Amar’e Stoudemire To Return To Israeli Basketball, If No NBA Team Wants Him

Amar’e Stoudemire Image by Getty Images

By JTA July 1, 2018

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Former NBA All-Star Amar’e Stoudemire will return to the Israeli Hapoel Jerusalem basketball team, if he does not secure a position in the NBA.

The team made the announcement Sunday, saying that the all-star’s return was conditioned on him not finding a spot on an NBA team.

Stoudemire played for the New York Knicks and Phoenix Suns among other teams in a 16-year NBA career.

Stoudemire previously played for the team for a year, and left in September 2017, citing a desire to return to the NBA. Israeli media reported at the time that he had a rocky relationship with the Hapoel Jerusalem coach and his son was barred from playing on a local team because he is not an Israeli citizen.

Stoudemire is a partial owner of Hapoel, which he had to suspend in order to play.

During the 2016-2017 season, the team with his help won Israeli championships and reached the semifinals of the EuroCup tournament.

Stoudemire identifies with the Hebrew Israelites, African-Americans who believe they are connected to the biblical Israelites, and observes Jewish holidays. He told HBO sports reporter Jon Frankel at an event at Harvard University in April that he is “in the process” of converting.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO