TIMES OF ISRAEL
2 NFL stars pull out of Israel government publicity trip
by Gavin Rabinowitz
February 11, 2017

Two top US National Football League players have pulled out of publicity trip to Israel, saying that they do not want to be “used” by the Israeli government. Seahawks defensive end Michael Bennett was the first to pull out of the trip planned for 12 football stars to tour Israel, including stops at Rambam hospital, Yad Vashem, and Jordan River’s Yardenit baptismal site. Bennett first tweeted a picture of Martin Luther King Jr., saying “Im not going to Israel.”….I was not aware until reading this article about the trip in The Times of Israel that my itinerary was being constructed by the Israeli government for the purposes of making me, in the words of a government official, an ‘influencer and opinion-former’ who would then be ‘an ambassador of good will.’” READ MORE