As I write this, a week has passed since the last Maccabi athletes returned to their homes. I thought the Maccabi experience might feel less intense after a few good nights of sleep, but it doesn’t. I still feel grateful and emotional and proud —...

Before traveling to the JCC Maccabi Games in St. Louis, Jared Steele, 15, had more experience in the water than in the clouds. A swimmer from Texas City, a port and refinery city about an hour south of Houston, Jared had never before left Texas. It was...

A sea of blue “Host Family” T-shirts swarmed into Chaifetz Arena Sunday night in anticipation of the 2016 JCC Maccabi Games Opening Ceremony. The crowd numbered between 4,500 and 5,000 people, according to organizers. The host families and spectators...

If you attended the JCC Maccabi Games this week and heard athletes from the St. Louis delegation speaking Hebrew with perfect — seemingly native — accents, it’s understandable that you might have been confused.There were, in fact, 10 athletes from...

Given that the JCC Maccabi Games have been around since 1982, several St. Louisans who took part in them as teenagers are now involved as adults in other aspects of the weeklong competition. What follows are the stories of five local individuals who have...