About a year ago, Adam (AJ) Edelman spoke on the Upper East Side club Rodney’s; during the set he delivered jokes, but many in the audience didn’t realize he was quite serious when he said he competed in the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea in the skeleton competition. That night, he wore a shirt touting that he is a Zionist and said he was witnessing attempts to make Zionism an evil term.
Edelman (not to be confused with his brother, Alex, who won an Emmy Award for his HBO comedy special “Alex Edelman: Just for Us,” which had a successful Broadway run) helped recruit others for the Israeli bobsled team, including some who had no experience in the sport before. Amazingly, the team qualified for the 2026 Olympics in Milan, Italy.
Speaking to The Jewish Press prior to the February 16 and 17 competitions, Edelman, who wears a yarmulka and is believed to be the first Orthodox athlete to qualify for the Winter Olympics, explained that he dubbed the team “Shul Runnings” in a nod to the 1993 comedy film Cool Runnings about the Jamaican bobsled team, which made the Olympics in 1998 for the first time.
“The guys worked hard and they devoted six months of their life to train hard,” Edelman told The Jewish Press. “I’m not nervous, and I’m proud we were able to meet the goal of getting to the Olympics.”
Before the games had begun, the story that got a lot of media attention was that there was a robbery – both money and passports were stolen – in the apartment where the Israeli bobsled athletes were staying prior to the start of the Olympics.
Edelman said he had tunnel vision to look at what they were there to do.
“The focus is on the competition and we’re glad everyone is safe and none of us walked in on an armed robbery or something like that,” he said, adding that he had no information on whether or not any perpetrator was caught.
The headlines did not stop there. During a two-man race, when Edelman was with Menachem Chen, Swiss broadcaster Stefan Reina said not a single word about the race, but instead said the following according to a translation shown on Drop Site News: “Adam Edelman, first time Olympian and self-defined Zionist to the core who has posted several messages on social media in support of genocide in Gaza. It should be noted that genocide is the term used by the UN Commission of Inquiry to the region. Edelman, who described the Israeli military intervention, and I quote ‘the most morally just war in history.’”
Reina also claimed Edelman mocked a “Free Palestine” sign in Lillehammer and called for support for Ward Fawarsa, a teammate in Milan who Reina said served for the IDF in Gaza.
“This raises the question of his (Edelman’s) presence in (Milan) Cortina during these games,” Reina said.
Edelman, 34, responded to what Reina said on Instagram stating “I am aware of the diatribe the commentator directed towards the Israeli bobsled team on the Swiss Olympic broadcast. I can’t help but notice the contrast. Shul Runnings is a team of 6 proud Israelis who’ve made it to the Olympic stage. No coach with us. No big program. Just a dream, grit and unyielding pride in who we represent. Working together towards such an incredible goal and crushing it. Because that’s what Israelis do. I don’t think it’s possible to witness that and give any credence to the commentary.”
Canadian-Israeli David Greaves, president of the Israeli Olympic Bobsled and Skeleton Federation, told The Jewish Press: “It was shameful and careless and is the reason why Jews are unsafe in the streets of many places around the world. Imagine the uproar if he did that to an athlete from any other nation.”
Larry Sidney, the secretary general of the Federation, also said the Swiss commentary was inappropriate.
“Everyone has the right to their opinion, but a sports broadcast for an Olympic event is simply not the place for that opinion,” Sidney said.
The Israeli Olympic Committee referred to it as “one-sided, political and inflammatory.”
The Swiss channel removed the commentary from online, stating that the reasons was due to length and not due to any factual inaccuracies.
In an interview prior to the competition, Greaves said the Israeli team missed the Beijing Olympics by a hair and was confident that Edelman would have a good chance to qualify if he had a chance to recruit for this 2026 Winter Games.
The team included Edelman, Chen, Fawarsa, Omer Katz and Uri Zisman.
“What AJ has been able to do has been remarkable,” Greaves said. “He’s a special person.”
Edelman was the pilot in the 2-man and 4-man races.
(A key to bobsled is getting off to a good start during the 40- to 50-meter sprint before the athletes get in the bobsled, which can then go as fast as 85 miles per hour. The pilot goes in first and the break-man goes in last after the two pushers in a four-man race.)
Edelman told The Jewish Press before competition that he got along well with athletes from other countries, though, ironically, one Jamaican competitor made a comment about genocide.
Edelman had also said that the favorites were Germany, which has a history of excellence in the sport and spends millions of dollars to prepare. That wound up being true as Germany took all three medals in the 2-man race, with America coming in fourth place. In the 4-man race, Germany took the gold and silver while Canda took bronze. Israel ended up in last place in both of its events.
Edelman told the Associated Press: “We are victors, not victims.” He told The Jewish Press that it was a testament to the team’s determination and hard work that they were able to make the Olympics and he hoped that would be a spring board for future efforts for Israel in the sport and over all in the Winter Olympics.
Greaves said the team bought the belief that if they pushed themselves, they could qualify for the Olympics.
“They all believed they could make it and they made history,” Greaves said.
If you would like to see more, go to: AJ Edelman: The National Mission of an Olympic Athlete