Maccabi Canada is recruiting elite athletes

by Maxine Fischbein

(AJNews) – Calgarian Jordan Balaban is on a mission to send the largest-ever delegation of Alberta Jewish athletes to the 22nd Maccabiah Games in Israel in July 2025.

His enthusiasm comes from having competed on the basketball court five consecutive times at the “Jewish Olympics,” which are typically held every four years in Israel.

According to Maccabi Canada, which promotes the games in this country, Maccabiah is the world’s third largest athletic games after the Summer Olympics and the World University Games. Maccabi Canada is a member of the World Maccabi Union which boasts the membership of affiliate organizations in more than 70 countries.

After the COVID pandemic postponed the 2021 games, Canada sent a delegation of 600 to Maccabiah in 2022, 500 of them athletes. Team Canada was the third largest delegation after Israel and the US, says Maccabi Canada CEO Lee Mes.

Balaban’s Maccabiah journey began in 2001, in the midst of the Second Intifada. While it was a challenging time to be in Israel, the games provided a unique opportunity for Jewish Canadian athletes to bond with peers from around the world while supporting Israel at a critical time.

Balaban exudes gratitude for the profound ways Maccabiah helped to shape him. About a decade ago, he paid his good fortune forward by joining the board of Maccabi Canada and, subsequently, its investment committee.

Registration for Maccabiah is open and tryouts are happening, says Balaban, who, in particular, encourages teen athletes to apply.

Though Junior athletes are subsidized by Maccabi Canada—and athletes and their families can participate in a fundraising pool—the price tag in 2025 will land between $10 and $11 thousand per athlete, pending finalization of flights to Israel. This does not include flights to Toronto for tryouts and when connecting to included flights to Israel for the games.

While the cost is prohibitive for some athletes and their families, Maccabi Canada CEO Lee Mes urges talented athletes to invest in the $40 registration fee and try out for their sports.

If they are selected by coaches, Maccabi Canada will do its best to access subsidies so that the best of the best are not sidelined by financial barriers, Mes told AJNews, adding that coaches can sometimes also access grants for elite athletes.

Some Canadian Jewish Federations and community philanthropists also step up, said Mes, lauding the generosity of Calgarians Barb and Ron Krell who established the Krell Maccabi Endowment Fund at the Jewish Community Foundation of Calgary (JCFC).

The Krells know what a difference Maccabiah can make.  Their daughter Marnie played beach volleyball at the 2005 games and hard court volleyball in 2009. At the 2005 games, their son Lewis played basketball.

“We created our fund because we felt that there are some athletes that we could help get to the games,” said Ron Krell.

Some kids need help to get to Toronto for tryouts so that they can even become part of the team, noted Barb Krell.

Maccabi Canada turns to the Krells and like-minded philanthropists when they know of athletes in need.

“We look first in Calgary, then in Alberta, and then we look next to Western Canada,” said Ron Krell, adding that athletes seeking grants can contact the JCFC for more information or to apply.

Because adult athletes are not subsidized, the cost to participate in the Open and Masters categories will land somewhere between $14 and $15 thousand for the 2025 games.

The experience, of course, is priceless.

Compared to other Jewish sporting events, Maccabiah is an “elite competition,” said Balaban.

Evidence of this abounds. For example, Torontonians Zach Hyman and his brother Spencer helped Team Canada win Gold in hockey at the Maccabiah Games in 2013. Zach subsequently played for the Toronto Maple Leafs before signing with the Edmonton Oilers in 2021.

According to Mes, many non-Jewish Canadian coaches are well aware of Maccabiah. When they know that their athletes qualify for the games, some encourage them to try out.

Generally, the youngest Junior competitors are 14, but exceptions are made in accordance with guidelines set by the governing bodies for each sport.

The experience of Junior athletes has morphed since Balaban’s time thanks to the Azrieli Israel Experience, a six day tour during which young athletes travel with Israeli and international peers in a cultural experience similar to Birthright Israel. The Israel Experience is completely underwritten by the Azrieli Foundation.

Calgary identical twins Nick and Conaire Taub brought home silver medals in Junior Volleyball in 2017 and 2022. Team Israel won gold on both occasions. Notably, one of its most talented players, Shay Liberman, recently signed a pro basketball contract in Italy, says Nick, who has stayed in touch with the rising star.

During the 2022 Maccabiah Games the brothers Taub were honoured as Team Canada flag bearers together with women’s hockey goalie Molly Tissenbaum, formerly of Toronto.

“The most surreal moment would be when we were about to enter the stadium for the opening ceremonies with the flag. It kind of felt like we were celebrities. That was pretty cool,” recalled Conaire.

Athletes often compete alongside family members or follow in the footsteps of relatives who are Maccabiah alumni. Nick and Conaire’s father, Ari Taub, competed in wrestling at the 1989 Maccabiah Games, earning gold medals in both Greco-Roman and Freestyle Wrestling.

Notably, Nick and Conaire’s mother, Sarah Howell, is no stranger to international competition, though not at Maccabiah. An accomplished runner, she earned gold in the 1500m race at the Pan Am Games in 1991 and silver in the same event and games in 1995.

Nick and Conaire, now 20, play volleyball with the UBC Thunderbirds, while studying forestry and kinesiology respectively. They are mulling a possible return to the Maccabiah Games to play beach volleyball on an Open team. In the longer term, each would like to one day return as a coach.

“Some of my biggest mentors in volleyball, indoor and beach, came from Maccabiah, said Nick, who described his journey as “super cool” and “life-changing.”

“What you see on the news doesn’t tell the whole story [about Israel],” he told AJNews.

A highlight for both Nick and Conaire was taking part in a 2017 B’nai Mitzvah ceremony offered to kids who had not experienced the rite of passage at home.  Though the brothers are not religiously observant, they enjoyed the experience so much that they repeated the mitzvah when they returned in 2022.

Conaire and Nick keep in touch, mainly on social media, with friends they made as they toured Israel, including members of the USA women’s soccer team and Israeli women’s volleyball team.

“That was the first real international, big, world-wide, multi-sport event that I’ve ever been to,” said Conaire. “There are so many other people…all striving for the same goal. That’s pretty cool to me.”

Some athletes go to the games primarily for the love of their sport, said Nick, who adds that the calibre of teams and individual athletes varies by sport.

Nick says his love for volleyball was what took him to Maccabiah in 2017. But it was the cultural experience that compelled him to return in 2022.

“Sports and Zionism go hand in hand,” says Lee Mes who adds that historically Maccabi clubs sprang up around the world with the growth of antisemitism.

The Maccabi World Union (MWU) describes itself as “the oldest continuously active Zionist organization.” It has always dedicated itself to building what modern political Zionism founder Theodor Herzl’s right-hand man, Max Nordau, called “muscular Judaism.”

According to the MWU, “Nordau contributed greatly to the idea of the New Jew, a total transformation of the frightened Jew of the ghetto.”

Maccabi sports clubs were a big part of that transformation.

“One of the unspoken goals was bringing Jews to Israel,” Mes said.

The first Maccabiah Games took place in 1932. Maccabi Canada was established in 1950 just two years after the modern state of Israel declared its independence.

The first Canadian delegation did not suffer jetlag; they traveled to the Holy Land by ship, Mes said.

The theme of the 2025 Games, More than Ever, captures the current zeitgeist as Israelis and Diaspora Jews cope with the fallout of the deadly October 7 Hamas terrorist attacks, the resulting war in Gaza, attacks by Hezbollah in northern Israel, and an uptick in antisemitic acts worldwide.

“The goal was always to strengthen Jewish identity and the connection between Jews around the world to Israel…but I think now, more than ever, the next games will really emphasize that,” Mes said. “The significance goes well beyond sport.”

Maccabiah athletes must be Jewish in accordance with the definition spelled out in Israel’s Law of Return, which allows for both matrilineal and patrilineal descent.

But close to half of Team Canada coaches are not Jewish, says Mess, adding that Maccabi Canada’s priority is to find the best coaches, doctors and team managers, regardless of faith.

“This has always seemed important…to include people who are not Jewish and have never been to Israel or wouldn’t necessarily go there on their own,” Mes said.

“I’m a coach in my sport, and that’s why I went. Now I can’t shut up about Israel,” said one non-Jewish coach to Mes following Maccabiah in 2022.

“It’s so important for us to have those allies right now when everything is going crazy in the world,” said Mes. “A lot of them have decided to come back and join us again for the next games in spite of everything that’s going on. I’m really proud of that.  It makes me feel that Maccabiah serves way more than sports. It’s about also exposing everyone…to the reality beyond social media. It’s about real people…and getting the real story.”

Of course, security is top of mind.

“Our main goal is to bring everybody back safe,” says Mes, adding that security trumps medals.

Mes urges athletes to register despite the current state of affairs in the Middle East.

The situation is fluid, says Mes, with “plenty of time to see how things are unfolding.”

Typically some 50 percent of the Team Canada delegation is visiting Israel for the first time. Roughly half the athletes come from families who are active in Jewish communal life. The other half are invested in their sport but not as connected in the Jewish community.

“There are lots of organizations in the Jewish community that deal with Jewish engagement and connections to Israel. We do both. We utilize athletes’ passions for sports in introducing and connecting them with Israel,” Mes said.

Notably, Maccabi Canada has, in recent years, supported initiatives bringing Israeli athletes in the opposite direction.

For a second year in a row, Israeli athletes participated in the JCC Maccabi Games held earlier this summer in Detroit.

Last January, Maccabi Canada helped bring 23 Israeli hockey players to Canada. All were evacuated from their homes in the Galilee Panhandle following Hezbollah attacks in Israel’s north.

In November, the manager at Canada Centre in Metula (built some four decades ago with the help of Canadian philanthropists via United Israel Appeal) contacted Maccabi Canada in the hope that a hockey camp could be arranged in Canada for the young athletes, who hadn’t been on the ice since their displacement.

Interest in hosting the kids was expressed in Jewish communities across the country; in the end, the younger players went to Vancouver and the older ones to Winnipeg.

Even the recovery of the players’ hockey gear was dramatic, given the situation along Israel’s northern border.

“They really had to orchestrate a military operation in the night…to go into all those kids’ homes and rescue their gear,” Mes said.

All’s well that ends well.

“They were spoiled so much by the communities, by their host families, by the JCCs, by the Federations in both Vancouver and Winnipeg,” recalls Mes, whose organization assisted with fundraising and logistics.

Some of the Israeli players went on to win the Israeli national championship, said Mes, thanks, in large measure, to the opportunity they were given to get back on the ice and train in Canada.

Hearing the kids’ stories and speaking with some of their parents by phone helped to make host families feel connected, more than ever, to Israel, Mess said.

She hopes to “nourish more connections” of this type, though right now Maccabi Canada is laser focused on Maccabiah 2025.

At the 2022 games, there were six athletes from Alberta: Danyael Halprin (Gold, Track and Field, Women’s Open); Brittney Sawyer (Gold, Hockey, Women’s Open); Conaire Taub (Silver, Volleyball, Junior Male); Nick Taub (Silver, Volleyball, Junior Male); Zohar Broder (Tennis, Junior Male) and Nicole Hult (Squash, Women’s Open). Alberta staff included Ian Power (Squash); Alana Takahashi (Medical) and Tim Takahashi (Medical).

When AJNews spoke to Maccabi Canada toward the end of July, they had already received ten applications from Albertans, nine of them from athletes.

“I’d really like to see more athletes and staff from Alberta,” said Mes. “You do it once and it’s an experience that never leaves you.”

Jordan Balaban seconds the emotion more than ever:

“At the current time, it’s really important that we take active steps to connect ourselves and feel unity and strength and pride in our Judaism,” says Balaban who knows, first-hand “the power of sports to unite, find common ground and build character.”

For more information, or to register for the 2025 Maccabiah Games, go to maccabicanada.com. For information about grants from the Krell Maccabi Endowment Fund for qualifying Maccabiah athletes, contact the Jewish Community Foundation of Calgary, jcfc.ca, 403-640-2273.

 Maxine Fischbein is a Local Journalism Initiative Reporter.