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Nelson Cruz and other Hispanic MLB players visit Israel to promote Christian-Jewish relations
TEL AVIV (JTA) — On a recent Monday, the owner of a restaurant here captivated a group of 14 lunch patrons with stories of her life before and after moving to Israel from Ethiopia as a youngster. A family visiting from New York approached from another table, and the adult son asked if he could pose for pictures with some of the members of the big group.
After the group had left to walk to the shore nearby, the restaurant’s owner learned that she had just hosted a group of professional athletes and their entourage. She briefly considered running after them for a photo herself.
“I wish I’d known who they were,” she said.
The athletes — Nelson Cruz, Cesar Hernandez and Jeimer Candelario, all Major League Baseball players in the United States — were surprised by what they learned at lunch, too. For instance, they had not known of the existence of Black Jews, including the thousands of Ethiopians living in Israel.
The players and their significant others were brought to Israel for a week by the Philos Project, a U.S.-based nonprofit organization that promotes Christian relations with Israel and other Middle Eastern countries. It was the organization’s first delegation to Israel involving Hispanic athletes, said Jesse Rojo, the Philos Project’s director of Hispanic affairs. The group toured Christian sites in Jerusalem and the Galilee and ran a baseball clinic for Jewish and non-Jewish youth in Raanana.
The visit also aimed to “proactively” combat antisemitism, Rojo said, “to show our baseball players that they can make a difference, not wait for someone to come out with an antisemitic tweet to do something.” The trip was organized well in advance of the recent antisemitism controversies involving American celebrities such as rapper Kanye West and NBA star Kyrie Irving.
But the players also expressed eagerness to learn about Israel and to impart their experiences upon returning to their homelands of the Dominican Republic and Venezuela — and to MLB clubhouses.
Cruz, from the Dominican Republic, is 39th on the MLB’s all-time home run list with 459. He hit only 10 homers this year and is 42 years old, but he said he’s hopeful a team will sign him to a contract for 2023. Hernandez, a second baseman who is also now a free agent, hails from Venezuela and is a former Gold Glove winner, earned for being named the best defender at his position in the American League. Candelario, born in New York but raised in the Dominican Republic, is also looking for a new team after playing six seasons at third base for the Detroit Tigers. Cruz and Hernandez played together on the Washington Nationals this past season.
On a minibus, before it set out for a day of touring, Cruz led a prayer of gratitude as everyone along for the ride bowed their heads. Members of the group uttered “amen” responses throughout. In Jaffa, Candelario expressed excitement at learning that the Bible’s Jonah had departed by ship from the ancient city’s port before being swallowed by a huge fish. At lunch, Candelario led the table in grace.
In separate interviews, each of the three visiting players said he had never heard anti-Jewish or anti-Israel views expressed by relatives, friends or acquaintances. Most of their compatriots, they said, think that Israel is constantly under enemy attack, a view they added was dispelled by their experience traveling around the country and feeling safe.
All attributed pro-Israel inclinations to their strong Christian beliefs, including regularly attending church services. They cited their mothers as devout women who raised them with Bible stories.
“We love God and the word of God. This is the land of our fathers,” said Candelario. “Whoever blesses Israel will be blessed,” he said, paraphrasing God’s promise to Abraham.
Rojo is organizing a charity softball game in the Dominican Republic between Dominican and Jewish-American MLB players in the coastal town of Susua — which was founded by refugees of Nazism who established still-operating dairy and sliced-meat factories. Funds raised through the event will pay to renovate both a baseball field and the town’s synagogue and to commemorate the Jewish immigrants’ roles in Susua’s history, Rojo said.
Cruz is trying to recruit fellow Dominican players to come on subsequent Israel trips and to play in next year’s Susua event. Superstar outfielder Juan Soto, Cruz’s former teammate on the Washington Nationals, considered participating in the recent delegation, but he reversed course after being traded mid-season to San Diego, Cruz said. Cruz also hopes to persuade the retired legends Albert Pujols and Manny Ramirez to come to Israel, too.
Back home, “we’ll share this experience, and definitely more players will be motivated to come,” Cruz said.
“Anyone who’s an opinion-maker from such countries helps us,” said Jonathan Peled, the Israeli foreign ministry’s deputy director general for Latin America. “They become ambassadors of good [will]. Whether a pastor, an athlete, a performer, a YouTuber – on every visit to Israel, there’s nothing like firsthand observation to see Israel in a more balanced, positive manner and less distorted.”
Jeimer Candelario, a third baseman for the Detroit Tigers, interacts with children at the Raanana field. (Nico Andre’ Duran)
Israel enjoys good relations throughout Latin America, with Venezuela an exception after it broke off diplomatic relations with the Jewish state in 2009, Peled said. “But we hope that [ties] will be renewed soon,” he said.
Venezuela, the Dominican Republic and Israel, coincidentally, will be competing (along with Puerto Rico and Nicaragua) in the same group at the upcoming World Baseball Classic, to be held in Miami in March. The teams will feature large contingents of major leaguers, with Israel’s roster consisting mainly of American Jews.
Baseball is not a top sport in Israel, but Team Israel’s periodic success on the world stage has helped promote the game. The Raanana site — dedicated in memory of Massachusetts native Ezra Schwartz, who was killed in a 2019 terrorist attack in Israel — is one of only a handful of baseball fields in the country. Other notable ones are at Kibbutz Gezer, in Tel Aviv’s Yarkon Park, and at the Baptist Village complex in Petach Tikvah.
At the group lunch, Hernandez said that he “would live here” in Israel in the off-season if he could obtain a visa. He was asked whether he meant it.
“Yeah, because it’s the Jesus country,” Hernandez said. “I asked my wife, and she said yes.”
Sitting beside him at the restaurant, Gabriela Hernandez nodded.
“Yes,” she said, “because of the significance it has for us.”
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The post Nelson Cruz and other Hispanic MLB players visit Israel to promote Christian-Jewish relations appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Nvidia in Advanced Talks to Buy Israel’s AI21 Labs for Up to $3 Billion, Report Says
A smartphone with a displayed NVIDIA logo is placed on a computer motherboard in this illustration taken March 6, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration
Nvidia is in advanced talks to buy Israel-based AI startup AI21 Labs for as much as $3 billion, the Calcalist financial daily reported on Tuesday.
Nvidia declined to comment, while AI21 was not immediately available to comment.
A 2023 funding round valued AI21 at $1.4 billion. Nvidia and Alphabet’s Google participated in that funding.
AI21, founded in 2017 by Amnon Shashua and two others, is among a clutch of AI startups that have benefited from a boom in artificial intelligence, attracting strong interest from venture capital firms and other investors.
Shashua is also the founder and CEO of Mobileye, a developer of self-driving car technologies.
Calcalist said AI21 has long been up for sale and talks with Nvidia have advanced significantly in recent weeks. It noted that Nvidia‘s primary interest in AI21 appears to be its workforce of roughly 200 employees, most of whom hold advanced academic degrees and “possess rare expertise in artificial intelligence development.”
Calcalist said the deal to buy AI21 is estimated at between $2 billion and $3 billion.
Nvidia, which has become the most valuable company in history at more than $4 trillion, is planning a large expansion in Israel with a new R&D campus of up to 10,000 employees in Kiryat Tivon, just south of the port city of Haifa – Israel’s third-largest city.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has described Israel as the company’s “second home.”
Nvidia has said that when completed, the campus will include up to 160,000 square meters (1.7 million square feet) of office space, parks and common areas across 90 dunams (22 acres), inspired by Nvidia‘s Santa Clara, California, headquarters. Nvidia expects construction to begin in 2027, with initial occupancy planned for 2031.
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How The New York Times Used Selective West Bank Data to Shape a False Moral Verdict
The New York Times building in New York City. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
The New York Times’ recent interactive project on the West Bank avoids incendiary terminology. It does not accuse Israel of ethnic cleansing outright. Yet the impression it leaves readers with is unmistakable: a story of systematic dispossession, driven by Israeli settlers and tolerated by the state.
That conclusion is not argued directly. It is constructed indirectly, through selective facts, emotional imagery, and critical omissions.
The article portrays a daily reality of Palestinian villagers under siege by armed settlers, shielded by Israeli soldiers, and backed by state institutions. The tone is stark and accusatory. But the apparent coherence of this narrative depends on three elements that are completely biased.
1/
The New York Times doesn’t use the phrase “ethnic cleansing” in its West Bank project.It doesn’t have to.
Selective imagery, distorted data & erased Palestinian terrorism lead to one conclusion: Israel is driving Palestinians off their land.
That claim is false.
pic.twitter.com/a4boarQwVq
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) December 22, 2025
Casualty Statistics
The first is the use of casualty statistics. The Times relies extensively on data from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) to demonstrate a dramatic rise in settler violence.
What readers are not told is how those numbers are assembled. UNOCHA does not consistently distinguish between civilians and terrorists killed while carrying out attacks. Palestinians who die while attempting stabbings, shootings, or vehicular assaults, are frequently recorded simply as casualties.
This methodology matters. It collapses perpetrators and victims into the same category and inflates the appearance of civilian harm. When such figures are presented without explanation, they create a misleading picture of violence divorced from context. The New York Times adopts these numbers uncritically, allowing a flawed dataset to underpin its central claim.
Ignoring Palestinian Terrorism
Second, the article ignores Palestinian terrorism. Over the past year, according to Israel Security Agency data, thousands of attacks have targeted Israelis in the West Bank, ranging from shootings and stabbings to Molotov cocktails and explosive devices. Many were intercepted before civilians were harmed. This sustained campaign is essential to understanding Israeli military operations and security measures. Yet it appears only faintly, if at all, in the article.
HonestReporting visualization based on B’Tselem data of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces from October 7, 2023, to October 31, 2025.
The absence extends further. Palestinians killed during Israeli counterterror operations are frequently affiliated with armed groups such as Hamas or Islamic Jihad, particularly in hotspots like Jenin and Nablus. These affiliations are rarely acknowledged. Readers are left with an image of indiscriminate force rather than targeted security activity.
Visual Storytelling
The third biased element in the article is the visual storytelling, which reinforces the narrative.
Images of demolished homes and emptied landscapes suggest deliberate displacement. But the legal framework governing much of the territory is barely explained.
Many demolitions occur in Area C, which, under internationally recognized agreements, falls under Israeli civil and security authority. Construction there requires permits. Unauthorized structures, whether Palestinian or Israeli, are subject to enforcement. By omitting this context, regulation is reframed as expulsion.
The article also implies that Israeli institutions tolerate or even enable extremist settler violence. This claim overlooks documented realities.
Israeli political and military leaders have repeatedly condemned such acts, warning that they undermine security and divert resources. Extremist settlers have been arrested, prosecuted, and in some cases have violently clashed with Israeli soldiers themselves. Internal accountability exists, but it is erased from the story.
Criticism of Israeli policy is legitimate and necessary. But journalism carries an obligation to present complexity honestly. When context is stripped away, when flawed data is treated as fact, and when terrorism is sidelined, reporting stops informing and starts directing. The New York Times’ project offers readers a powerful story, but not a complete one. And when narrative takes precedence over evidence, the public is misled.
HonestReporting is a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.
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Israel, Greece, and Cyprus: In Search of New Synergies
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (center), Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides (left), and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis hold a joint press conference after a trilateral meeting at the Citadel of David Hotel in Jerusalem, Dec. 22, 2025. Photo: ABIR SULTAN/Pool via REUTERS
The 10 trilateral summit of Israel, Greece and Cyprus, which took place in Jerusalem on December 22, showcased the continuing commitment of the three countries to the expansion of their collaboration. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hosted his Greek counterpart Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides in an effort to revitalize the trilateral mechanism. The ninth trilateral summit took place on September 4, 2023 in Nicosia, and the regional order has changed a great deal in the two years since. Israel responded to the terrorist invasion of October 7, 2023 by engaging in wars on multiple Middle East fronts, including a 12-day war with Iran. Despite the multidimensional and complex character of all these conflicts, Israel managed to show its power and resilience.
Both Greece and Cyprus continued to value their strategic partnership with Israel even as the Jewish State was being roundly condemned and vilified. Unlike the EU member states that chose to condemn Israel for the war in Gaza, Athens and Nicosia took a mild and balanced approach. Premier Mitsotakis has been able to prioritize what he perceives as Greece’s national interests and fend off criticism from other parties. Nikos Androulakis, the leader of the main opposition PASOK party, did not hold back in his excoriation of Israel in the context of the war in Gaza, inaccurately using the terms “ethnic cleansing” and “genocide” to describe Israel’s conduct during the war and denying that both terms in fact apply to Hamas’s assault on Israel, as well as to its ongoing plans for that country. On October 16, 2025, Androulakis called Netanyahu a “butcher” and demanded that Mitsotakis apologize for aligning Greece’s interests with those of Israel. Similarly, the parliamentary spokesperson of PASOK, Dimitris Mantzos, spoke of a “live-streamed genocide” and wondered “what strategic partnership might endure the pain of this bloodshed.”
Interestingly, it was the former leader of PASOK, George Papandreou, who laid the foundations for the Greek-Israeli friendship while serving as prime minister in 2010.
During the Israel-Iran war of June 2025, Greece and Cyprus served as hubs for Israeli civilians unable to return to their country. Planes belonging to Israeli airlines were stationed at Greek and Cypriot airports, and the aircraft serving Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog departed for Athens after Operation Rising Lion was launched on June 13. When the conflict ended, the Greek and Cypriot authorities coordinated with the Israeli government to implement Operation Safe Return to facilitate the repatriation of Israelis. Former Knesset member Gadeer Kamal-Mreeh praised Greece and Cyprus in a Jerusalem Post commentary in which he argued that the two countries had stepped up to help Israel – with actions, not just with words – at a time of serious crisis.
In the sphere of defense, Greece and Cyprus have looked favorably towards the Israeli market for years. Greece is now finalizing an agreement with Israel to purchase 36 PULS rocket artillery systems for $757.84 million. The Greek Parliament and the Government Council for National Security have approved the budget for the purchase, according to a press release from Elbit, the PULS manufacturer. Cyprus reportedly deployed Israel Aerospace Industries’ Barak MX air defense system last September and is eyeing new military deals with Israel to equip its National Guard. In addition to the arms transactions, Jerusalem, Athens and Nicosia are expected to conduct joint drills in 2026. In the past, Greek-Israeli exercises in the area between Israel and the island of Crete have allowed Israeli pilots to engage in bombing exercises and to rehearse the kind of aerial refueling necessary to cover a distance equal to that separating Israel from Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment facility.
Israel, Greece and Cyprus are all apprehensive about Turkish tactics in the Middle East and the Eastern Mediterranean, a common concern that facilitates dialogue. Jerusalem is of course primarily concerned about Ankara’s attitude toward Hamas and presence in Syria, while Athens and Nicosia are more focused on Ankara’s policies in the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean as well as on the Cyprus question. Israel, Greece and Cyprus support the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC), which bypasses Turkey, though IMEC will inevitably have limitations. The Turkish market is too big to be ignored, and the Corridor is still lacking tangible investments.
Energy also brings the three countries closer. Last November, Israeli Energy and Infrastructure Minister Eli Cohen put the idea of the East Med pipeline back on the table. Cohen made the comment on the sidelines of a ‘3+1’ Energy Ministerial Meeting in Athens that was also attended by US Energy Secretary Chris Wright. Although the East Med pipeline project remains expensive and technically difficult, attention is being directed towards a connecting of Israeli gas fields and LNG facilities in Cyprus. Israel is keen on selling its natural gas to Cyprus. The Energean company, which is drilling in Israeli waters, has proposed the construction of a subsea pipeline from its Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) to Cyfield’s planned power generation facility in Cyprus. According to Reuters, the cost will be around $400 million, while the capacity of the new pipeline will be 1 billion cubic meters a year. Theoretically, Israel, Greece and Cyprus remain committed to the Great Sea Interconnector project, but the Cypriot government seems to be having second thoughts about its viability. Athens and Nicosia have openly disagreed on this matter over the past few weeks.
Last but not least, Israel, Greece, and Cyprus are expected to improve coordination in accessing EU Horizon programs and other external funding sources. When the European Commission proposed, in July 2025, to partially suspend Israel’s integration into the European Innovation Council, Greece and Cyprus were among the EU member states to oppose the idea.
The trilateral Jerusalem summit welcomed the Cypriot presidency of the Council of the EU for the first semester of 2026, and Greece will hold the EU presidency in the second semester of 2027. The next two years should be a good opportunity to recalibrate EU-Israel relations under the aegis of Cyprus and Greece as well as to intensify the European fight against antisemitism.
Dr. George N. Tzogopoulos is a BESA contributor, a lecturer at the European Institute of Nice (CIFE) and at the Democritus University of Thrace, and a Senior Fellow at the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy. A version of this article was originally published by The BESA Center.