Maple Leafs hire Sundin, Chayka to lead front office

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Maple Leafs hire Sundin, Chayka to lead front office

2026-05-04 07:02 Last Updated At：07:10

TORONTO (AP) — The Toronto Maple Leafs hired former captain Mats Sundin as senior executive adviser of hockey operations and John Chayka as general manager Sunday.

The moves mark a reset of the club’s front office after a season that ended with Toronto missing the playoffs for the first time since 2016.

The team said Sundin will provide support across hockey operations, with a focus on team culture, player development and leadership support.

“This fan base deserves greatness and I am grateful for the opportunity to help this team, organization and city achieve that,” Sundin said in a release.

Toronto fired GM Brad Treliving in March, near the end of the disastrous campaign for the Maple Leafs, who entered the season among the Stanley Cup favorites.

The club also did not replace president Brendan Shanahan after he was let go in May 2025.

Sundin and Chayka arrive with the organization still searching for its first Stanley Cup since 1967.

The Maple Leafs’ career points leader, Sundin had a complicated Toronto exit in 2008 before a brief stint with the Vancouver Canucks, but remains a fan favorite for his 13 seasons in blue and white.

The 55-year-old Swede, who was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2012 and returned home to start a family after retiring, has never held a formal management position in the game.

The 36-year-old Chayka became the NHL’s youngest GM when he was hired by the Arizona Coyotes a decade ago. His time in the desert was marked by an analytics-heavy push and bold trades.

“I’m honored to join the Toronto Maple Leafs organization and excited to work alongside Mats and the entire organization,” Chayka said in a statement. “This is one of hockey’s most historic franchises, with a passionate fan base who want to win."

Chayka abruptly resigned in July 2020 on the eve of the league’s pandemic restart and was subsequently suspended by commissioner Gary Bettman for one year in 2021 for “conduct detrimental to the league and game” after pursuing job opportunities with other teams while still employed by the Coyotes.

Arizona was also docked first- and second-round picks for holding unauthorized workouts with draft prospects under his watch, in breach of the league’s scouting combine policy.

Chayka hadn’t worked in the NHL since.

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Foreign visitors return to Jewish pilgrimage in Tunisia under tight security

DJERBA, Tunisia (AP) — The annual Jewish pilgrimage to the 26-century-old El-Ghriba Synagogue in Tunisia drew a modest but notable return of international visitors this year, worshipping together under tight security after a deadly 2023 attack disrupted the festival.

Visitors came from France, China, Ivory Coast and Italy, including France’s ambassador to Tunisia, a symbolic gesture after two French citizens were among those killed in the 2023 attack. A national guardsman shot and killed five people at the El-Ghriba synagogue soon after the festival that year, spreading fear among the local Jewish population and international pilgrims.

Participants said about 500 people have attended this year’s pilgrimage, held on the Mediterranean island of Djerba from April 30 to May 6 to celebrate the Lag B’Omer Jewish holiday. Jews have lived in Tunisia since Roman times, and the pilgrimage remains central to the country’s small but long-standing Jewish community.

Inside the synagogue, the atmosphere was calm and devotional, while also buzzing with conversations and social exchanges. Worshippers lit candles, read sacred texts and wrote wishes on eggs later placed in a sacred cave within the complex, a tradition believed to bring blessings.

Among them was Redj Cahen, a Tunisian-Italian pilgrim who returned after missing last year’s gathering. “We are back, and we are proud to be Tunisian Jews,” he said. “It is a feeling you cannot explain. Only those who come here understand.”

The gathering draws both local worshippers and members of the diaspora returning to their ancestral roots and has long been seen as a symbol of coexistence, attracting Muslim visitors alongside Jewish pilgrims.

A visible but contained security presence surrounded the synagogue, while heavier measures were deployed at access points to the island, where police checkpoints and barricades controlled entry. Vehicles were searched and identification documents carefully inspected. Within Djerba, security was especially concentrated in Hara Seghira and Hara Kebira, the island’s main Jewish quarters.

Despite security worries, the traditional “Minara” procession took place for the first time since the 2023 attack, signaling a cautious easing of restrictions.

The Minara, a pyramid-shaped tower of gold and silver, is placed at the center of the synagogue. Women drape it with colorful scarves in a gesture associated with good fortune, fertility and marriage. A symbolic auction of paintings and Jewish religious items follows as part of a traditional fundraiser for the synagogue’s maintenance, after which the scarf-laden Minara is placed on a cart and paraded outside to the sounds of the traditional darbuka drum, singing and throwing of candy. It is later brought back into the synagogue, concluding one of the event’s pillar traditions.

The pilgrimage, one of the oldest in Africa, has historically drawn thousands from around the world. Attendance dropped sharply after the 2023 shooting outside the synagogue that killed two pilgrims and three security officers. The synagogue was also targeted by a 2002 truck bombing by al-Qaida that killed about 20 people.

“This year’s Ghriba pilgrimage marks a gradual return,” said former Tourism Minister René Trabelsi. “We are returning little by little.''

Trabelsi said Tunisian authorities had pushed to maintain the pilgrimage despite the challenges. The event plays an important role in supporting the local economy.

Khedir Hnaia, who has worked at the synagogue for more than three decades, welcomed the return of longtime visitors. “We would like to reflect a good image to the world, to bring back the glory of Ghriba and make it even better than how it used to be,” he said.

“We need to stand up for our country, we love Tunisia very much and in the same way our country stood up for us we will always stand up for it,” said Haim Haddad, a member of the pilgrimage organizing committee from Zarzis.

Ben Mbarek reported from Tunis, Tunisia.