Auburn University men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl will lead his team to the Final Four this weekend, highlighting an already impressive season, throughout which Pearl has used the spotlight to call for the release of the remaining Gaza hostages.
Pearl, a Jew who proudly calls Israel “the ancestral homeland for the Jewish people,” opened a press conference viewed by millions after the Auburn Tigers’s victory over Creighton earlier this month by drawing attention to 21-year-old American hostage Edan Alexander. 
“I believe it was God’s plan to give us this success – success beyond what we deserve,” Pearl said. “To give us this platform. To give me an opportunity to start this conference really briefly and remind the world that Edan Alexander is still held hostage in Gaza right now. … Bring the hostages home.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl opens post-game presser by calling to “bring the hostages home.” <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/israel?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#israel</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/hamas?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#hamas</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ncaa?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#ncaa</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/marchmadness?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#marchmadness</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/auburn?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#auburn</a> <a href="https://t.co/Jb93kYXYEd">pic.twitter.com/Jb93kYXYEd</a>
&mdash; WVTM 13 (@WVTM13) <a href="https://twitter.com/WVTM13/status/1903643988906684589?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 23, 2025</a></blockquote>
Alexander is believed to be the last living American hostage in Hamas captivity.
Later in the press conference, Pearl said Israel is “under attack, it’s under siege, and all it wants to do is live in peace with its neighbors.”
“There are some Arab countries that are actually wanting peace with Israel right now, but there is a segment of the population that there in the Middle East who have been doing nothing but attacking Israel for 85 years,” Pearl added. “October 7th was the worst day since the Holocaust for the Jewish people, and they [Hamas] say they want to do it again and again and again. We have Americans who are held hostage in Gaza right now. It’s unacceptable.”
Pearl was wearing the dog tag “Bring Them Home” necklace during the conference.
Last week, Pearl <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/video/6370463736112">was interviewed</a> on Fox News, where he called for the release of the 59 remaining Hamas hostages, with Israeli flags behind him in his office. Pearl said he was going to go to the press conference and just talk about the game, but as he was walking with his players, he changed his mind.
“I was thanking God for the blessings that we’ve had, and in some ways, He spoke to me. He said, &#8216;Remember where you came from, take advantage of this opportunity.&#8217;”
Pearl said he asked his players if they were okay with him bringing up Alexander’s name, and they said they said they  “absolutely” were.
“I just feel like so much of our success at Auburn has been because we pray first, we thank God first for the blessings,” he said. “I’m grateful to be a citizen of this country and be Jewish. And we gotta call out the difference between this good and this evil.”
Pearl added that he believes President Donald Trump is getting close to securing the release of the hostages. 
Israeli President Isaac Herzog thanked Pearl during a video call Thursday for supporting Israel and calling to release the hostages.
“You have raised the plight of our hostages in the most important arena of the United States public,” Herzog said, <a href="https://www.jns.org/herzog-thanks-coach-pearl-for-supporting-hostages-in-gaza/">according to Jewish News Syndicate</a>. “This is the most important issue for humanity to my mind, because it shows how we are dealing with cruelty and the urgent need to bring innocent people home.”
A <a href="https://www.jns.org/herzog-thanks-coach-pearl-for-supporting-hostages-in-gaza/">recent piece</a> in The Jerusalem Post compared Pearl to legendary Jewish baseball player Sandy Koufax, who skipped pitching in Game 1 of the 1965 World Series for the Los Angeles Dodgers to observe the Jewish holiday of repentance, Yom Kippur, cementing him as a symbol of Jewish pride. 
Pearl <a href="https://www.al.com/auburnbasketball/2025/03/bruce-pearl-invites-family-of-american-hostage-to-auburns-sweet-16-game-vs-michigan.html">invited</a> Edan Alexander&#8217;s family to Friday’s game against Michigan State. The family met Danny Wolf, a 7-foot American-Israeli basketball player who proudly showcases his Jewish identity. Wolf obtained Israeli citizenship to represent the Jewish State at the FIBA U20 European Championship in Greece, where the team won a silver medal. Prior to joining Michigan, Wolf faced anti-Semitism after Hamas’s October 7 massacre while playing for Yale University.
“It was against Dartmouth,” he recalled to the <a href="https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/article-846984">Detroit Free Press</a>. “There were (more than 80) fans who came to the game disguised. And then, minutes into the game, they broke out chanting and holding Palestinian flags. And it was a small gym, so everyone’s focus turned to that.” 

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Vocally Pro-Israel Coach Leads Auburn To The Final Four