More on Israeli sports vs. international politics

Harvey Araton, who recently wrote about the decision by UAE officials to ban Israeli tennis star Shahar Peer from participation in the Barclays tournament in Dubai, contributed this column on former Maccabi Tel Aviv basketball star Anthony Parker and his take on the difficulties of participating in sports in the Middle East.

I had the opportunity to take in an exhibition game between Tel Aviv and the New York Knicks prior to the 2007 season. Several members of the Israeli team were originally from the U.S. Perhaps they were being politically correct when the spoke of how much they enjoyed playing in the Holy Land, and how “messed up” it was that there was so much violence in the region.

Parker, who currently plies his trade for the Toronto Raptors in the NBA, conveyed the sentiment in Araton’s column:

“Oh, yeah, you feel it,” he said, when asked if there was a stigma attached to playing for Maccabi. “It’s not with the other players or anything, but with the atmosphere, the fans. They’d wave Palestinian flags. They’d yell things.

“And we always had security, beefed-up security. We’d have it in the hotels, on the bus. Going through the towns on the way to the arena, we had police escorts. For us, that was the norm.”

Comparing Parker with Peer’s situation, Araton notes,

Security was also the rationale last week in Dubai, where [she] was denied a visa to enter the United Arab Emirates to play in a major tennis event. No one explained why officials waited until the 11th hour and 59th minute to announce their decision. When widespread condemnation ensued and the tournament was threatened with extinction, security conditions miraculously improved.

A visa, the authorities said, would be given to the Israeli doubles player Andy Ram for the coming men’s tournament. (Andy Roddick has said he will boycott on principle, and good for him.)

Justin Gimelstob, a player representative on the ATP Board, said earlier this month that if Ram had been denied entry to Dubai it would have “serious ramifications” that would be dealt with “harshly.”

“We have to wait for all the official information to come in and see what the reason for the denial is” if it happens, Gimelstob said. “Tennis is the ultimate meritocracy and we take pride in that.”

Gimelstob — a 2006 inductee of the JCC MetroWest Jewish Sports Hall of Fame with 10 singles and 15 doubles titles as a professional — said there was “no room for interpretation” in the ATP rules for the rejection of a player based on nationality, a situation he called “surprising, disappointing, demoralizing and repulsive.”

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Kaplan’s Korner on Jews and Sports © 2009 New Jersey Jewish News

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