes in the so-called “revenue sports” — football and basketball. A good number of Tribe’s roster, by contrast, are Division III athletes, and few are in football or basketball. They’re still better at their chosen sport than nearly all other human beings, yet not good enough to be recompensed financially.
“That’s a problem,” said Moses. “A D-III field hockey player who doesn’t have inherent NIL value is still working a full-time job. It’s crazy they don’t get any compensation.”
With Tribe, then, Moses imagined other kinds of compensation. “The question we’re asking,” he said, “is how can our athletes use their name, image and likeness to get where they want to be in five or 10 years from now?”
Tribe’s answer is to cultivate closer ties with a myriad of institutions, and with their Jewish stakeholders in particular, in hopes of securing sponsorships, internships and jobs for its growing list of charges.
“Say I’m a big Jewish law firm,” Moses told me, “and I want to show that I support Jewish athletes. What if I hired a bunch of Jewish athletes for my summer internships, and then give them each an extra $1000 to allow us to advertise them on our Instagram?”
Moses and Levine pocket a fee for each deal, on top of whatever the athlete receives. Take the law firm example: In such a scenario, both men would be paid, by the firm, for giving that office access to the athletes — for “making the introductions,” Moses said.
The simple fact these athletes are Jewish is not the sole reason firms would hire them, Moses emphasized. “Like, they have a degree, and a full-time job as a basketball player on top of that, right? They’ve shown a level of commitment.” But Jewishness, Moses believes, can provide the proverbial foot-in-the-door. And he wants Tribe to be the intermediary.
“I wouldn’t ever tell a kid like they should only rely on the Jewish community to network,” he said. “But it’s a silver platter right there for you, and I promise you, it’ll work out for you if you lean in.”
For the tribe, by the tribe
Tribe is the brainchild of comedy writers Jeremy Moses and Eitan Levine. The pair met while working on Amazon’s short-lived sports TV show, “Game Breakers,” where they created a segment called “This Week in Jews.”
The duo, Moses said, quickly bonded over their shared cultural and sporting interests. Moses had a Conservative rabbi for a father and used to work for the site My Jewish Learning. Levine has a sizable social media presence as a comedian, which he often used to highlight Jewish sporting achievements in ways both heartwarming and acerbic.
In 2024, almost by accident, Levine helped broker the most significant Jewish NIL deal yet: A partnership between Manischewitz, of Matzoh fame, and Jake Retzlaff, Jewish quarterback at Brigham Young University. (Retzlaff was dubbed, entirely appropriately, B-Y-Jew.) Levine had worked with Manischewitz on his webseries, When Can We Eat, while Retzlaff had been the subject of one of Levine’s Instagram videos; he played matchmaker and made the shidduch to introduce the brand to the athlete.
Naturally, the photographs of a smiling Retzlaff holding up Manischewitz’s Potato Latke mix did not escape the attention of other Jewish student-athletes. Levine was soon inundated with requests for further kosher NIL deals, Moses told me.
This took both men by surprise; after all, they too had always subscribed to the notion that Jewish athletes were hard to come by.
“Our first thought was, ‘How many Jewish college athletes are there?’” said Moses. He decided to carry out a survey of sorts. “I went on the UCLA Athletics website — because I needed a school with a large population, a large Jewish population, and tons of sports programs — and looked at last names. If I was 75% sure they were Jewish, I counted it.”
His survey was unscientific, to be sure — Moses was a Jewish studies major, not a statistician — but it was effective: He counted 25 names.
“I was like, ‘Wait, that’s just at one school!” he said.
Moses realized that Jewish student athletes, far from being under-represented, were punching above their weight relative to the overall population. Thus was born Tribe NIL.
Schmoozing to success
Tribe’s yichus-heavy approach is premised on what Moses sees as one of American Judaism’s most enduring traditions: Rooting for Jews in sports just because they’re members of the tribe, whether they’re on your favorite team or not.
Moses offered up a choice example about Max Fried, the Yankees’ excellent pitcher. “Maybe you’re not rooting for the Yankees to win, but you’re still proud that the starting pitcher for the other team is a Jew.”
He acknowledged, however, that such an approach could limit Tribe’s appeal. It would be harder to pull off a paid appearance at a local synagogue, say, or a Q&A with Jewish partners at a business — with a view to potential employment down the road — if the athlete in question doesn’t feel especially Jewish.
So the collective is aimed squarely, and solely, at “proud” Jews, Moses said. “If they’re not comfortable talking about being Jewish out loud, then this is not the organization for them.”
Both Moses and Levine are holding out hope that Tribe will be spared the debates over Israel’s conduct in Gaza, and over competing definitions of antisemitism and Zionism, that have roiled so many Jewish-American institutions. “We really strive to be an apolitical organization,” Moses said. “Because the one time Republicans and Democrats sit together is at a college football game.”
Still, the fairly well-established pathway from U.S. college sports to the Israeli professional ranks is one Moses hopes to exploit, and he’s not afraid of upsetting anyone. “We want to help American Jews play in Israel,” he said. “If this is a political statement, then it’s a political statement. But I don’t think it should be.”
The post He used to think Jewish athletes were a punchline; now, he wants to help them get a proper paycheck appeared first on The Forward.
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‘Shameful’: California Jewish Advocacy Group Denounces Challenge to K-12 Antisemitism Law
Students from Encinal High School and St. Joseph Notre Dame High School in Alameda, California, participating in anti-Israel demonstration on Jan 26. 2024: Photo: Michael Ho Wai Lee / SOPA Images via Reuters Connect
A California state legislator has introduced a bill aimed at gutting a recently passed K-12 antisemitism law (AB 715), which strengthened civil rights protections for Jewish students amid a pandemic of bullying, harassment, and extreme anti-Zionist activity in public schools.
Robert Garcia, a Democrat and member of the California State Assembly, introduced the measure — Assembly Bill (AB) 2159 — on Wednesday, and it has already amassed support from a number of groups which have opposed the Jewish community’s efforts to address antisemitism in education.
In October, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law which requires the state to establish a new Office for Civil Rights for monitoring antisemitism in public schools at a time of rising anti-Jewish hatred across the US. As previously reported by The Algemeiner, the bill confronted Newsom, a Democrat rumored to be interested in running for US president in 2028, with a politically fraught decision, as it aims to limit the extent to which the state’s ideologically charged ethnic studies curricula, supported by progressives and many Democrats, may plant anti-Zionist viewpoints into the minds of the 5.8 million students educated in its public schools.
Newsom, who has since endorsed the false charge that Israel is an “apartheid” state, approved the measure amid these cross currents, paving the way for state officials to proceed with establishing an Antisemitism Prevention Coordinator, setting parameters within which the Israeli-Palestinian conflict may be equitably discussed, and potentially barring antisemitic materials from reaching the classroom.
“Specifically, this bill removes reference to a definition of antisemitism that could include criticism of Israeli government policy, requires the Antisemitism Prevention Coordinator to be selected through an unbiased, merit-based civil service process, and removes vague and subjective language that exposes schools and teachers to discrimination complaints,” Garcia’s new bill says.
Garcia is a former trustee of the Etiwanda School District, located in the southern region of state, which has already been the subject of a civil rights complaint alleging harrowing incidents of “vicious antisemitism” in which a 12-year-old Jewish girl was flogged with a stick, told to “shut your Jewish ass up,” and teased with jokes about Adolf Hitler. During the period of the alleged abuse the girl’s bullies stated that it would not have occurred were she non-Jewish. According to the complaint, filed by the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law in March 2025, the school district never punished her tormenters despite receiving a torrent of complaints.
“It is shameful that Assemblymember Garcia not only introduced a bill that would harm Jewish students, but ‘worked closely’ on it with organizations that have promoted or enabled antisemitism,” StandWithUs, a California-based Jewish advocacy group, said in a statement denouncing the measure.”
The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), the far-left Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), the California Faculty Association, and the California Labor Federation were among the groups specifically called out by StandWithUs.
“All legislators should reject efforts by these groups to influence policy on the state of California,” StandWithUs continued. “The assemblymember should apologize and withdraw AB 2159, which is a transparent ploy to prevent extremists from being held accountable for spreading hate in K-12 schools.”
Garcia is not alone in attempting to effectively overturn the K-12 antisemitism law. California Middle school teacher Andrea Prichett, joined by the Los Angeles Educators for Palestine group, challenged it in a lawsuit last year, arguing that it violates the First Amendment, was “hastily written,” and “singled out” anti-Zionist viewpoints for punishment. A federal judge, Noël Wise, appointed by former US President Joe Biden, struck down the complaint, noting that teachers working as government employees do not enjoy unfettered free speech. In her ruling, Wise stated that while teachers may comment on matters of public interest, previous jurisprudence prohibits their uttering statements which obstruct government’s “legitimate interests.”
She continued, “As public school education belongs to the government, the government may regulate Teacher Plaintiffs [sic] speech to accord with the government’s education goals. It is of no significance that the curricula and the attendant speech required to teach it may advance a single viewpoint to the exclusion of another.”
Another lawsuit was filed in November by the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), whose national legal director, Jenin Younes, has said on social media that Jews “fake…hate crimes” and endorsed claims that “Zionists” control the media and played a role in assassinating former US President John F. Kennedy.
“It’s dawning on me recently how insane it is I just accept that I’m subservient to them,” Younes wrote.
In a statement announcing its lawsuit, the ADC argued that Arabs are victims of discrimination and said that the California law amounts to a hijacking of American policy by Israel, an argument advanced by neo-Nazis, including Nicholas Fuentes, and commentators who promote their views such as Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens — both of whom claim that proliferating antisemitism is an exercise of free speech.
In Wednesday’s statement, StandWithUs said that if the latest assault on AB 715 succeeds it would “harm the Jewish community and public trust in California’s education system.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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US CENTCOM Chief Says Iran Attacking Civilian Sites as Regime Grows Increasingly Desperate
US Central Command (CENTCOM) chief Admiral Brad Cooper speaks to Iran International’s Samira Gharaei, March 22, 2026. Photo: Screenshot
Iran has increasingly targeted civilian sites across the Middle East out of “desperation” as the regime’s internal cohesion and military capabilities crumble amid intensifying pressure from the US-Israeli campaign, according to the head of US Central Command (CENTCOM).
In his first one-on-one interview since the outbreak of war with Iran late last month, Admiral Brad Cooper told Iran International on Sunday that, “in the last couple weeks,” Tehran has carried out more than 300 strikes on civilian, non-military sites, describing the pattern as a shift driven by battlefield setbacks.
“They’re operating in a sign of desperation” Cooper said, arguing that Iran’s ability to sustain large-scale offensive operations has diminished under sustained US and Israeli strikes. Cooper added that Tehran’s rapidly degrading military capabilities have pushed the regime to begin targeting civilian infrastructure and residential communities.
US and Israeli officials have said the initial days of the conflict, which began on Feb. 28, were marked by coordinated barrages of drones and missiles. Those Iranian attacks, however, have now given way to smaller, less intense launches, a change they attribute to deteriorating Iranian capabilities.
“At the beginning of the conflict, you saw large volumes in the dozens of drones and missiles. You no longer see that. It’s all one or two at a time,” Cooper said.
Iran, however, has vowed to continue its military operations against Israel and the US, while also targeting Gulf countries.
Meanwhile, concerns are growing over the security of the Strait of Hormuz, a critical global shipping route through which about a fifth of the world’s oil flows. According to Cooper, the waterway remains technically open but commercial traffic has dropped sharply as vessels avoid the area due to Iranian drone and missile activity.
“The Strait of Hormuz is physically open to transit,” he said. “The reason ships are not transiting right now is because the Islamic Republic is shooting at them with drones and missiles.”
The United States and its allies have stepped up efforts to secure the corridor, part of what Cooper described as the “largest umbrella of air defense in the Middle East history.”
The conflict has also raised fears of broader escalation. US officials had previously warned that additional strikes could target key Iranian infrastructure, while Tehran has threatened retaliation against regional energy and water facilities.
However, US President Donald Trump stated on Truth Social Monday that he and Iranian leaders had “VERY GOOD AND PRODUCTIVE CONVERSATIONS REGARDING A COMPLETE AND TOTAL RESOLUTION OF OUR HOSTILITIES IN THE MIDDLE EAST.” Trump added that due to the purported success of the meetings, he has “INSTRUCTED THE DEPARTMENT OF WAR TO POSTPONE ANY AND ALL MILITARY STRIKES AGAINST IRANIAN POWER PLANTS AND ENERGY INFRASTRUCTURE FOR A FIVE DAY PERIOD.”
Iranian officials declined any dialogue with Trump, claiming that the president had “retreated” from his military posture “out of fear of Iran’s response.”
The statement came after Trump threatened on Saturday to “obliterate” the country’s energy infrastructure if the regime did not agree to an ultimatum to reopen the Strait of Hormuz within 48 hours. Iran said it would retaliate to such an attack by targeting critical infrastructure across the Middle East.
Some analysts have speculated that Trump’s apparent shift in tone was a way to buy time to make preparations for the next US military moves.
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UK Art Exhibit Condemned for Displaying Drawings With Antisemitic Tropes ‘Worse Than Nazi Propaganda’
Demonstrators hold Israeli and British flags outside the Law Courts, during a march against antisemitism, after an increase in the UK, during a temporary truce between the Palestinian Islamist terrorists Hamas and Israel, in London, Britain, Nov. 26, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Susannah Ireland
An art exhibition that opened this weekend in Margate, a seaside town in England, features nearly 100 drawings that promote antisemitic tropes, feature swastikas, target Jewish or Israeli individuals, and deny violence that took place during the Hamas-led terrorist attack in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
“Drawings Against Genocide” at the Joseph Wales Studios will be open until March 29 and is organized by the groups Art for a Free Palestine and Thanet for Palestine. The artist behind the drawings is Matthew Collings, a 70-year-old writer and former art critic who has been openly critical of Israel. There are roughly 100 drawings in the exhibit critical of Israel, Jews, the “Israeli lobby,” and more, according to Art for a Free Palestine.
One drawing in the exhibit shows members of a so-called Israel lobby that is “nuts and utterly in control,” while other drawings accuse Israel of apartheid and committing a genocide against Palestinians. Several drawings feature a Nazi swastika, often alongside the flag of Israel, while one artwork in particular depicts ancient Israelites with horns. A separate piece shows two Sotheby’s auctioneers eating babies with blood dripping from their teeth and one of them is Sotheby’s French-Israeli owner Patrick Drahi. The drawing claims he is a “fanatic Zionist” who eats babies alive.
Another picture targeting an individual – the owner of @Sothebys – suggesting he eats babies alive. This sickening and medieval antisemitic hate is ok according to Kent police. pic.twitter.com/JpgiseKisD
— Stop The Hate UK (@StopTheHate_UK) March 22, 2026
Another drawing in the exhibit shows an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldier spewing blood from their mouth and hands, while another shows an IDF soldier standing over a pool of blood and a human skull. A separate drawing denies that sexual violence took place during the Hamas terrorist attack in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, while another falsely claims there is “no reliable evidence whatsoever” about some of the violence that took place during the massacre.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is depicted naked in one drawing while spewing blood from his mouth and the piece suggests that he is trying to “change reality” with hypnotism in his desire to “invade Iran.” Other drawings target the chief executive of the Jewish organization Community Security Trust, pro-Israel writer and journalist David Collier, and even film director Quentin Tarantino, who lives in Israel with his family.
“This is the recycling of classic antisemitic tropes dressed up as activism,” Collier told The Algemeiner. “When swastikas and dehumanizing imagery are normalized in an art gallery, it tells you something has gone badly wrong.”
“I am currently looking out at a UK landscape in which Jewish people are murdered while going to pray on Yom Kippur, and ambulances owned by a Jewish charity are torched,” he added. “If the government and the police do not start connecting the dots between antisemitism masquerading as pro-Palestinian activism and the real-world violence we see unfolding before us, then the situation for British Jews will only get worse.”
The Combat Antisemitism Movement said the drawings are “worse than Nazi propaganda” and feature “monstrous blood libels.” The grassroots nonprofit organization Stop the Hate UK said the drawings display the artist’s “obsessive hatred of Jews” that is “dressed up as art.”
“The artist makes sure to include lots of bank notes and blood. All the old tropes,” the group noted in a post on X. “The British Jewish community are fed up of being told this sickening hate is ok. It’s not.” Stop the Hate UK also shared on X a video of the exhibit’s alleged curator saying “globalize the intifada” and “from the river to the sea,” a slogan that calls for the dismantling of the State of Israel and for it to be replaced by “Palestine.”
The exhibit has also been publicly condemned by the UK’s Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp and several other groups, including the Jewish Leadership Council, Labour Against Antisemitism, and Campaign Against Antisemitism in statements given to The Telegraph. The exhibit was reported to local police, but they have taken no action, and it remains open.
The Thanet district council, led by the Labour Party, was criticized for promoting the exhibition after its tourism website, Visit Thanet, provided information about its dates and venue, but the webpage has since been deleted.
Collings said in an Instagram post that the drawings are “directed against the horrific genocide against the Palestinians being perpetrated by Israel.”
Art for a Free Palestine said the exhibit “is about raising consciousness and welcoming people to learn about the UK government’s connections to the Israeli lobby and its continued manufacturing of precision weapons on UK soil that are used to target and murder civilians in Gaza.” The drawings, the group added, “teach us the way in which our politicians and mainstream media use propaganda to lie and manipulate the general public in order to cover up the slaughter of thousands of Palestinians.”