More than 300 Canadian athletes, staff, and supporters are among thousands of Maccabiah Games participants around the world who learned this morning that the games, scheduled to start in Israel on July 8, will be postponed until 2026.
The Maccabi World Union (MWU) announced the one-year postponement early on June 16, calling it “neither possible nor appropriate” to proceed.
Israeli authorities have declared a state of emergency to June 30 after the latest round of missile warfare exchanges with Iran began early on Friday, June 13, following Israel’s attack on Iran’s nuclear weapons program, top scientists and military leaders.
According to the Maccabiah Games, the event, sometimes described as a “Jewish Olympics” draws competitors and fans to Israel every four years for the Games. About 8,000 people from 55 countries were expected to attend.
The last edition, the 21st, took place in 2022, after the COVID-19 pandemic delays. The 20th Games in 2017, included 10,000 athletes from 74 countries gathering to compete in 42 sports, The CJN previously reported; Canada won 50 medals at those Games.
The 2025 competition had been set to take place in venues around the country, with associated cultural events, all of which are impossible under current restrictions, which include closed airspace, stranding a number of travellers in all directions.
The more than 320 members of the Canadian delegation — including athletes, coaches, doctors and physiotherapists — included 143 under-18 athletes, comprising Maccabi Canada’s sizeable junior delegation. The assembled delegation that was set to go also included team managers, chaperones, and people handling communications.
In 2022, before the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attacks that sparked the current Gaza war, the Canadian delegation numbered 583.
With the organizing body announcing the one-year postponement June 16, it’s still a matter of waiting to figure out the next steps, says Lee Mes, Maccabi Canada’s national executive director.
Organizers in Israel had been working on the massive event over the past year and a half, Mes told The CJN in a phone interview.
She hopes to be able to take the same team in the delegation next year for the rescheduled Games.
“There’s a lot of things to work through,” from bureaucracy to an inevitable planning reset, she says.
For the moment, nobody has much by way of detail beyond the one-year postponement, Mes points out.
“I don’t know next summer… I don’t know what happens to the age groups, or class. We would love to take the same delegation obviously, after that if there’s more people who want to join, but we would love to say we have those teams in place and we want to take them to go next year and if they are able to go next year.”
It is not clear what will happen with the juniors on an under-18 team who will turn 19 in the intervening period.
While those are questions that can’t yet be answered by MWU organizers, Mes says the Canadian organization supports the decision.
“Obviously safety and security is number one,” she says. “We know at this point that it’s going to take place next year, and we do expect… [that] although things are shut down in Israel, we do expect it to be a really large and meaningful [Games]” when they do take place, she said.
This had also been the first year that American organization OneRoot, which promotes Jewish identity through youth travel to Israel, made subsidies of $4,000 available for junior delegation participants, in exchange for completing online Jewish education modules.
Despite this year’s setback, Mes applauded the organizing and support efforts that had gone into preparing for the trip, including the contributions of both donors and participants.
“The staff [are] all volunteering to go and work for Maccabi Canada, and for the delegation and the Games, and they all worked really, really hard to put this delegation together, so we’re very grateful for that,” she said, adding that delegation members will hear from the organization directly when there are updates.
Ben Shore is a runner on the University of Toronto’s cross-country and track and field teams, and had been named the flag bearer for Canada at this year’s Games. He previously won three medals in 2022, including a bronze for a 5000-metre run in the track component, and had been set to return for a second Games.
“[The Games] were amazing… a really incredible experience, and I was really looking forward going back again,” including competing in a new event, called the Maccabi Run, that had been set to debut this year.
“It’s kind of like a triathlon, but every event is just running, specifically distance running, so we had a half marathon, a 10K, a 5K, and a mile, and all the events were going to be combined for a final score,” explained Shore, who is completing a Master’s degree in chemical engineering when he’s not running.
He notes that the junior delegations normally would also visit for about a week, meeting up with other groups before the Games begin, and describes the reception and widespread interest in Israel during the Games.
“For Jewish athletes, this is a very big deal. [Driving from] the airport in Israel, all the roadways are papered with posters, flags about the Maccabi… signs everywhere talking about the sporting events, where to watch them.”
In his most memorable race last time, in Jerusalem, Shore finished third in the 10-kilometre circuit. (He was awarded a silver medal per his race bracket.)
“I think there were 10,000 athletes there last time,” which include “some semiprofessional runners … running through the streets in the Old City, which was really special.”
The Games give Jewish athletes, who he says have had a tough time in other areas of sport, a chance to see others doing what they’re doing.
“Just seeing the coming together and showing that… we’re strong, we’re proudly Jewish, and competing together as one” gives additional meaning to the large-scale sporting event, he said.
“I was on the beach a few days later, in Tel Aviv, had some people come up and say, ‘Hey, I just saw you, you came third place in that race in Jerusalem.’ That was awesome… an experience unlike anything else.”
Shore says it was a “tremendous show of faith” to know the committee voted to acclaim him as the Canadian flag bearer.
He’s excited and hopeful to still have that chance next year, even though “everything’s up in the air” for now.
“It was supposed to be an incredible [Games]… [people] have been going through some tough times in the past couple of years, and I think it was very important to be able to come together… to show unity. So not being able to do that is obviously very tough… we don’t know what the situation’s going to be like in a year,” he said.
“Though obviously [it’s] completely understandable given the circumstances… as terrible as it is, there’s a lot of people going through a lot more right now in Israel, people having to deal with the attacks and damage.”
He doesn’t take for granted the shared experience that the Games represents for Jewish athletes to meet, compete, and show excellence and unity.
“Getting to meet athletes from around the world that have similar stories to you, it was something really special to be able to compete in,” said Shore, who says while training at UofT athletic facilities, he’ll run into a few of the doctors and coaches from the Maccabi Canada support staff.
Maccabiah “really built some great bonds that I think are unparalleled.”
