What I Learned Inside The Maccabi Bubble

As soon as I arrived at University of Hertfordshire, I could feel the youthful bustle, like it was the first day of school. Hundreds of Jewish teenagers, from around the world, teetered on campus: The South African soccer team mounted the picnic tables in their black and gold Kappa tracksuits; the Dutch field hockey team, unmissable with their blond hair, wooden sticks and orange t-shirts, huddled around a phone, giggling uncontrollably; the Argentines, (as if they had already won gold) danced, sang, and sunbathed on the lawn as their portable speaker played the latest songs from Buenos Aires. This colorful patchwork of world Jewry, all carefree and in one place, was already an achievement in itself.

From July 28th to August 6th, amidst the global hostilities and the rising ethnic tensions locally, a tiny Jewish bubble grew just north of London. The European Maccabi Youth Games were not a bubble with its free form and delicate borders. Here there were gates and fences, cameras and fiery guards who interrogated us if our credentials were not displayed. These days it takes a lot of effort to keep Jews safe.

“Do we have too much security?” An American coach asked me.

It may have seemed ridiculous in our tiny, peaceful Jewish Olympic village until your thoughts drift towards Munich in 1972.

“I rather too many than not enough.” I answered.

For the undeterred athletes this week was a chance to compete against Jewish teenagers from across the world in soccer, field hockey, basketball, tennis, futsal, and table tennis. It was also a lesson in Jewish history. Although, it is summer vacation and teenagers can be excused if they didn’t grasp the enormity of the moment. “The original Maccabees stood up for Jews and Judaism with great courage,” Sir Ephraim Mirvis, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, said at the opening ceremony. “They fought for the future of our nation. Am Israel Chai.” If the teenagers knew it or not, they were modern day Maccabees. Banding together to struggle, again, against another enemy of the Jewish people. I heard someone say in the crowd: “We’ve done this before. We can do it again.”

When I walked into the five-story dormitory, I suddenly felt like I was a college freshman again: A single bed in a room that lacked adequate ventilation. Someone spilt a box of Apple Jacks onto the rug and left it there. Doors slammed continuously. Before I left New York, I had this fantasy that I would be able to read, write, and swim in my free time. Maybe even lose a few kilograms. In fact, it would be a sleepless week in Great Britain. I’m fairly certain I could not live in a dorm again.

I’d agreed to sacrifice comfort to be the Maccabi USA head coach for the under 18 boys basketball team. Whatever you think about the Maccabi World Union–overpriced sport tournaments or a better version of J-Date–you can also ask yourself if it was wise to put hundreds of Jewish teenagers encircled by a weaponless security company in a country where even the police don’t have guns. To be honest, because of the risk I agreed to go. I wanted to play a role, however small, and help make the European Maccabi Youth Games a success.

I met my team for the first time in London. The seven young men from Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Boston, Atlanta, New Jersey and Seattle had one practice together and that was more than enough. Our first game against Italy was flawless. We won easily. In the balcony were the players’ parents cheering us on. On the sidelines in her wheelchair was Naomi Drezner. She wore her Maccabi 1993 t-shirt, the one she wore when her son Jon played in the Maccabi World Games over thirty years ago. Now she watched her grandson, Jonah, play in England. These multigenerational Maccabi moments are priceless and worth, in my opinion, whatever Maccabi wants to charge. This was my third Maccabi event and each one never fails to inspire and strengthen my faith and my belief in the necessity of Jewish bonding through sports.

The basketball games took place in the more bucolic setting of Haberdashers’ Boys’ School. To get there, we took a bus. To get on the bus, the security team, dressed in baggy black shirts and pants with the familiar white coiled earpieces, would secure the perimeter and usher us aboard. Once at Haberdasher’s another team dressed exactly the same would welcome us and escort us to the gym. These security details made me believe we were safer than a former US president was just a few weeks ago.

Our final game in pool play was against Israel. The Israeli 18U team did something unprecedented in Maccabi basketball history; they had  eight players on the team with special needs. During the pregame ceremony they gave us yellow #BringThemHomeNow wristbands. I found myself becoming emotional about the hostages, the war, even more impressed with the bravery of the young men and Israeli coaches. This event felt different and momentous. Explicably, I was moved. I scribbled instructions on my clipboard. My eyes welled with tears. I was about to coach a basketball game and I hadn’t felt so close to crying since the birth of my daughters. Basketball brought the teams to London, but we all sensed there was something else going on. We were overcome with rachmanus (compassion).

On July 31st, I read the news. Ismail Haniyah’s was killed when his apartment in Iran blew up. More news followed. Fuad Shukr was killed in Beirut. Later on that day, I received a text from my family: “Be careful given you are at a Jewish event in a country struggling to respond to radical jihadist Islamofascism appropriately.” Would the games be canceled? We were warned to avoid central London. The national march for Palestine would be parading down Piccadilly. I watched it on YouTube. People held signs that read “Cease Fire Now”, “Stop Arming Israel”, and of course the ubiquitous genocidal claim “River to the Sea.” The games carried on.

Consequently, the news fortified our bubble. If bubbles are fragile and temporary. This was something different. On the soccer field during the closing ceremony the South African soccer player exchanged his jersey with a German basketball player. The Israeli coach and I exchanged polos. It was a stark contrast to the first day when each country kept to themselves. The recipe worked. Over the eight days, the Jewish aura grew stronger, after each game, after each meal, after each lecture, after each conversation, after each social media exchange, and grew more unyielding even as we boarded our planes to go back home. I left the European Maccabi Youth Games honored to have witnessed the energetic Jewish spirit in all shapes and forms. And I was reminded that when Jews play together, we win together, regardless if we have a gold medal in our suitcase or not.