Mariachis played in the lobby of the Tucson Convention Center arena Monday night, welcoming participants and spectators to the Opening Ceremony of the Tucson JCC Maccabi Games® & Access.
The Maccabi Games are a weeklong Olympic-style athletic competition for teens, celebrating Jewish identity and connection. Tucson last hosted the games in 2000.
Inside, New York-based comedian Eitan Levine, the master of ceremonies, gave each delegation a personalized introduction – for example, calling the combined North and South Carolina group “a Carolina mega-team like Optimus Prime but with better barbecue” – as 876 teen athletes filed into the arena, many dancing and jumping for joy. Spectators waved flags and cheered for the Israeli and Ukrainian delegations.
Speakers included DJ Yarin Ilovich, aka Artifex, who was the DJ playing at the Nova Music Festival on the morning of Oct. 7, 2023, when the Hamas attack started.
Artifex, a DJ since age 16, lost many friends in the massacre and said that for a long time afterward, he couldn’t bear to hear the music that until then had been the center of his life.
A therapist urged him to listen for just a second or two, a little more each day, and now he is back to loving music, making “We Will Dance Again” his motto. On the dance floor, he said, it doesn’t matter if you are a Jew, Muslim, or Christian, black or white – you are just a dancer.
As he played throbbing electronic music, the teens created a mosh pit in front of the stage.
Israeli Judoka Ori Sasson, the second Israeli to win two Olympic medals, told the crowd about his bout with an Egyptian who refused to shake his hand at the 2016 games. Years later, when Sasson was giving a talk in the U.S., another Egyptian apologized for his countryman’s behavior.
Former U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords and her husband, Sen. Mark Kelly, sent a video greeting, and U.S. Rep. Juan Ciscomani spoke live.
Barney Holtzman, Tucson JCC Maccabi Chair, spoke about the Maccabi Games’ six core midot, or values, such as respect, repairing the world, and Jewish peoplehood.
Jewish Philanthropies of Southern Arizona President and CEO Hava Leipzig Holzhauer had the honor of bringing in the torch to light the Maccabi flame, passing it to Tucson JCC Maccabi Chair Barney Holtzman and Tucson Jewish Community Center Chair Caron Mitchell.
After the ceremony, the teens headed home with their host families, excited for three more days to play sports, make new friends, celebrate Jewish peoplehood – and, as Levine, the emcee, exhorted them in a nod to Tucson’s heat, “Hydrate! Hydrate! Hydrate!”
