An Olympic ritual that really must end

An Olympic ritual that really must end


Adi Rubinstein




Every four years, we go through the same ritual when the issue of a minute's silence for the Munich 11 comes up. Is Israel's request legitimate? Absolutely. Are members of the International Olympic Committee hypocrites? Absolutely. Is the Israeli Knesset also filled with hypocrites? The answer is affirmative. What about the Israeli football association? What about your place of work? That's just the way it goes. No one is more anti-Semitic than us in the way we deal with ourselves.


If a minute's silence is held, the Arab nations will boycott the Games – and they are more important than the Israeli Olympic family.


Want to flex your muscles? Go ahead. If there isn't a minute's silence, then Zvi Varshaviak, president of Israel's Olympic Committee, won't fly to Rio de Janeiro for conferences ahead of the next Games. Doesn't it make sense? Enough with the cocktail parties!


Representatives of the finalists who are hoping to stage the 2020 Olympics are due to visit Israel at the end of the year. The delegation will include representatives from Qatar, Azerbaijan and Turkey. Please, go and demonstrate outside their Eilat hotel rooms and demand a minute's silence for the Munich victims. Or perhaps by then the matter will be forgotten and we'll meet again in another four years.


And then the usual commentary articles will appear attacking Alex Gilady – the Israeli member on the IOC. Full disclosure: in March, Gilady treated me to a steak in London. He picked up the bill and laughed that the steak was too expensive for a journalist, just like he was once.


The attacks against Gilady are reminiscent of the attacks against Jacob Erel, a senior UEFA official: If you're Israeli, then look out for your country. And if Milan is scared to come to Israel because there's shooting in the middle of Tel Aviv, then you've forgotten your roots.


Then follow the accusations that these people are ashamed of being Israeli. It's funny – like there isn't one Israeli tourist who doesn't tell his children not to speak Hebrew in crowded, busy places, and also wishes that everyone around him thinks he is Italian.


Many Israeli sports people have received scholarships from the IOC when their own country did nothing for them, many Israeli journalists have been invited to major sporting events, including major projects linked to the upcoming Olympics.


And a large part of this is thanks to the man from Ramat Hasharon who sits on the committee of the corrupt. Oh and in Rio, when dozens of Israelis are guaranteed employment for the next few years through security, communications and construction contracts, we will first and foremost remember that the IOC and the Israeli IOC member are anti-Semites who hate Israel and hate having moments of silence. And so the caravan moves on.


http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=2291