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Israel struck out at the World Baseball Classic, but the team’s Twitter account was a hit
(JTA) — Many fans were despairing as Team Israel trailed Puerto Rico 6-0 in the World Baseball Classic last week, but the team’s Twitter account had a different message.
“We will never give up,” the account tweeted. “After all, Moses was once a basket case.”
While the quip couldn’t stave off the team’s ultimate 10-0 loss, it came in the course of a win for Avi Miller, the 30-year-old marketing veteran who runs the @ILBaseball account. For Miller — who tweeted the tournament from 3,000 miles away — the World Baseball Classic was a breakout moment, nearly doubling Team Israel’s social media followers and exposing countless baseball fans to jokes straight out of Hebrew school.
Miller told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that his ambition was to do for Team Israel what the World Baseball Classic, an international Olympic-style baseball tournament, aims to do for baseball itself: deepen fans’ interest.
“Of course virality is nice, because it creates more of a following. But then once you have a following, what are you doing with it?” Miller said. “So for me, and it’s even continued through today, and it will tomorrow and so on, is to create engagement with people, create interest in it, help to create and raise the fundraising efforts, help to create awareness of these programs.”
Team Israel won its first game but dropped the next three to exit the competition early. Some of those games were brutal: Across 15 innings on March 13 and 14, Israel managed just one base runner against its opponents.
But on the team’s Twitter account, the hits kept coming. One breakout post, seen more than 100,000 times, showed a photo of a seemingly apoplectic Jakob Goldfarb (who was actually celebrating, despite what his expression suggests). Miller’s caption reflected contemporary meme culture: “When she says a latke is just a hash brown.”
when she says a latke is just a hash brown pic.twitter.com/K0jkVNHfeN
— Israel Baseball (@ILBaseball) March 12, 2023
In another popular post, the account outlined its “bubbie rankings,” using the Yiddish word for grandmother used in some Jewish families — and a homonym for the first name of one of the team’s pitchers. The list: “1) my bubbie 2) Bubby Rossman 3) other bubbies.”
From joking about storing a cooler of Manischewitz in the dugout to leaning into the “nice Jewish boy” vibe of the team, which was almost entirely composed of American Jewish ballplayers, the account’s sense of humor seemed to resonate.
Bill Shaikin, an award-winning baseball writer for the Los Angeles Times and a member of the Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, called Israel’s Twitter “the best social media account in the tournament.”
“I thought the account was a wonderful mix of baseball information and witty nods to what your Jewish mother might say,” Shaikin told JTA. “If you know, you know. But, if you didn’t know, it still worked.”
The USA doesn’t need the World Baseball Classic to popularize baseball within its country.
Other countries do. Here’s a thread from one (from the best social media account in the tournament): https://t.co/fyifV9H1lF
— Bill Shaikin (@BillShaikin) March 15, 2023
Miller was well positioned to tell Team Israel’s story. A marketing consultant living in San Diego, he worked in communications for sports teams and the NCAA before expanding his portfolio to include tech clients. He’s also been involved with the Israel Association of Baseball in different capacities for a few years, mostly helping with social media and video editing. The Baltimore native is a Jewish day school graduate and cofounded a Moishe House in San Francisco.
“I’ve had these two worlds collide,” Miller said. “I have a mentally strong relationship with baseball in my life, and then I have a bond to Judaism, from my entire upbringing. And for me as a passionate storyteller, my goal has been, both in years past and this World Baseball Classic, it’s been to help tell that story.”
That story, which included a late-game comeback win over Nicaragua and an impressive performance by Orthodox prospect Jacob Steinmetz, took place entirely in South Florida — a few thousand miles from Miller’s home in San Diego. Miller had been planning to be present at the tournament but was not able to — though no one would have been able to tell from the tweets.
Paging r/mademesmile – just watch Jacob’s face light up here in the dugout after his debut outing.
What a memory for @JacobSteinmetz6. pic.twitter.com/rCRJCk781Y
— Israel Baseball (@ILBaseball) March 14, 2023
“I think it’s similar to what a great YouTuber or videographer would tell you, is that to make the best video you don’t need the best camera ever made,” Miller said. “What I needed was the passion and the storytelling ideas behind it. Between that and then having contact with almost every single guy on the team and people on the ground, it gave me plenty of ideas to work with when it came to telling that story in a fun way.”
Miller said the feedback was overwhelmingly positive — and came from all levels of baseball fandom, from those who know little about Israel baseball, or even baseball, to die-hard fans.
“That to me is the best response to it, making it something that was approachable for all, but then still getting the signs of respect from the deep baseball people,” Miller said.
He also said there were, predictably, some negative responses. Miller said he made a conscious effort to shy away from politics, including keeping his own personal opinions out of the mix. Not everyone followed that tack.
“Could I have engaged with every single person that wrote in on any platform and was sending us messages about ‘Free Palestine,’ and [said], ‘Oh, you respect our boundaries now, because you don’t like the strike zone,’ all these different things?” Miller said. “Sure, I could have been sassy and responded within those spaces, one hundred percent. I could easily talk smack with anyone any day. But at the end of the day, that wasn’t the goal.”
Part of that restraint, Miller said, had to do with channeling the voice and priorities of the team itself.
“If you talked to Ryan Lavarnway, you talk to Josh Zeid, any of those guys about their views on Israel baseball, I can’t imagine the Palestinian conflict comes up as part of it because it’s simply not,” he said, referring to a Team Israel player and coach, respectively. “It doesn’t make that not an important thing to talk about, but in this case, the story was aside from that.”
In general, Miller said he worked to build relationships with the players and other members of the Israel baseball organization, to help craft an authentic presence of the team’s social media accounts — from the underdog mentality to the emphasis on team camaraderie.
And in that vein, it was tweets showcasing players’ talents that Miller said made him most proud. Not only did the players’ families appreciate the content, but some of their agents did, too — with one pitcher even asking Miller for video highlights he could send to teams considering bringing him on. Miller declined to share who it was, but at least one Team Israel pitcher landed an MLB contract after the tournament, Rossman with the Mets.
“The most meaningful to me are ones where I can put out content that showcases an individual or multiple individuals and then knowing that that impacts that guy in some way,” Miller said.
—
The post Israel struck out at the World Baseball Classic, but the team’s Twitter account was a hit appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Who can play a Jew — A debate in Germany
אױף דער בינע פֿון „דײַטשן טעאַטער“ אין בערלין טראָגט דער בלאָנדער שױשפּילער מאָריץ קינעמאַן אַ טלית. ס׳איז שװער צו זײַן אַ ייִד אין דײַטשלאַנד, גיט ער צו פֿאַרשטײן. שפּעטער שילט ער אין עולם אַרײַן מיט אױסגעשרײען פֿון „פּאַסקודנע גױים!“
מע װאָלט געקענט מײנען אַז קינעמאַן איז אַ ייִד, און אַז ער רעדט פֿאַר זיך אַלײן. ס׳איז אָבער נישט אַזוי פּשוט.
זײַן חבֿר דוד, דערציילט ער אין דער סאָלאָ־פֿאָרשטעלונג, איז אַן אַקטיאָר, נישט קיין ייִד, װאָס שפּילט גערן ייִדישע ראָלעס. ס׳איז אים אָבער שווער. „פּלוצעם װילן אַלע רעזשיסאָרן בלױז ׳עכטן׳ ייִדן!“ זאָגט ער. אײן מאָל האָט דוד אַפֿילו געבאָרגט בײַ מאָריצן זײַן יאַרמלקע כּדי צו פֿאַרבעסערן די שאַנסן צו קריגן אַזאַ ראָלע.
קינעמאַן שפּילט דאָ אַ פּאַרשױן וואָס, כאָטש ער טראָגט אַ טלית, איז נישט קײן ייִד. די פּיעסע הײסט טאַקע „פֿאַלשע ייִדן“ און זײַן פּאַרשױן איז באַשײַמפּערלעך באַזירט אױף אַ דײַטשן זשורנאַליסט אונטערן נאָמען פֿאַביאַן װאָלף.
יאָרנלאַנג האָט פֿאַביאַן װאָלף פּובליקירט פּראָװאָקאַטיװע פּאָליטישע עסײען פֿון אַ ייִדישן קוקװינקל אין אַ נאַציאָנאַלער צײַטונג – ביז זײַן לעצטן עסײ דאָרט אין 2023, װען ער האָט זיך מודה געװען אַז זײַנע מעשׂיות װעגן אַ ייִדישער באָבען זענען… פּוסטע באָבע־מעשׂיות. פֿאַביאַן װאָלף איז געװען אַזאַ מין „פֿאַלשער ייִד“, אַ װאָלף אין שאָפֿנפּעלץ, און פּונקט ווי וואָלף, האָט קינעמאַן דאָ אויך אָפּגענאַרט דעם עולם.
נאָך דער פֿאָרשטעלונג האָב איך בײַם שענק אין דער פֿאָיע פֿון טעאַטער געכאַפּט אַ שמועס מיט קינעמאַן און דעם דראַמאַטורג־רעזשיסאָר פֿון דער פּיעסע, נעם ברוזילאָװסקי. „קודם־כּל װיל איך װיסן, צי ביסטו טאַקע אַ ייִד?“ האָב איך געפֿרעגט בײַ קינעמאַן.
און איצט קלער איך, צי איז זײַן ענטפֿער װיכטיק?
ברוזילאָװסקי, װאָס איז יאָ אַ ייִד, האָט מיר דערקלערט׃ „ס׳איז מיר געװען װיכטיק צו טרעפֿן אַ בלאָנדן אַקטיאָר פֿאַר דער ראָלע. סוף־כּל־סוף האַנדלט זיך די פּיעסע נישט װעגן ייִדן, נאָר װעגן דײַטשן און זײערע נעװראָזן.“
די צוקוקערס פֿון דער פּיעסע האָבן נישט געוווּסט צי קינעמאַן איז אַ ייִד ביזן סוף. אַפֿילו דער קלאַנג־טעכניקער האָט הינטער די קוליסן געשטעלט די זעלבע פֿראַגע. קינעמאַן און ברוזילאָװסקי װילן דער עולם זאָל פֿאַרגעסן די סטערעאָטיפּן װעגן ייִדישן אױסזען און גלײבן, בשעת־מעשׂה, אַז קינעמאַן איז יאָ אַ ייִד.
צװישן זײַנע מאָנאָלאָגן האָט מען איבערגעשפּילט אױסצוגן פֿון רעקאָרדירטע אינטערװיוען װעגן די אַזױ גערופֿענע „קאָסטיום־ייִדן“. דאָס איז אַן אמתער פֿענאָמען׃ דײַטשע שאַרלאַטאַנען װאָס מאַכן זיך פֿאַר ייִדן און רעדן עפֿנטלעך װעגן דעם חורבן פֿון אַ ייִדישן קוקװינקל. פֿריִער האָבן זיי זיך געמאַכט פֿאַר לעבן געבליבענע פֿונעם חורבן, און הײַנט — װי זײערע קינדער און אײניקלעך. עטלעכע „קאָסטיום־ייִדן“ האָבן, אײדער מע האָט זײ אַנטפּלעקט, דערגרײכט גרױסע הצלחה. אײנער איז אַפֿילו געװאָרן דער ראָש פֿון אַ ייִדישער קהילה מיט הונדערט מיטגלידער.
אין אַן אינטערוויו האָט באַרבאַראַ שטײַנער, די מחברטע פֿונעם בוך„די אינסצענירונג פֿון ייִדישקײט“, געטענהט אַז קאָסטיום־ייִדן „דערגאַנצן אַ בלױז אין מאַרק“. אין אַ געזעלשאַפֿט מיט קאָלעקטיװער שולד לגבי אַ מינאָריטעט ציִען שאַרלאַטאַנען צו אַ היפּשן עולם. זײ פֿאַרשטײען גאַנץ גוט װעלכע רעפּליקן פֿאַרקױפֿן זיך.
ענלעכע פֿאַלן געפֿינט מען אין אַנדערע געזעלשאַפֿטן. אין קאַנאַדע, למשל, האָט מען אין די לעצטע יאָרן אַנטדעקט שרעקלעכע באַװײַזן פֿונעם אַמאָליקן גענאָציד אױף די אָרטיקע ערשטע אײַנגעבוירענע פֿעלקער. גלײַכצײַטיק האָט מען אַנטפּלעקט אַז דער פּרעמירטער קאַנאַדער שרײַבער טאָמאַס קינג, באַקאַנט פֿאַר זײַנע ביכער אָנגעשריבן פֿון אַ טשעראָקי־קוקװינקל, שטאַמט בכלל נישט פֿון די ערשטע פֿעלקער.
בסך־הכּל לעבן אין אַ לאַנד פֿון 83 מיליאָן מענטשן בלויז אַ 200 טױזנט ייִדן, לרובֿ אימיגראַנטן פֿון אַמאָליקן ראַטן־פֿאַרבאַנד אָדער מדינת־ישׂראל – ווי אויך אַ גרױסע צאָל גרים פֿון דײַטשן אָפּשטאַם. דער „צענטראַלער ראַט פֿון ייִדן אין דײַטשלאַנד“ פֿאַרטרעט בלױז אַרום אַ העלפֿט פֿון די ייִדן, װײַל נישט אַלע ייִדן פֿילן זיך צוגעבונדן צו דער אָפֿיציעלער ייִדישער קהילה אין זײער שטאָט. נישט געקוקט אױף דער קלײנער פּראָפּאָרץ ייִדן אין לאַנד – 0.24% – קומען זײ צו רײד בײַ כּלערלײ געזעלשאַפֿטלעכע דעבאַטעס: בפֿרט װעגן געשיכטע, װעלטפּאָליטיק און דער ראָלע פֿון אימיגראַנטן אין דײַטשלאַנד. מע קוקט אױף ייִדן װי די „גוטע, אַסימילירטע“ מינאָריטעט. להיפּוך — לױטן ראַסיסטישן נאַראַטיװ — אַסימילירן זיך קוים די מאַכמעדאַנער אימיגראַנטן און פּליטים און ברענגען מיט זיך אַן „אימפּאָרטירטן אַנטיסעמיטיזם“.
דער סאָציאָלאָג י. מיכל באָדעמאַן ז״ל און דער פּאָעט מאַקס טשאָלעק באַשרײַבן די עפֿנטלעכע דיסקוסיע װעגן ייִדן װי אַ מין מעטאַפֿאָרישן בלאָף, דעם אַזױ גערופֿענעם „אָנדענק־טעאַטער“: צו ערשט שרײַבט אַ נישט־ייִדישער דראַמאַטורג אָן דעם סצענאַר; דערנאָך קלײַבט ער אויס אַ ייִד װאָס זאָל רעדן פֿאַר אַלע ייִדן אין דײַטשלאַנד; אָט דער „רעפּרעזענטאַנט“ זאָגט אױס דעם דראַמאַטורגס רעפּליקן ווי געהעריק — און דער נישט־ייִדישער עולם אַפּלאָדירט. די מעטאַפֿאָרישע פּיעסע רעדט זיך װעגן די טױטע ייִדישע קדושים פֿון אַ מאָל, װעגן אַ נײַעם אױפֿבלי פֿון ייִדישקײט אין דײַטשלאַנד און מדינת־ישׂראל, װעגן אַנטיסעמיטיזם בײַ לינק־געשטימטע מענטשן און בײַ מאַכמעדאַנער, װעגן דײַטשן תּשובֿה טאָן און ייִדישן מוחל זײַן. אמתע ייִדן מיט אײגענע מעשׂיות אָדער מיט די „פֿאַלשע“ מײנונגען געהערן נישט אױף אַזאַ מעטאַפֿאָרישער בינע.
די שרײַבערין דבֿורה פֿעלדמאַן, באַקאַנט פֿאַר איר בוך „נישט־אָרטאָדאָקסיש“ און דער נעטפֿליקס־אַדאַפּטאַציע דערפֿון, האָט געשריבן אַ בוך אױף דײַטש מיטן טיטל „ייִדן־פֿעטיש“. לױט איר איז דער איצטיקער דײַטשער פֿילאָסעמיטיזם ענג פֿאַרבונדן מיטן אַלטן אַנטיסעמיטיזם. בײדע פֿאַרגרינגערן און פֿאַרשטומען די ייִדישע פֿילמיניקײט.
דאָס אויסטײלן ראָלעס אין טעאַטער קען זײַן פּריקרע, אַפֿילו ווען עס האָט גאָרנישט צו טאָן מיט אידענטיטעט. קינעמאַן האָט אפֿשר אַ מוסקוליעזן גוף אָבער ער זעט נישט אויס ווי קיין קינאָ־שטערן. די ראָלע־דירעקטאָרן (casting directors, בלע״ז) װײסן אָפֿט נישט װעלכע ראָלעס פּאַסן אים: איז ער אַ „נערד“ צי אַ „העלד“? „װי אַ שױשפּילער בין איך בײַ די ראָלע־אויסטײלער אין די הענט“, האָט קינעמאַן געזאָגט.
אין 2023 האָט דער אַמעריקאַנער נישט־ייִדישער אַקטיאָר־רעזשיסאָר ברעדלי קופּער, שפּילנדיק דעם דיריגענט און קאָמפּאָזיטאָר לענאַרד בערנשטײן אינעם פֿילם „מאַעסטראָ“, געטראָגן אַ פֿאַלשע „ייִדישע“ נאָז. דאָס האָט דערפֿירט צו אַ קלײנעם סקאַנדאַל, אָבער בערנשטײנס קינדער האָבן קופּערן פֿאַרטײדיקט.
ס׳איז שױן דורכױס פּסול, אַז אַ װײַסער אַקטיאָר זאָל זיך אױספֿאַרבן דאָס פּנים און שפּילן אַן אַפֿראָ־אַמעריקאַנער אױף דער בינע. אַזױ האָט געטאָן דער ייִדישער אַקטיאָר על דזשאָלסאָן (אַסאַ יאולסאָן) אין די פֿאַראײניקטע שטאַטן אין די 1910ער יאָרן אָן – און איז דעמאָלט געװאָרן אַ שטערן פֿון טעאַטער און קינאָ, דער „מלך פֿון ׳בלעקפֿײס׳“. מיט זײַנע קאָמישע פֿאָרשטעלונגען פֿון טראַדיציאָנעלע אַפֿראָ־אַמעריקאַנער לידער האָט דזשאָלסאָן, צװײ דורות נאָך דער שקלאַפֿערײַ, צעזײט און צעשפּרײט כּלערלײ ראַסיסטישע סטערעאָטיפּן.
אָבער װער מעג דען שפּילן אַ ייִד, און װער נישט? װײַטער׃ װער מעג רעדן פֿאַר די ייִדן אין דײַטשלאַנד 81 יאָר נאָכן חורבן?
אױף אָט די פֿראַגעס האָט קײנער אינעם שענק פֿון „דײַטשן טעאַטער“ געהאַט קײן קלאָרן ענטפֿער. סיר הענרי, אַ שױשפּילער בײַ דער בערלינער „פֿאָלקסבינע“, אַ געבױרענער אין קאַנאַדע, טענהט׃ „בעסער זאָלן דאָס די ייִדן דערצײלן די ייִדישע װיצן. אױף דער בינע, פֿונדעסטװעגן, װענדט זיך אַלץ אינעם קאָנטעקסט און די כּללים זענען נישט אַזױ פֿעסט.“
דער ייִדישער רעזשיסאָר ברוזילאָװסקי איז מסכּים׃ „מיר האָבן נישט קײן כּללים אין טעאַטער.“
The post Who can play a Jew — A debate in Germany appeared first on The Forward.
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Defining the Goals of the Iran War
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth holds a briefing with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine, amid the US-Israeli war on Iran, at the Pentagon in Washington, DC, US, March 19, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Evan Vucci
Going after the unacceptable threat Iran posed to American, Israeli, Gulf Arab States, European, and Asian military and political interests — and understanding the destructive hand of China behind the mullahs — was not a mistake. It was recognition of the stakes for the civilized world.
But the US and Israel, indispensable allies at many levels, have to take account of their differences in threat level and capabilities, and forge a political as well as military path together.
Two points to make in wartime:
First — achievable goals are essential to ending a war. Corollary 1: It is easier to start a war than end one Corollary 2: Every war must end
Second — there are things you don’t know and won’t know (although in some cases, people knew, but people weren’t listening.
President Donald Trump said in his State of the Union address: “They [the Iranians] have already developed missiles that can threaten Europe and our bases overseas, and they’re working to build missiles that will soon reach the United States of America.”
He was right, but dismissed with a collective snicker.
My husband, security analyst Dr. Stephen Bryen, ran the statement through Google Gemini and found disparaging references to the President in The Washington Post, The Guardian, American Progress, PBS NewsHour, PolitiFact, The New York Times and CNN, among others.
He found “experts” who told us that the range of Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal was about 2,000 km, which made Israel and the Gulf States potential targets, but allowed the Europeans to claim immunity. In 2025, a Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) assessment posited that Iran was “years away” from possessing a viable ICBM.
They were wrong.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told NBC News in February, “We are not developing long-range missiles … we have limited the range below 2,000 kilometers.”
He lied.
Trump was right. The range is closer to 4,000 km, technically putting Paris in range (about 4,200 km from Tehran).
[Aside: Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) said in a TV interview that Iran had enough uranium to make nuclear bombs, but there was no reason to do anything about it because Iran’s missiles couldn’t yet reach the US. Is he still sure?]
The unwillingness to see and understand threats is, in some ways, an admirable attempt to avoid war. War is terrible. No one wants war. War may kill the enemy, and surely it will also kill innocents. But the decades-old idea that one could negotiate with terrorists is a huge failing in the Western world.
The Oslo Accords were not peace. Temporary deals with Lebanon are not peace. Multiple Gaza ceasefires were not peace. Operations Rising Lion and Midnight Hammer were not peace. The return of the Israeli hostages was not peace.
Israel collected intelligence and built an extraordinary military force in cooperation with the United States, while the US built Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOPS). But it also assumed that giving the people of Gaza a decent life, including work permits in Israel, would keep things calm.
It worked at some level until October 7, 2023.
After that, Israel’s determination to defend its citizens forced a reckoning. It would no longer ignore Iran. President Trump agreed. Last summer’s attack on Iranian assets was a masterpiece of coordination and cooperation.
But it wasn’t enough.
The attacks launched this year were designed not only to eliminate Iran’s weapons and weapons-producing capability, but to put in place a new strategic pattern for behavior.
Much of the Arab world has come to his thinking. UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iraq and even Qatar, seeing that they are targets for Iran, not allies, have stepped up. Azerbaijan, too. Syria is silent and Lebanon is trying to figure out how to get rid of Hezbollah. In Europe, the Czech Republic and Estonia defied the EU resolution on the war.
In the past few days, Japan and several European countries appear to have awakened to the fact that their future, their security, and their people are on the firing line.
The late Fred Iklé, a defense strategist and official in the Reagan administration, wrote a book entitled Every War Must End. He was writing primarily, but not only, about American wars. For Iklé, who passed away in 2011, the essential lesson was that it is much easier to start a war than to successfully conclude one. Having achievable aims — both military and political — and stopping when they have been met — is the key to success.
The alternative is to slog along with grinding casualties until the conflict peters out ignominiously when public opinion no longer supports the effort. The French, he pointed out, were the military victors in Algeria — as were the Americans in Vietnam — but in both cases, the Western power withdrew without a political victory, and public disillusionment hampered the government at home and abroad for years after.
The Russians left Afghanistan when it produced unacceptable grumbling at home. More recently, the US left Afghanistan and northern Syria.
In none of those cases was the war over; in each case, people continued to die on the ground when we went home.
But Israel is home. Israel needs victory to ensure peace — how you define that between allies is precisely the point. And America and Israel must find a definition of victory that works for each.
Shoshana Bryen is Senior Director of the Jewish Policy Center and Editor of inFOCUS Quarterly magazine.
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When a Jewish Landmark Disappears, So Does Jewish Presence
The Contemporary Jewish Museum. Photo: screenshot.
Another major Jewish institution has collapsed – and the implications reach far beyond San Francisco.
The Contemporary Jewish Museum (CJM) has closed and is selling its building. What was once a bold, architecturally striking institution in the heart of downtown will soon be something else entirely. Another civic space repurposed. Another cultural anchor lost.
I loved seeing that building. Designed by Daniel Libeskind, it was bold, unmistakable, and confident – right off Yerba Buena Gardens in the heart of the city. It stood prominently, not tucked away or obscured, but fully visible. It sent a simple but powerful message: Jewish life belongs in the civic fabric. For me, it was a symbol of pride.
And now it is gone.
The explanations offered are familiar. Attendance declined by roughly 50 percent from 2019 to 2023–2024. Revenue fell. In the fiscal year ending June 2024, expenses outpaced revenue by more than $5.9 million. Leadership acknowledged that the building itself had become “beyond our capacity” to maintain.
All of that may be true. But it is not sufficient.
Institutions do not simply collapse because conditions change. They collapse because they fail to respond to changing conditions with clarity, discipline, and purpose. And when a flagship Jewish cultural institution disappears in one of the wealthiest and most philanthropic regions in the country, it is worth asking not only what happened, but what it says about us.
At one level, this is a story of institutional failure. The museum expanded into a large and expensive footprint – a 63,000-square-foot facility completed in 2008 at a cost of $47 million in a city already becoming more difficult to sustain. It relied on a fragile mix of philanthropy and foot traffic in a downtown that was hollowing out even before COVID accelerated the trend. The museum was still carrying roughly $27 million in outstanding construction debt. When those pressures intensified, there appears to have been no clear plan to right-size the institution, refocus its mission, or rethink its role in a changing cultural landscape.
Instead, the result was a slow drift toward insolvency – followed by closure.
But the deeper problem is not simply managerial. It is cultural. And it was visible in the year before the closure, when the museum found itself caught in an episode that illustrated just how far it had drifted from its core identity.
In spring 2024, the museum mounted its first major open-call exhibition of California Jewish artists. Seven of the accepted artists withdrew their work in a coordinated protest, demanding that the museum commit to BDS – the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement against Israel – and divest from all funding associated with the Jewish state. The museum rejected those demands. But rather than confidently reaffirming its identity as a Jewish cultural institution, it hesitated publicly, left blank spaces on its walls where the withdrawn works would have hung, and framed the episode as a “complicated moment.” It was a moment that revealed an institution uncertain of what it stood for.
Too many institutions in recent years have confused relevance with purpose. In an effort to remain current, they have chased trends, embraced fashionable programming, and diluted the very identity that made them distinctive. In doing so, they have weakened the case for their own existence – both to the public and to their donors.
Jewish institutions are not immune to this drift. When they lose clarity about who they are and what they are meant to do, they risk becoming interchangeable with any number of other cultural organizations. And interchangeable institutions are far easier to abandon.
The museum’s collapse also raises uncomfortable questions about the direction of Jewish giving. The Jewish Federation Bay Area manages more than $2 billion in assets and provided millions in grants in fiscal year 2023 alone. The Bay Area is home to some of the most generous Jewish philanthropists in America. If a flagship institution like this cannot be sustained in that environment, the problem is not a lack of resources. It is a question of priorities.
Much contemporary giving is directed toward causes, programs, and initiatives – often important ones. But less attention is paid to sustaining the shared institutions that give Jewish life visibility, continuity, and public meaning. Museums, cultural centers, and communal spaces do not always produce immediate or measurable outcomes. But they create something more enduring: a sense of presence.
The board chair told reporters that the building “does not define the museum.” And perhaps he is right, technically. The executive director expressed optimism about a smaller, reimagined future. That deserves acknowledgment. But what has been lost in the interim – the physical presence, the civic statement, the visibility – cannot simply be reimagined back into existence. Presence is not just programmatic. It is architectural. It is spatial. It is the fact of a building that stands in the middle of a great city and says: we are here.
Places like the Contemporary Jewish Museum did something rare. They connected past and present, insiders and outsiders, tradition and creativity. They offered a space where Jewish life could be explored without precondition – neither purely religious nor purely academic, but deeply cultural and civic at once. They were not simply museums. They were part of the infrastructure of Jewish public life.
The disappearance of such institutions is especially troubling given what is happening in the broader culture. The ADL recorded 9,354 antisemitic incidents in 2024, the highest level since tracking began in 1979 – a staggering 893 percent increase over the past decade. The FBI simultaneously recorded the highest number of anti-Jewish hate crimes since it began reporting data in 1991. A majority of American Jewish college students report feeling uncomfortable or unsafe on campus because they are Jewish.
At a moment like this, the disappearance of visible Jewish institutions sends precisely the wrong signal. It suggests contraction when presence is needed. It risks normalizing a quieter, less visible Jewish public life.
It is also worth noting that the CJM’s collapse is part of a wider pattern in San Francisco’s struggling cultural sector – the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts, California College of the Arts, and the nearby Mexican Museum have all faced severe financial distress in recent years. This context matters. The CJM did not fail in a vacuum. But it is not exculpatory, either. What distinguishes the institutions that endure is usually not better luck. It is clearer purpose and stronger accountability.
When an institution like this collapses in a wealthy and engaged community, it is rarely because no one cared. It is because no one felt ultimately responsible for ensuring that it endured. Not the board. Not the donors. Not the broader community.
Everyone assumes someone else will step in. And no one does.
That is the accountability failure. And it is correctable – if the community chooses to correct it.
The sale of the Contemporary Jewish Museum should not be treated as a local story or an isolated failure. It is a signal, one that should prompt concrete action.
Jewish philanthropists and federations should dedicate a meaningful portion of their giving specifically to sustaining cultural institutions – not just causes and programs, but the physical and civic infrastructure of Jewish life. Boards of Jewish institutions should be held to explicit accountability for institutional survival, not just programmatic innovation. And Jewish communities in every major city should ask, right now, whether their flagship cultural institutions are financially sound – and what they would do if they were not.
If the CJM survives in some smaller, reimagined form, that would be welcome. But the larger lesson stands regardless: Jewish presence in American public life is not self-sustaining. It requires deliberate investment, disciplined governance, and a community willing to prioritize endurance over the fashions of the moment.
Some institutions are easy to replace. Others are not.
The Contemporary Jewish Museum was more than a museum. It was a statement.
And its disappearance should force us to ask whether we are still willing to make such statements – or whether, slowly and quietly, we are allowing them to disappear.
Samuel J. Abrams is a professor of politics at Sarah Lawrence College and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.