She claimed Auschwitz was just a work camp, not a death camp, and that nobody had been gassed to death there.

She challenged a German court to prove that the Nazis committed mass murder, and declared on TV that the Holocaust was “the biggest and most sustainable lie in history.”

She spent years in prison, as an elderly widow, for lying about the Holocaust, and was deemed the “Nazi grandma” by German media.

On Wednesday, Ursula Haverbeck, one of Germany’s most infamous Holocaust deniers and a hero of the country’s far-right and neo-Nazi movement, died while awaiting her latest prison term. She was 96.

Her antics, particularly in the last two decades of her life, brought shame to many Germans and helped keep Holocaust denialism from being completely snuffed out of public life there. She routinely flaunted national laws designed to keep citizens like herself from denying or downplaying the atrocity of the Jewish genocide.

“We won’t have any impact on you with words,” one German judge, Lisa Jani, announced during one such 2022 sentencing of Haverbeck. In explaining why a prison term was necessary for the nonagenarian, Jani said the defendant had “strayed miles from the historical truth” and “damaged the memories of millions of murdered people.”

“She is a lost cause,” Magistrate Bjoern Joensson, who issued an earlier sentence against Haverbeck, said about her in 2015, according to German news agency Deutsche Welle. He added that it was “deplorable that this woman, who is still so active given her age, uses her energy to spread such hair-raising nonsense.”

Born in 1928, Haverbeck married Werner Georg Haverbeck, a former Nazi officer nearly two decades her senior. Ursula largely stayed in her husband’s shadow until his death in 1999, after which she began publishing writings and other work glorifying him and the Nazis and questioning the historical record on the Holocaust.

She was first convicted and fined in 2004 for such writings; many more convictions followed. At a highly publicized 2015 trial of an Auschwitz guard, Haverbeck stood outside the courtroom and went on TV to deny that Auschwitz had ever been a death camp. She also challenged the court to prove that people had been murdered there, leading to her being sentenced to 10 months in jail.

More such sentences followed, the longest — for more than two years — coming after magazine articles Haverbeck published in 2016. After numerous unsuccessful attempts to appeal her sentence, Haverbeck initially failed to show up for her sentencing date in 2018. She was finally arrested and served the time, running for a seat in the European Parliament under the auspices of a fringe far-right party while behind bars.

Even then, Haverbeck continued to spread denialism and face heavy legal consequences. Her latest conviction for incitement came just this past June. She was sentenced to a year and four months in prison for her lies about Auschwitz and died while appealing the ruling.

As Haverbeck spread lies throughout the last years of her life, German society was shifting further to the right. Far-right ultra-nationalist parties, who have promoted messages of German pride and argued that Germans should no longer have to feel guilty about the Holocaust, have gained more seats in parliament; celebrity politicians have made waves for inciting comments, including employing banned Nazi phrases. 

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Happy Friday! In this week’s Jewish Sport Report, we profile Orthodox college football player Sam Salz, invite you to an exciting Jewish sports event next month and share hall of fame updates across multiple sports.

Let’s dive right in.

Inside Orthodox player Sam Salz’s historic college football debut — and his improbable path to the SEC

Before Nov. 16, Sam Salz had never played a snap of organized football. The 5-foot-6, 160-pound wide receiver grew up attending an Orthodox day school in Philadelphia that didn’t have a football team.

But last Saturday night, Salz took the field for the first time with the Texas A&M Aggies, the No. 15-ranked team in Division I and a decorated program that plays in the elite Southeastern Conference.

Salz walked me through his first taste of football, and what it meant to hear his name called for a play as the Aggies routed New Mexico State 38-3.

“There’s probably a Jewish kid, and maybe even especially an Orthodox kid, who wants to play football, or wants to play sports, and is sitting somewhere confused about what he should do, or who’s told that he’ll never be able to do it,” Salz said. “Even getting to see me run down on that field, successful play or not, could have given him all the hope that he wanted.”

Click here for Salz’s remarkable story.

Halftime report

COOPERSTOWN CALLING? Longtime second baseman and former Team Israel player-turned-manager Ian Kinsler is on the 2025 MLB Hall of Fame ballot, making him the first Jewish player to make the ballot since Kevin Youkilis in 2019. Kinsler is a 4-time All-Star, two-time Gold Glove winner and 2018 World Series champion. Getting on the ballot is itself an accomplishment — even if his chances at making it to Cooperstown alongside the likes of fellow first-balloteer Ichiro Suzuki appear slim.

DEFLATED. One prominent Jew who will definitely not be enshrined in a hall of fame in 2025 is New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, who, according to ESPN, was not selected for the 2025 class of the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. Kraft, one of the league’s most influential owners and a six-time Super Bowl winner, failed to advance out of the hall’s nomination committee for the 13th time. Ralph Hay, a co-founder of the NFL, was chosen instead.

HONORED. More on halls of fame! Former NHL star Mathieu Schneider was inducted into the National Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in New York last weekend. Schneider, who scored 223 goals across 21 seasons in the league, said being a Jewish pro athlete “meant an awful lot to me.”

LISTEN TO THIS. U.S. rugby bronze medalist Sarah Levy appeared on the Women of Reform Judaim’s “Just For This” podcast, which highlights women in leadership positions. Check out the interview here, and for a refresher, here’s our profile of Levy from this past summer.

HOLDING COURT. The Israel Tennis and Education Centers Foundation raised half a million dollars at a fundraiser Tuesday in New York City to benefit the organization’s work supporting Israeli children across socioeconomic and religious backgrounds. The ITEC, which has more than 200 courts across Israel, has expanded its work since Oct. 7, 2023.

Jews in sports to watch this weekend (all times ET)

🏒 IN HOCKEY…

Jakob Chychrun and the Washington Capitals host Jack and Luke Hughes and the New Jersey Devils Saturday at 7 p.m. Jason Zucker — who scored his 200th career goal Wednesday — and the Buffalo Sabres face Jake Walman, Luke Kunin and the San Jose Sharks Saturday at 8 p.m. Zach Hyman and the Edmonton Oilers host Adam Fox and the New York Rangers Saturday at 10 p.m.

🏈 IN FOOTBALL…

Michael Dunn’s Cleveland Browns beat the Pittsburgh Steelers 24-19 last night on “Thursday Night Football.” In the NCAA, Jake Retzlaff and No. 14 BYU face No. 21 Arizona State Saturday at 3:30 p.m. Sam Salz and Texas A&M play Auburn Saturday at 7:30 p.m.

⚽ IN SOCCER…

Daniel Edelman and the New York Red Bulls face their crosstown rivals, New York City F.C., at Citi Field in the MLS conference semifinals on Saturday at 5:30 p.m. In European soccer, Matt Turner and his Premier League club Crystal Palace play Aston Villa Saturday at 10 a.m., and one level down, in the Championship, Manor Solomon and Leeds United take on Swansea Sunday at 10 a.m.

🏀 IN BASKETBALL…

Deni Avdija and the Portland Trail Blazers face the Houston Rockets tonight at 8 p.m. in the NBA Cup and Saturday at 8 p.m. in regular season play. Domantas Sabonis, who is converting to Judaism, and the Sacramento Kings play the Los Angeles Clippers tonight at 10:30 p.m. in the NBA Cup and host the Brooklyn Nets Sunday at 9 p.m. in regular play.

⛳ IN GOLF…

Daniel Berger is competing in the PGA Tour’s RSM Classic tournament this weekend in Georgia.

🏎 IN RACING…

Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll will be on the grid this weekend at the Las Vegas Grand Prix. Lights out at 1 a.m. on Sunday.

Join us for an online event to mark the 75th anniversary of a remarkable Jewish basketball championship

On Dec. 10 at 8 p.m. ET, I will sit down (virtually) with Matthew Goodman, author of “The City Game: Triumph, Scandal, and a Legendary Basketball Team,” to discuss the 75th anniversary of the City College of New York’s extraordinary 1949-50 basketball championship — and the point-shaving scandal that rocked the sport in its aftermath.

The CUNY Beavers, a team made up entirely of Jewish and African-American players at a time when the NBA was still segregated, became the only team in history to win the NIT and NCAA tournaments in the same year.

Click here for more information and to register for our free online event.

Pam Bondi, whom President-elect Donald Trump has tapped to be his attorney general, said last year that campus protesters who express support for Hamas should face FBI questioning.

Trump named Bondi, who served as Florida attorney general from 2011 to 2019, on Thursday. The nomination came after his first pick, the scandal-plagued  former Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, withdrew following meetings with Republican senators, who apparently made clear that allegations of sexual predation and drug use , which he has denied, would bury him.

Bondi’s confirmation process is expected to face fewer hurdles.

On Friday, Jewish Insider uncovered an interview Bondi gave Newsmax, the conservative news outlet, last year about the spike in anti-Israel protests on American campuses following Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack, which sparked Israel’s multi-front war.

“The thing that really was troubling to me, these students in universities in our country — whether they’re here as Americans or if they’re here on student visas — and they’re out there saying, ‘I support Hamas,'” she said in the Oct. 23, 2023, interview. “Frankly, they need to be taken out of our country, or the FBI needs to be interviewing them right away when they’re saying, ‘I support Hamas. I am Hamas.’ That’s not saying I support all these poor Palestinians who are trapped in Gaza.”

A number of protests in the weeks after the attacks included people who praised the attacks, although most of the protesters focused on condemning Israel’s counterattacks and on the suffering of Gaza Palestinians. Over the past year-plus, some hardline pro-Palestinian activists have continued to evince support for Hamas.

The Republican Party platform, released in July, calls for the deportation of noncitizens who back Hamas and terrorism, and pledges to “make our college campuses safe and patriotic again.” Trump and his advisers have also called for deporting foreign students who organize pro-Hamas protests.

The platform does not recommend the investigation of Americans who express rhetorical support for the terrorist group, as Bondi did in her interview, a path that could trigger First Amendment challenges.

Bondi, one of Trump’s earliest and most steadfast backers in his bid for the presidency, advised him during his first impeachment proceedings. She has a record of pro-Israel statements, lining her up with most of Trump’s other cabinet picks, though she has also lobbied for Qatar’s government, according to Semafor.

Some Jewish Republicans were wary of Gaetz because he voted earlier this year against emergency defense assistance for Israel and also opposed a bill that would codify an official definition of antisemitism, and invited a Holocaust denier to the State of the Union address.

It’s clear from Ritchie Torres’ social media that he spends a lot of time thinking about Israel.

But now, the Democratic congressman from the Bronx may have another locale on his mind: Albany.

In the weeks after Election Day Torres, an outspoken pro-Israel advocate, has signaled that he may challenge Gov. Kathy Hochul in a primary in 2026.

“Kathy Hochul is the new Joe Biden,” he tweeted Friday morning. “She may be in denial about the depth of her vulnerabilities as a Democratic nominee. A Democratic incumbent who is less popular in New York than Donald Trump is in grave danger of losing to a Republican in 2026–an outcome not seen in 30 years.”

Torres added, “Let’s avoid repeating history and avoid sleepwalking toward impending disaster and defeat. ‘Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.’”

Torres’ comments come as Democrats nationwide and in New York are smarting, and recalibrating, following a Republican sweep of the White House, House of Representatives and Senate. President-elect Donald Trump also made substantial gains in New York City and state. As the political world begins to think about 2026 — still two years away — Hochul could be vulnerable. She has a record-low approval rating of 39%, according to a recent Siena College poll, and fought off a surprisingly close challenge from Republican Rep. Lee Zeldin in 2022.

Torres — who won reelection in his deep blue district — has criticized the far left in the wake of the campaign, during which he stumped for Kamala Harris in front of Jewish audiences, but hasn’t definitively said that he’s in the 2026 race. When asked whether he is running for governor, a spokesperson for Torres told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency over text, “The Congressman has yet to make a final decision regarding his future.”

“I’ve made no final decision as to where my future lies, but I’m concerned about the crisis of governance we have in New York State and New York City,” Torres told Spectrum News New York 1. “We have a leadership crisis in America and nowhere is it more profound than in New York.”

On Friday morning, Torres told POLITICO’s New York Playbook newsletter that he plans to embark on a “listening tour” of New York and “and find out about the needs of New York state.”

Torres, 36, assumed congressional office in 2021 after serving on the New York City Council for seven years, where he was the first openly gay candidate from the Bronx elected to the office. A moderate Democrat — Torres parted ways with the Congressional Progressive Caucus February — he is known for his pro-Israel politics and for his advocacy against antisemitism.

In Nov. 2023, Torres spoke at the march for Israel in Washington, D.C. and in March, he went to Israel to visit the sites of the Oct. 7 massacres. He is a kind of local celebrity at SAR Academy, a Jewish day school in Riverdale that he has visited multiple times over the past few years. He also traveled to Israel with the school’s principal on a Jewish Community Relations Council trip.

His office has been hit with anti-Israel vandalism. In a speech in January, he said pro-Palestinian protests immediately after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack reminded him of “when the public mobs of Jim Crow would openly celebrate the lynching of African Americans.”

In June, he mocked a covert Israeli campaign to sway him and other Black Democratic U.S. lawmakers to be pro-Israel.

“If you think I need to be ‘influenced’ to be pro-Israel, then please see a doctor because your brain might be rotting,” he wrote on X. He then issued a rare criticism of Israeli conduct.

“The blithering idiots behind this embarrassing operation should be fired for gross incompetence,” Torres wrote. “A foreign influence operation that singles out Black Congressional Democrats is racist.  There’s no correlation at all between race and Israel in the United States Congress.”

Torres also told POLITICO Friday that others have suggested he could run for New York City mayor, given Mayor Eric Adams’ scandal-plagued tenure.

Though no one has yet declared a candidacy for governor in 2026, another standout pro-Israel congressman, Republican Mike Lawler, from Rockland County, has also recently weighed a bid for the position. Torres and Lawler together introduced a bill in April to place monitors on college campuses to address antisemitism.

Zeldin, the 2022 Republican candidate, who is Jewish, was recently tapped by Trump to head the Environmental Protection Agency.

For decades a museum of Jewish art in Tulsa, Oklahoma, held the remains of several unidentified Holocaust victims in its collection.

But last week the Sherwin Miller Museum of Jewish Art took steps to give those remains a proper home, by burying and holding a Jewish funeral for them.

“We are committed to preserving history in a way that respects human dignity,” Sofia Thornblad, the museum’s chief curator, told local news organizations. “This burial is a testament to our dedication to honoring the memories of Holocaust victims and educating future generations about the importance of remembrance and ethical stewardship.”

The museum said the remains likely dated back to before the year 2000, when it was more common for museums to accept human remains into their collections. Shifting priorities in the museum space have led to a reexamination of such practices. The Tulsa museum also includes an extensive collection of Holocaust-era artifacts donated by Jewish Oklahomans, including refugees from Nazi Germany.

Thornblad said the museum was “unable” to perform any DNA testing that might have revealed the identities of the remains, but said that they had originally come from the Auschwitz and Dachau concentration camps. (Jewish groups including Operation Benjamin have invested considerable resources as of late into identifying and reburying World War II-era Jewish remains.)

The Tulsa museum isn’t the only one to have taken steps to bury remains of Holocaust victims in its collection. In 2019 the Rockland Holocaust Museum and Center for Tolerance and Education, in Rockland, New York, announced it would hold a proper Jewish funeral for the ashes of victims of the Chelmno death camp it had recently discovered in its collection. The ashes had been donated in 2006 by a Holocaust survivor who’d gathered dirt from the camp, apparently without realizing it held the ashes of others.

The same year, the Imperial War Museum in London also announced it had the remains of several Jewish death camp victims in its collection and would be giving them a Jewish funeral. The remains of five adults and a child, all murdered at Auschwitz, were donated in 1997 by a private donor; the museum’s decision to bury them on English soil marked the first time that Holocaust victims had been laid to rest in the United Kingdom, according to Museums Journal.

The question of what to do with human remains has vexed museums in recent years, particularly when it comes to Native American remains. Decades after passage of a law urging tribal remains to be returned to their descendants, many museums had yet to act on their own collections, according to a ProPublica investigation last year.

Those present at the Tulsa funeral last Thursday, held at a Jewish cemetery, included local rabbis, an archaeologist, and local descendants of Holocaust survivors. Thornblad was among those who took turns shoveling dirt into the grave, in accordance with Jewish custom.

The Jewish people have long taken pride in their moniker, People of the Book. But Jews are also people who dance — and not just at weddings and bar or bat mitzvahs, or on holidays like Simchat Torah.

Like many other communities, Jews dance to foster and build community, and to come together for spiritual, social and recreational occasions. They dance to express unity and individuality, their peoplehood and creativity. Simply put, they dance to belong.

An illuminating exhibit at the venerable 92nd Street Y, New York  — which has been celebrating its 150th anniversary this year, rebranded as 92NY — explores the Jewish community’s rich movement traditions. Drawing upon 92NY’s extensive archive of photos, programs, posters and more, “Dance to Belong” tells the story of the vibrant and creative community Jews built and uplifted  through dance.

Among the many treasures on view are a 1915 photo depicting a dance class with lines of women clad in white tunics, their arms waving, a la Isadora Duncan; a 1940 poster advertising an evening by ballet and Broadway choreographer Agnes de Mille, featuring maverick modern dancer Sybil Shearer; and a 1943 playbill for a concert starring flamenco greats La Argentinita and Jose Greco.

“I was asked by Jody Arnhold, who is the chairwoman of the board [of 92NY], to curate a show on the 150th anniversary that would celebrate dance at the Y,” said cultural historian Ninotchka Bennahum, a professor of theater and dance at University of California Santa Barbara and a co-curator of the exhibit. “I knew that the Y was a social justice warrior [in] its commitment to working artists, to Jewish dance artists, to BIPOC artists, to immigrant artists. It was a 150-year story.”

Dance has been part and parcel of 92NY since it opened its doors in 1874 as the Young Men’s Hebrew Association, founded by a group of German Jewish businessmen to serve the social and spiritual needs of the burgeoning American Jewish community. First located on West 21st Street, then 42nd Street, the organization moved uptown several times to 65th Street in 1899, then 92nd and Lexington the next year. In 1930, the current digs at 92nd Street and Lexington Avenue opened.

According to Bennahum, 92NY became an essential meeting space because Jewish immigrants in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, like Jews today, weren’t necessarily affiliated with synagogues or other Jewish organizations, nor did they always speak the same language or come from the same socio-economic class. The 92NY served as a crossroads for Jews across religious, national, economic and social identities.

“Think of the people coming [to New York], not speaking English, feeling that they live in translation,” Bennahum said. “What do we carry with us in our body? Dance is shelter … which required no translation.”

“We’re talking about Ukrainian, Lithuanian, Polish, Russian and Mizrahi Jews meeting in intercultural exchanges, or, in the words of [dance scholar] Hannah Kosstrin, who calls these many intercultural exchanges ‘kinesthetic peoplehood,’ the migration of Jewish cultures and people — Mizrahi, Ashkenazi, Israeli, American, Palestinian, Turkish — from the Sefarad and Eastern Europe to the U.S.,” she added.

In addition to providing New York’s Jews a place to dance socially, 92NY offered its stages and studios to a cadre of early modern dancers. The Harkness Dance Center, which opened at 92NY in 1935, became a prime space where eminent modern dancers including Martha Graham, Doris Humphrey and Paul Taylor presented their works. Furthermore, when doors were closed to African-American, Asian-American, Latinx and Native American dance artists, 92NY welcomed them.

The exhibit, which opened in March and is on display in the Kaufmann Concert Hall lobby and adjacent Weill Art Gallery through Dec. 31, traces the myriad ways dance has shaped the venerable cultural institution. Featuring video panels designed by Jeanne Haffner of Thinc Design, “Dance to Belong” moves across five major themes. The first focuses on education and community building, and includes photos of children’s classes; senior adults standing at a ballet barre, legs lifted; and Israeli folk dance sessions led by Fred Berk, founder of the Y’s Jewish dance division in 1951, who introduced Israeli folk dance to Jewish communities across the U.S.

Other sections include “Black Moderns,” which spotlights the 1960 premiere of a then-unknown multi-racial company helmed by the now-renowned Alvin Ailey, whose choreography examined challenges of being Black in America, and “Dance As Political Manifesto,” which traces how Eastern European Jewish immigrants on the Lower East Side used dance and choreography as protest, and how successive generations followed suit.

Dance continues to thrive and evolve at 92NY; upcoming performances include former street-dance krumper-turned-ballet dancer Babatunji Johnson on Dec. 14 and, on Jan. 11-12, 2025, “A Dance of Hope” from Carolyn Dorfman Dance that draws upon Dorfman’s “rich Jewish legacy.”

“This exhibit confirms the Y’s longevity and significance of community-based dancing not as something tertiary, but as something primary,” Bennahum said of “Dance to Belong,” emphasizing that the institution has “creat[ed] a continuous space for dance in always giving sanctuary to contemporary artists, in believing in Jewish dance artists and in believing in all artists.”

“Dance to Belong” is on view at the Milton J. Weill Art Gallery and the Kaufmann Concert Hall lobby at the 92nd Street Y (1395 Lexington Ave.) through Dec. 31. Admission is free. 

A couple hours before Shabbat one week ago, Sam Salz was in the parking lot of the Texas A&M Chabad, running practice football plays by himself.

Salz, the 5-foot-6 Orthodox player who made headlines in 2022 for walking onto the Division I Aggies, was in his third season with the team but had yet to appear in a game. Now, he was approaching the 10th game of a 12-game regular season in his final year, and still had not taken the field.

Saturday was senior night at Texas A&M, honoring the team’s outgoing players, and Salz’s father and a high school friend were in attendance, as were a group of Jewish friends from campus.

For Salz, it may have also been his last best chance to play. But as the game progressed into the final minutes, he was still waiting his turn.

With 42 seconds left, he heard his name called.

“All of a sudden I was standing there and I heard ‘Sam, Sam!’ and I was like, who is it?” Salz recounted in an interview. “It was my coach, and he was looking for me, like, ‘Come with me.’ I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is the moment. I’m going to play.’”

Salz, who joined the Aggies as a running back and is now listed as a wide receiver, had not practiced a kickoff in quite some time. And, in fact, he had never played an official, organized football match of any kind.

In other words, this wasn’t just his first college football game. It was his first real game, period.

“The main thing that was going through my mind was, ‘You’re not going to false start or be offsides,’” Salz said, referring to two common penalties. “Even after they kicked it, I waited like a split second to see everybody else start moving, so then I started moving. Because I was like, I’m not going to be the one screwing this up.”

The main reason Salz had yet to take the field is that he is likely the only athlete among the approximately 77,000 NCAA football players who is an Orthodox, Shabbat-observant Jew. Traditional Shabbat observance forbids 39 different manners of work — from driving to carrying objects in public spaces — on Saturday, the day nearly all college football games are held.

Salz, of course, knew that going in, but went out for the team anyway. His appearance marked the culmination of a years-long journey, one that took him from Kohelet Yeshiva High School — a Modern Orthodox school in Philadelphia with roughly 100 students and no football team — to a legendary college football program that currently sits at No. 15 in the national rankings and plays in the vaunted Southeastern Conference.

“I was a kid who grew up in Philly attending Orthodox day schools my entire life, and ended up in the middle of Texas playing Division I football in the SEC,” Salz said. “At this point in my life, I’m just doing my best to accomplish my purpose. And, you know what: God, take the wheel.”

After last week’s game, he said, he is “very thankful,” calling the experience “just a very meaningful moment for me to be there and just get to run down.”

When he got to College Station, he began practicing on a patch of grass near the Aggies’ practice field, and boldly introduced himself to then-head coach Jimbo Fisher by saying, “I’m Sam Salz and I’m going to walk on to your football team.”

The hard work paid off: Salz joined the team as a sophomore walk-on, “Rudy”-style, in 2022. He chose jersey No. 39 in honor of those categories of work forbidden on Shabbat. While he has only played that one snap, he still contributes to the team by joining practices. He’s a member of the scout team, which acts as the opposing team to allow the Aggies to practice plays.

And the team has made arrangements to accommodate his Jewish observance, from exempting him from team travel and activities on Shabbat and other Jewish holidays to providing kosher food and his own kosher microwave in the team facility. During Passover last year, the Aggies even gave Salz his own water bottle to ensure that he was able to follow the holiday’s especially strict rules regarding kosher food.

Rabbi Yossi Lazaroff, the founder and director of Texas A&M’s Chabad, said Salz is an important role model for the Jewish community, which he estimated numbers in the “several hundreds” at the school of nearly 80,000 students.

“Sam is an upstander, and he tries to really make a difference,” Lazaroff said. “Every move that he was doing was like, ‘If I’m going to do it, then I need to do it properly. I can’t compromise. If I’m going to do it, No. 39, I’m not even going to go onto the field [on Shabbat]. I don’t want to have people even think that I’m compromising on my Jewish beliefs or halacha,’” the Hebrew term for Jewish law.

Lazaroff said Salz is an active member of the Chabad community, visiting the center daily for kosher meals, events and text study. During his freshman year, Salz even lived in a house next to the center that Chabad owns.

Salz said he cherishes the opportunity to teach his teammates about Judaism.

“People always ask questions. People are always curious about things,” Salz said. “They learn things about Judaism through me, and I take pride in that honestly, because especially when it comes down to Orthodox Judaism, it doesn’t tend to be represented in locker rooms that well.”

Some of the questions, Salz said, are expected: Why don’t you practice on certain days? How does kosher observance work? What’s that tree branch and lemon — a lulav and etrog — you’re walking around with during Sukkot? And what is Sukkot?

Others veer into the more personal and complex aspects of Jewish law, like questions about dating and sex. Even when his teammates think they’re joking around in the locker room, Salz said, there’s always a Jewish answer.

“As somebody who avidly studies the Talmud and Jewish law, I’ve heard a lot of the questions they’ll ask me,” Salz said, adding that he would tell them, “You’re joking about it, but there’s actually a debate about this in Jewish law.”

Moose Muhammad III, a fellow senior and wide receiver, told JTA that Salz has taught him about kosher laws and the schedule of Orthodox worship, which includes prayer thrice daily, and more on Shabbat and holidays.

“It’s been real cool, just because I feel like he’s all about the team, and he’s always trying to teach somebody,” Muhammad said. “He’s always just a positive influence on everybody, a good relationship to have.”

Muhammad said he remembers seeing Salz practicing on that patch of grass before he made the team, using trash cans as cones to run drills by himself. He said Salz’s work ethic is admirable.

“He comes out to work every single day,” he said. “Ever since then, since Jimbo [Fisher] brought him in, he’s just always been a good teammate and he’s had a positive presence.”

Salz has a Shabbat routine that allows him to catch the end of some contests after nightfall, when the day of rest ends: He spends Friday evening and Saturday mornings at Chabad. After afternoon prayers, he walks to the team’s facility for Seudah Shlishit, the customary third meal of Shabbat that occurs right before sundown. Depending on the time, he’ll either study text or sing Shabbat songs by himself in a spare room in the stadium. Then, time permitting, he dons his jersey and joins the team on the sideline.

Salz is part of a small cohort of Orthodox athletes whose stories have garnered attention in recent years, and he said he’s enjoyed talking to his contemporaries like Elie Kligman, a Sacramento State baseball player who was drafted into MLB in 2021. He’s also met Ryan Turell, the former Yeshiva University basketball star who now plays professionally in Israel.

Salz said he and Kligman have discussed launching a collective for Jewish college athletes to provide extra support when it comes to navigating the NCAA’s rules regarding benefitting from and promoting their brands and college careers.

He said the decision not to play on Shabbat is an easy one — even when the team’s wide receiver coach offered him a rare opportunity to travel with the team to Louisiana State University  for a weekend game last season. But Salz said that doing that would have undercut the example he was trying to set.

“I’m here because I want to inspire people to keep Shabbat,” Salz said. “Without that, there’s not really a reason for [me] to be here, because it’s a very large part of my purpose of being here. So in that respect, I was like, I want to travel, but I can’t.”

Around campus, Salz said he often gets recognized as a local celebrity of sorts. He called Texas A&M “the most philosemitic campus you’ll probably get in the United States,” and said he hasn’t faced any antisemitism or discrimination, either before or after Oct. 7, 2023. Instead, peers often know his story and occasionally ask for selfies or autographs.

“I love having people who appreciate me, and I think I appreciate them more than they probably appreciate me,” Salz said. “I enjoy it. I feel honored, honestly, when someone comes up and they want to take a picture.”

Salz said his focus on empowering other Jewish people and athletes won’t end when he graduates college next year. He has plans to get ordained as a rabbi, be a motivational speaker — and hopefully make it to the NFL.

“There’s probably a Jewish kid, and maybe even especially an Orthodox kid, who wants to play football, or wants to play sports, and is sitting somewhere confused about what he should do, or who’s told that he’ll never be able to do it,” Salz said. “Even getting to see me run down on that field, successful play or not, could have given him all the hope that he wanted.”

The 2024 election was a dismal one for most Democrats. But it has been a very good year for one particular demographic: Jewish candidates named Josh.

In North Carolina, Josh Stein won his gubernatorial election over (reportedly) self-proclaimed “Black Nazi” Mark Robinson. When Stein assumes his new role in January, he will be the third Jewish Josh heading a state — after Pennsylvania’s Josh Shapiro, a popular official thought to have lofty ambitions, and Hawaii’s Josh Green. 

A fourth may soon join them. Perhaps sensing the backwinds propelling Joshes everywhere, U.S. Rep. Josh Gottheimer last week announced his candidacy for governor of New Jersey. If he wins his race next year, fully 8% of all governor’s mansions in the country would be occupied by Democratic Jewish Joshes. (Of note: The “J” of J.B. Pritzker, Illinois’ Jewish Democratic governor, stands for “Jay.”)

Just a few short years ago, the national community of Joshes had devolved into battling with pool noodles (really) over rights to the name. Now, the Renaissance of Josh in America’s halls of power raises some serious questions: Is it just a coincidence? Or does it perhaps speak to a broader, subconscious trend among an electorate that finds itself craving strong Jewish leaders?

“I think it’s a coincidence,” Sarah Benor, a linguistics professor at Hebrew Union College and director of the Jewish Language Project, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

But, Benor added, “I think the reason it’s a coincidence is because of the popularity of that name and the generation that our politicians are from.”

She’s not just joshing. All four Joshes sitting in or seeking the governorship were born between 1966 (Stein) and 1975 (Gottheimer). Those years overlap with the period when, according to the records of the Social Security Administration, the name Josh began its meteoric rise in popularity. It hit No. 24 among boys in the 1970s, climbed to No. 4 in the 1980s and 1990s and peaked at No. 3 in the 2000s. 

Benor says that trend appeared among Jews first. Whereas early immigrant Jews tended to name their children in a way that would not explicitly call attention to their Jewishness, the next generation of Jews reacted to assimilation in part by choosing more Biblical names, while also joining what Benor describes as a 1960s-era “trend toward ethnic pride and multiculturalism.” The trend later spilled over into the general population.

“Jews were becoming more entrenched in American society, farther removed from the generation of immigration, and they felt more comfortable expressing their distinctiveness in their names,” she said. 

And while the name “Josh” might not immediately register as Jewish to the general population, it certainly does to other Jews. 

“In the Jewish imaginary, it’s coded Jewish,” she said. “Those are also very popular names beyond the Jewish community. But if you’re in the Jewish community, you don’t necessarily know that. And all the Joshes you know are Jewish.” 

But is there something about the name Josh that invites the image of a strong authority figure? After all, the original Josh was Yehoshua Bin Nun, the protege of Moses who becomes a leader of the Jewish people at the end of the Book of Deuteronomy. Subsequently, in the Book of Joshua, he is the man who leads the Israelites into Canaan.

“The Biblical namesake of all these Joshuas was a major leader of the Jewish people,” Benor said. “Just something to look at.”

Could the Joshmentum (to borrow a portmanteau coined by another J-named Jewish politician) keep rolling? A Jewish Telegraphic Agency survey of the Jewish Joshes currently serving in government, or who have expressed an interest in politics, turned up some other possible future gubernatorial Joshes.

Reached for comment, a spokesperson for California Democratic State Senator Josh Becker, who represents part of the Bay Area, did not explicitly rule out a gubernatorial run in his future.

“Senator Becker is deeply humbled to have been reelected to serve the constituents of Senate District 13 and looks forward to continue his service for this upcoming term,” the spokesperson said. 

“While I cannot speak to Senator Becker’s thoughts on ‘Jewish Joshes in politics’ I can say that he is an active and proud member and Vice Chair of the Jewish Caucus, where he works to instill Jewish values in policy and uplift all communities,” the spokesperson added. “I would hope and suspect that these are goals that many of our Jewish elected officials share and pursue with passion.”

Other Jewish Joshes were not so forthcoming. 

Neither fellow California State Sen. Josh Newman; nor Rhode Island State Sen. Joshua Miller, both Democrats; nor Josh Levy, the (nonpartisan) mayor of Hollywood, Florida, returned requests for comment asking if they, too, were planning to follow the lead of their fellow Joshes and run for governor. 

Neither did a representative for Josh Kraft, son of New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, who himself (Josh, that is) has teased a possible run for mayor of Boston next year. He currently runs the family’s philanthropic initiatives. 

In the past, Josh Kraft’s name was floated as a candidate for governor of Massachusetts, seemingly making him the next-most-likely Josh to chase the statehouse dream.

Some Joshes — including Shapiro and Stein — won their posts in states that went red for president, but Josh fever hasn’t quite spread across the aisle. In 2022, Josh Mandel, the Jewish former state treasurer of Ohio, mounted a campaign for the U.S. Senate (the second time he ran for the spot) after making an explicit appeal to “Judeo-Christian” right-wing voters. He lost the Republican primary to a political neophyte named J.D. Vance. 

Today Vance (who is not Jewish, and whose “J” does not stand for “Josh”) is vice president-elect. Mandel’s name is not being circulated among possible replacements for the seat.

Mandel — who last year joined the board of TruthTells, a right-wing organization that purports to “name and shame Jewish politicians and policymakers who don’t stand up to antisemites” — did not respond to a request for comment on his political future.

A request for comment to Josh Cohen, former Democratic mayor of Annapolis, Maryland, also was not returned. 

Cohen got a head start on his fellow Joshes: He was first elected to public office in 2001, at the age of 28, and ascended to the mayoralty five years later. But the luck of the Joshes ran out in his bid for reelection, and in 2012, Cohen lost his mayorship by 59 votes. 

He hasn’t returned to public office in more than a decade, instead pivoting to a career in electric vehicle policymaking. But he doesn’t seem to mind. He recently told Maryland Matters that his opponent at the time “did me a huge favor by beating me.” And he has no apparent desire to re-enter the political realm.

Still, if the Josh of the Bible could orchestrate a mass circumcision of every Jewish male before passing into the promised land (per Joshua 5:3), the possibilities are limitless. A rising tide lifts all Joshes.

UPDATE: The Texas State Board of Education voted 8-7 on Friday to approve the curriculum.

Most of the time, as the senior rabbi of Temple Beth-El in San Antonio, Rabbi Mara Nathan’s focus is on Jewish families. But this week, she’s finding herself thinking about Christian ones, too.

That’s because Texas is poised to adopt a public school curriculum that refers to Jesus as “the Messiah,” asks kindergartners to study the Sermon on the Mount and presents the Crusades in a positive light.

The curriculum, Nathan said, “gives Christian children the sense that their family’s religion is the only true religion, which is not appropriate for public school education, at the very least.”

Nathan is among the many Texans raising concerns about the proposed reading curriculum as it nears final approval. Earlier this week, the Texas State Board of Education narrowly voted to proceed with the curriculum, called Bluebonnet Learning. A final vote is set for Friday.

The critics, who include Jewish parents and organizations as well as interfaith and education advocacy groups, say Bluebonnet — which will be optional but which schools would be paid to adopt — inappropriately centers on Christian theology and ideas. They have been lobbying for revisions since it was first proposed in May, offering detailed feedback.

“The first round of the curriculum that we saw honestly had a lot of offensive content in it, and was proselytizing, and did not represent Jewish people well,” said Lisa Epstein, the director of San Antonio’s Jewish Community Relations Council.

Now those critics say most of their specific suggestions have been accepted but they remain concerned.

“Looking at the revision, we still feel that the curriculum is not balanced and it introduces a lot of Christian concepts at a very young age, like resurrection and the blood of Christ and the Messiah, when kids are just really too young to understand and they don’t really have a grasp yet completely of their own religion,” she added. Epstein, who testified at a hearing on the proposal in Austin on Monday, has a child in high school and two others who graduated from Texas public schools.

The Texas vote comes as advocates of inserting Christianity into public education are ascendant across the country. Political conservatives are in power at the national level and the Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority has demonstrated openness to blurring church-state separation.

President-elect Donald Trump has signaled support for numerous initiatives to reintroduce Christian doctrine into public schools, from supporting school prayer to endorsing legislation that would require public school classrooms to display the Ten Commandments. (One such measure in Louisiana was recently blocked by a federal judge.)

In Texas, Bluebonnet’s advocates say the curriculum would elevate students’ learning while also exposing them to essential elements of cultural literacy. They note that the curriculum includes references to a wide range of cultures, including ancient religions, and that the religious references make up only a small fraction of the material.

“They’ll elevate the quality of education being offered to all Texas students by giving them a well-rounded understanding of important texts and their impact on the world,” Megan Benton, a strategic policy associate at Texas Values, which says its mission is “to stand for biblical, Judeo-Christian values,” said during the hearing on Monday, Education Week reported. Texas Values called criticism of the proposed curriculum an “attack on the Bible.”

The Texas Education Agency solicited the proposed curriculum, which would join a menu of approved options, as part of a pandemic-era effort that waived some transparency laws, meaning that its authors are not fully known. But The 74, an education news organization, reported this week that a publishing company co-founded by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee contributed content to the curriculum.

Trump tapped Huckabee, a pastor and evangelical favorite, last week to become his ambassador to Israel.

For some in Texas and beyond, Bluebonnet represents a concrete example of how the national climate could ripple out into local changes.

“A lot of things, we think they’re outside of our community, or outside of our scope, like we hear these things, but are they really going to impact us?” said a Jewish assistant principal in the Richardson Independent School District north of Dallas who asked to remain anonymous. “But I think now that it’s becoming a potential reality, a friend was asking me, would Richardson adopt this? Is this something that is really going to happen in our community?”

While the Supreme Court has ruled that public schools can teach about religion, they cannot prioritize one religion over another in that instruction. So Bluebonnet’s inclusion of Christian and Bible stories in lesson plans drew scrutiny from the start — which grew after the Texas Tribune reported that a panel required to vet all curriculum proposals included Christian proponents of incorporating religion in public education.

In September, The Texas Education Authority’s curriculum review board published hundreds of pages of emails from members of the public along with whether the critiques had resulted in changes. Some did, the board noted, but many others were rejected.

A coalition of Jewish groups submitted 37 requested changes to the initial curriculum proposal. Epstein said the San Antonio JCRC had specifically objected to language in some lessons that evoked “antisemitic tropes” and textual inaccuracies in referencing the story of Queen Esther, as well as offensive references to the Crusades and language that explained the birth of Jesus as the messiah.

One passage had invited students to imagine “if you were a Crusader,” Epstein said, referring to the Christian knights of the Middle Ages who sought to conquer the Holy Land, massacred communities of Jews and are venerated by some on the Christian right.

In the case of the Esther lesson, the original curriculum had recreated an aspect of the Purim story in which Haman drew lots to determine when to kill Jews in the Persian Empire — as a way to teach probability. Nathan called that particular lesson “subversively antisemitic.”

“In ancient Persia [drawing lots] was a way of helping someone make a decision, and the game was called Purim,” the initial text read. “Ask students to choose a number from 1 to 6. Roll a die and ask the students to raise their hand if their number was rolled.”

“This is shocking, offensive and just plain wrong,” Sharyn Vane, a Jewish parent of two Texas public school graduates, said at a September hearing, according to the New York Times. “Do we ask elementary students to pretend to be Hitler?” (Historical simulations have widely been rejected by educators for all grades.)

Both of the lessons were revised after feedback from Jewish groups and others, but Epstein and Nathan said the changes were not adequate. A new prompt asks students to describe “the journey of a Crusader” in the third-person, but it still sanitizes the murder of many Jews and Christians during the Christian quest to conquer Jerusalem, Epstein charged.

And while the Purim lots activity was dropped, Epstein noted that a specific lesson plan about Esther — a beloved figure among evangelical Christians — also includes a reference to God, which the Megillah, the Jewish text telling the Purim story, famously does not do. She said that inaccuracy was not addressed in the revisions.

In a statement, San Antonio’s Jewish federation, under which the JCRC operates, also acknowledged the changes that were made after its feedback but expressed concern over what it called “an almost solely Christian-based” perspective with “inaccuracies” and content that is inappropriate for elementary school students.

“We are not against teaching a broad range of religious beliefs to children in an age-appropriate way that clearly distinguishes between ‘beliefs’ and ‘facts,’ and gives appropriate time and respect to acknowledging many different religions,” the federation said. “Public schools should be places where children of all religious backgrounds feel welcomed and accepted.”

The newer version of the curriculum also did not address the federation’s concerns about language referring to Jesus as “the Messiah,” written with a capital “M,” and references to “the Bible,” rather than “the Christian Bible” specifically, as the federation had urged the curriculum’s creators to adopt.

The Austin branch of the Anti-Defamation League, which was also involved in the efforts, also applauded the revisions that had been made thus far but said it still “reject[s] the current version of the proposed curriculum.”

“We agree that students should learn the historical contributions of various religious traditions, but ADL’s analysis of the originally proposed curriculum found that a narrow view of Christianity was overwhelmingly emphasized, there were few mentions of other faiths and the curriculum baselessly credited Christianity with improved societal morality,” the group said in a statement. “Although improvements have been made, the materials still appear to cross the line into teaching religion instead of teaching about religion.”

Criticism to the curriculum goes far beyond the Jewish community. Texas AFT, the state’s outpost of the American Federation of Teachers, a leading teachers’ union, also opposes the proposal. “Texas AFT believes that not only do these materials violate the separation of church and state and the academic freedom of our classroom, but also the sanctity of the teaching profession,” the union said in a statement.

Some Republicans on the Texas Board of Education expressed reservations about the curriculum’s quality and age-appropriateness, separate from its religious content.

And nonpartisan and interfaith groups like Texas Impact and Texas Freedom Network have also been involved in efforts to oppose the curriculum, as has the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty. Epstein said a Sikh parent also testified at one of the hearings, asking for her faith’s traditions to be incorporated into lesson plans to provide more religious perspectives.

Nathan said that when she testified against the proposal at a September hearing, her allies were diverse.

“Some of the people who were against it were not Jewish, and just were [against] the way that the curriculum was being put together pedagogically,” she said. “But there were both Jewish and non-Jewish people there, and also some Christian folks who were there who were opposed to such an overtly Christian curriculum.”

Marian Neleson, who has a 14-year-old daughter and a 12-year-old son in the Frisco Independent School District, said it has never been easy to be a Jewish family in her area.

“There’s always concerns as a parent when there’s just a handful of other Jewish children in a majority Christian school,” said Neleson, who is active in her local interfaith alliance. “From how the school celebrates, how they do their calendars. Do they remember that there is a Jewish holiday, and then they schedule major school functions on High Holy Days?”

Now, she’s worried that her own district could face pressure to adopt the new curriculum, if it is approved.

“These kind of curriculums are promoting one interpretation, one religion’s view, and I feel like that’s not very respectful of people who come from different backgrounds and different faiths and different religions,” Neleson said. She added, “I do think that the Frisco school district particularly does try to be inclusive and try to recognize the diversity of the community, but I know that there’s always pressure from groups who are trying to promote one agenda in the schools.”

The Richardson assistant principal said she saw in the financial incentive to adopt the curriculum — districts that do so will get up to $60 per student — an inappropriate assertion of support by the state. Many Texas districts are cash-strapped after legislators declined to substantially increase school funding last year.

“There is such a push in education for high-quality instructional materials,” said the assistant principal, who has three elementary school-aged children. “They’re pushing this so hard, and even potentially putting up funding for it if you adopt it, but it’s not a truly high-quality curriculum.”

In a Facebook post after Tuesday’s preliminary vote, Vane encouraged parents to reach out to members of the state’s education board to urge them to oppose the curriculum. “It’s not over yet,” she wrote.

Nathan said she’s not sure how much opponents of the curriculum can do if it’s approved, but she stressed the importance of local advocacy — especially since the curriculum is not required.

“I think reaching out to your local school board and communicating with local teachers in your community is going to be key,” she said. “If this occurs, what do I need to do in my local school district to make sure that there’s programming that balances the perspective?”

But she signaled that the intensity of the proposed curriculum would undercut any counter-programming by representatives of other faiths.

“It’s not presented as, ‘Here’s what Christians believe,’” Nathan said about Bluebonnet. “It’s presented as, ‘Here is the truth.’ There’s a difference.”

WASHINGTON — For Benjamin Netanyahu, the world just got a little smaller. 

Israel’s prime minister has long touted his worldwide network of relationships and years of experience working with foreign leaders. But now that the International Criminal Court has issued a warrant for his arrest, he’ll face incarceration if he sets foot in countries where he once strode with ease. 

In 1996, he was the first Israeli prime minister ever to visit Ireland. Now, the country has pledged to abide by the warrant if Netanyahu lands there. 

In 2016, the Dutch prime minister extended a “warm welcome” to Netanyahu as the two leaders stood side by side in Amsterdam. On Thursday, the Netherlands pledged to arrest him if he returns. 

The United States, like Israel, is not a party to the ICC, and has condemned the warrants against Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. 

But the same cannot be said of its neighbor to the north: Canada, which once exported tens of millions of dollars’ worth of arms to Israel, has now said it will abide by the ICC warrant as well. 

The countries’ pledges put Israel, which has long feared the prospect of international boycotts, in uncharted waters. On Thursday, the ICC issued warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant, charging them with war crimes and crimes against humanity over Israel’s conduct in Gaza. It also issued a warrant for Mohammed Deif, a Hamas commander believed to be dead. 

The warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant were themselves an unprecedented step. But it quickly became clear that the warrant for the prime minister also carried concrete consequences for Israel’s standing in the world — and even among countries it considered allies. Aside from damaging Israel’s foreign relations, the warrant puts a serious crimp on Netanyahu’s ability to travel as he seeks to defend the country’s conduct in its multi-front war.

“This may boost Bibi’s hometown cred and bunker mentality, but Israel is now a pariah,” tweeted Shai Franklin, a former top staffer for Jewish organizations who now works as a government consultant, using Netanyahu’s nickname.

In addition to Canada, the Netherlands and Ireland, Switzerland has also said it will abide by the warrants.  A number of other Western countries, including Britain, France, Italy and Sweden, remained non-committal. Others that are led by conservative ideological allies of Netanyahu — including Austria, Argentina and Hungary — have said they will ignore the warrants.

More than 120 countries — a majority of the world — are signatories of the statute establishing ICC. In principle, that means Netanyahu and Gallant risk arrest if they travel to any of them. But in reality, the countries are split.

Justin Trudeau, the Canadian prime minister, framed his agreement to comply as other countries did — less in agreement with the court’s conclusions and more as a matter of abiding by international law.

“As Canada has always said, it’s really important that everyone abide by international law,” Trudeau said in a press conference. “This is something we’ve been calling on from the beginning of the conflict. We are one of the founding members of the International Criminal Court, International Court of Justice. We stand up for international law, and we will abide by all the regulations and rulings of the international courts.”

Switzerland also said, according to Reuters, that its obligations under the 1998 Rome Statute, which established the ICC, required it to abide by arrest warrants.

Other countries were less definitive. Officials in France and Britain recognized the independence of the ICC, but declined to say whether they would act on the warrants. 

A spokesman for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the court “the primary institutional institution for investigating and prosecuting the most serious crimes in relation to international law,” according to The Telegraph, but added that “Israel has a right to defend itself in accordance with international law. There is no moral equivalence between Israel, a democracy, and Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah, which are terror groups.”

Argentine Prime Minister Javier Milei, a staunch ally of Israel’s, decried the warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant as “an act that distorts the spirit of international justice.” Milei added in his statement, “This resolution ignores Israel’s legitimate right to defend itself against constant attacks by terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah.”

A statement posted by the Hungarian ambassador to the United States, on behalf of the country’s Foreign Ministry, said the decision “brought shame to the international court system by equating the prime minister of a country attacked with a diabolical terrorist attack and the leaders of the terrorist organization that carried out the diabolical attack.”

The warrant for Netanyahu’s arrest comes more than a year after the ICC issued a warrant for the arrest of Vladimir Putin over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Countries have been split over enforcing that warrant as well — Putin traveled to Mongolia, a signatory, without incident — but U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged all of the parties to the ICC to “fulfill their obligations” to the court when it comes to Putin. 

In Israel’s case, the Biden administration has criticized the decision, and President-elect Donald Trump is likely to go further: In his first term, he sanctioned the ICC for contemplating cases against American personnel. Biden removed the sanctions, but Trump’s incoming national security adviser, Mike Waltz, hinted on X that they may be invoked again. “You can expect a strong response to the antisemitic bias of the ICC & UN come January,” Waltz said. 

South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, a close Trump ally, said he would introduce legislation to take action against countries that abided by the warrants. 

Such a law already exists, passed in 2002 after the United States invaded Afghanistan in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attack. It says the president can use “all means necessary” to free a U.S. citizen or a citizen of an allied country held on a warrant issued by the ICC. One nickname for the law is “The Hague Invasion Act,” and Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, a Republican, suggested that it could be more than a nickname.

“The ICC is a kangaroo court and Karim Khan is a deranged fanatic,” Cotton said on X, referring to the court’s chief prosecutor. “Woe to him and anyone who tries to enforce these outlaw warrants. Let me give them all a friendly reminder: the American law on the ICC is known as The Hague Invasion Act for a reason. Think about it.”