28.10.2018
Sometimes protest does lead to a good outcome! For the first time, Israeli judoka were able to compete in Abu Dhabi under the Israeli flag and – because they won – with the Israeli national anthem! Thank you to everyone who made this happen!
https://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Israeli-Judoka-Sagi-Muki-wins-gold-medal-in-Abu-Dhabi-570533
06.02.2018
The Deutscher Judobund invited us to talk, on 24/25.2.2018 at the Grand Slam in Düsseldorf, with the president of the world judo federation about the fact that the Israeli judoka in Abu Dhabi were only allowed to compete without a flag and without a national anthem and that some Arab judoka had refused to shake hands with them. We would have wished for a prompt, visible positioning by the Deutscher Judobund on this,
We did not accept the invitation to talk, however, since we are a primarily domestically oriented association and do not regard such a conversation as our task. The president of the Deutscher Judobund, Peter Frese, explained to us that the political aim is to normalise the role of the Israeli team in the world judo federation step by step. The German athletes, he said, had had good relations with the Israelis on the ground.
Since the world judo federation depends appreciably on Arab money, this process of normalisation is a laborious one. We have encouraged the Deutscher Judobund to contribute the maximum to it and wish it every success in that as well as in the competitions!
30.12.2017
Despite a friendly reminder email of 12.11.17 we have to this day (30.12.17) received no reply. Such ignorance cannot be explained and makes all statements about sportsmanship and fair play appear to be meaningless talk.
28.10.2017
On 28.10.2017 we wrote to the president of the Deutscher Judobund, Mr Peter Frese, after Israeli judoka had been discriminated against at an international competition in the United Arab Emirates and this had been accepted without comment by the German judoka represented there:
Dear Mr Frese,we are interested to know whether, when and how the DJB will react to the treatment of the Israeli athletes by the IJF and the UAEJWU as local host?! Neither your website, nor social media, nor the press contains any indication of your positioning on the incident.As you will certainly know, the host forbade the Israelis to display their flag on their sportswear and to have their national anthem played. Other – Arab – participants refused to shake hands with the Israeli athlete.Our initiative sees itself as the voice of Jewish Germans, which consistently stands up for the values of the free democratic basic order. And this not only within Germany, but also where German organisations ought to follow these values abroad. Germany and Israel are members of the EJU and of the IJF.
We point out that we will publish your reply.
Yours sincerely
Dr. Elio Adler,
Founder of the WerteInitiative.
