Why in the world is Israel taking part in the Winter Olympic Games? What does the Holy Land have to do with winter? How many athletes are actually born and bred Sabras that will participate in the games? What is the point of sending a delegation of half a dozen athletes to Beijing?<\/p>\n
These are questions that I have been posed time and time again over the the years just as the Winter Games are about to open and people see that the blue-and-white have athletes in a small number of disciplines that will take to the snow or the ice with a fleeting chance to win a medal or even advance to a final.<\/p>\n
Why should we waste our time and our energy participating in sports that in reality have very little to do with Israel at all.<\/p>\n
Figure skating? Skiing? Speed skating? Skelton? This can\u2019t be what Israel is all about.<\/p>\n
However, truth be told it has absolutely everything to do with Israel, the Jewish people and what we are all about as we take a look back at the country\u2019s history in the Winter Games. <\/p>\n
Israel took part in the Winter Olympics for the first time backing 1994 when a delegation of a grand total of one participated in the games being held in Lillehammer, Norway. To put the country\u2019s participation in these Games into perspective, Israel first went to the Summer Olympics in 1952 when they were held in Helsinki, Finland and it was almost half a century since joining the Winter Games. <\/p>\n
Michael Shmerkin, born in Odessa, Ukraine immigrated to the Holy Land together with his family and became the first ever Israeli athlete to don the blue-and-white at the Winter Games as he took to the ice and placed 16th overall in the men\u2019s figure skating event.<\/p>\n
In 1998 at Nagano, Japan, Shmerkin once again took part in the Olympics but was joined by Ice Dancers Galit Chait and Sergei Sakhnovski. Chait who was born in Kfar Saba was the first native Israeli to take part in the games while her partner Sakhnovski was born in Moscow. The pair trained for the games in Russia as there wasn\u2019t a suitable ice surface available at the time in Israel.<\/p>\n
At the Salt Lake City games in 2002, Chait and Sakhnovski once again took to the ice and were joined by another pair Natalia Gudina and Alexei Beletski who were born in Odessa and were also Israel\u2019s first married couple to participate in the Olympic Games. Olga Danilov rounded out the five person delegation as the Kharkiv, Ukarine native took part in women\u2019s short track speed skating.<\/p>\n
The following games in Turin, Italy saw Israel send its first skier in Mykhaylo Renzhyn to the games as the Latvian born alpine specialist made sure to add yet another discipline to the blue-and-white arsenal. Israeli also sent their first brother-sister team as Roman and Alexandra Zaretsky who made Aliyah to Metualla from Minsk, Belarus in 1990 took part in the ice dancing competition together with Chait and Sakhnovski.<\/p>\n
In 2010, Israel\u2019s delegation to Vancouver, Canada dropped back to only 3 participants as the Zaretsky siblings once again featured as well as Renzhyn, but the 2014 games in Sochi saw the country\u2019s numbers jump back up to five with all brand new athletes to take the place of the previous generation.<\/p>\n
Skier Virgile Vandeput originally from Anderlecht, Belgium punched his ticket to the games but was injured and missed out of competition, Vladislav Bykanov from Lviv, Ukraine became Israel\u2019s first men\u2019s short track speed skater while Alexei Bychenko originally from Kyiv represented Israel in men\u2019s figure skating. Rounding out the group were Andrea Davidovich from Burlington, Vermont and Evgeni Krasnopolski from Kiev who took part in pairs skating.<\/p>\n
What was so significant in these games was for the first time an athlete originally from both North America and Europe made the Israeli team as the base of potential athletes began to widen.<\/p>\n
The 2018 Winter Olympics were a banner games for Israel as the country sent a whopping 10 athletes to South Korea with not only Israelis from the former Soviet Union, but North America, Europe and a record number of native born Sabras as well. <\/p>\n
Bychenko, Bykanov and Krasnopolski were all back while the latter had a new partner in New York\u2019s Paige Connors. Other newcomers were AJ Edelman an Orthodox Jew from Boston who took part in Skeleton, skier Itamar Biran from London and another Boston native in Aimee Buchanan who participated in the team skating event.<\/p>\n
Adel Tankova from Dnipro, Ukraine and Kiryat Shemona native Ronald Zilberberg took part in the ice dancing competition while Israel\u2019s second Sabra Daniel Samohin from Tel Aviv joined Bychenko in men\u2019s figure skating. <\/p>\n
This year, Israel has a delegation of 6 athletes with Bychenko and Bykanov both taking part in the Beijing games along with Krasnopolski who teams up this time around with New Jersey native Hailey Kops. Rounding out the group is Israel\u2019s second Winter Games brother and sister team as Barnab\u00e1s and Noa Sz\u0151ll\u0151s born in Budapest, Hungary will each take part in their respective skiing competitions.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, Edelman along with his bobsled team just came up short of qualifying for the Olympics which would have bumped up Israel\u2019s delegation to double digits and a record number of Israeli born athletes. <\/p>\n
There is hope as there always is that the Israeli athletes will finish the various disciplines as high as they can but truly what is the ultimate goal of the country\u2019s participation in the Winter Games?<\/p>\n
Of course winning a medal and standing on the podium watching the Israeli flag raised high to the sky while HaTikva is played is the ultimate goal but no less important is the ability to represent Israel with pride and be a light onto the nations. There are no delusions that Israel will be as successful as it was this past summer when a record haul of two gold and two bronze medals along with participating in a number of finals in the pool and on the track. <\/p>\n
The Olympic Games, whether the Summer or Winter variety are an opportunity for Israel to compete alongside all of the other countries in the world, whether they are friend or foe. <\/p>\n
Israel being in the Olympics has a more global effect on Jews around the world to be proud of their heritage whether they live in the United States, Europe, Russia or countries of the former Soviet Union. It is a chance to learn more about country of the Bible and that of their forefathers and foremothers while being the greatest vehicles for \u201cHasbara\u201d and a beacon for the other athletes who may not know much about Israel other than what they see on television or in the newspapers. They are living proof of the story of the ingathering of the exiles from all corners of the world to Israel and to represent the country at the highest level of sports and of sportsmanship.<\/p>\n
Israel has and will always be a country built by Olim (immigrants) to the Holy Land whether it is because of persecution or for the love and belief in our very young nation. <\/p>\n
The Winter Games are a chance to walk side by side and hand by hand with the best of the best and an opportunity to hold the Israeli flag high when walking into the opening ceremonies for the entire world to see. <\/p>\n
Our six athletes this year understand that they have a great responsibility representing the blue-and-white and with that in mind will do the best that they can do no matter what for they have an entire nation resting of their shoulders in the snow and on the ice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Why in the world is Israel taking part in the Winter Olympic Games? What does the Holy Land have to do with winter? How many athletes are actually born and bred Sabras that will participate in the games? What is the point of sending a delegation of half a dozen athletes to Beijing? These are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":50886,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4074],"tags":[29,1229],"class_list":["post-50885","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-jews-in-sports","tag-israel","tag-olympics","et-has-post-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"yoast_head":"\n