Legal obstacle course

Israeli parents are required to pay hundreds of shekels every year for medical examinations, whose value and efficiency are doubtful.

By GREER FAY CASHMAN
Israeli flag raised at London's Olympic Village 390 (photo credit: Mark Blinch/Reuters)
Israeli flag raised at London's Olympic Village 390
(photo credit: Mark Blinch/Reuters)
PRIOR TO tonight’s opening of the Olympic Games in London, the Jerusalem Institute for Market Studies (JIMS) issued a report written by JIMS Research Fellow Yarden Gazit which claims that the Israeli Sports Law reduces the potential for winning Olympic medals in the future by setting up unnecessary obstacles and barriers to participation in competitive sports. This has a particularly negative effect on children living in peripheral areas, argues Gazit, who states, “An international comparison reveals that the Israeli Sports Law is one of the strictest and severest in the developed world, while the number of athletes per capita is the lowest in the West.
Israeli parents are required to pay hundreds of shekels every year for medical examinations, whose value and efficiency are doubtful and have never been tested in Israel, and for insurance policies providing double coverage to people already covered.
As a result, there is a decline in the number of children competing in sports.”
The Sports Law requires every athlete in an official competition (including children) to pass a yearly medical examination at a sports medicine clinic recognized by the Health Ministry. Athletes aged 17 and older are required to take an exercise ECG examination. In addition, the law requires athletes to purchase accident insurance.
Gazit notes that only two European countries require exercise ECG examinations, while the rest of Europe, the United States and Australia do not.
Gazit adds that “Child and student athletes are forced to buy two insurance policies, while they only need one.” Children in a recognized school are already insured by their local authority in policies covered by parents’ payments to schools. The insurance covers children for any kind of accident, whether it was related to a school activity or not. However, the policy is not recognized by the Sports Law because the child’s name does not appear on the policy. Similarly, college students pay for accident insurance as part of their student union dues but are required to purchase additional insurance to compete in sports.
■ SPORTS AND Culture Minister Limor Livnat, who publicly criticized Alex Gilady, the only Israeli member of the International Olympic Committee, for not doing enough to persuade the IOC to hold a minute’s silence for the 11 Israeli athletes murdered at the Munich Olympics in 1972, has asked Gilady to intercede on another issue – the correct listing by the BBC of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. On its Olympic website, the BBC originally omitted to list Jerusalem as Israel’s capital but listed East Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine.
Following protests by Israel, it amended the listings to read that Jerusalem is the seat of government of Israel and that East Jerusalem is the intended seat of government of Palestine, which currently has its administrative offices in Ramallah. Livnat is not satisfied with the change and wants Jerusalem to be listed as the capital.
■ IDC HERZLIYA is ecstatic that the International Academic Sports Federation published on its website that in the Israeli sports academic year that has just ended, the IDC women’s teams took first place, the men’s teams took second place out of 30 universities and colleges in the country, and the IDC’s overall team took first place in the country.
Better still, four IDC students and graduates qualified for the Israeli Olympic team squad. Judoka bronze medal winner from Athens 2004, Arik Zeevi, is a graduate of the Radzyner School of Law and is now registered at the Arison School of Business.
Judoka student of the School of Psychology Alice Schlesinger will be competing at her second Olympic Games. The 470-class sailor Vered Buskila, graduate of the Radzyner School of Law and Lauder School of Government, will be participating in her second Olympics.
Star high jumper Danielle Frenkel, a student of the Radzyner School of Law and Arison School of Business, was injured after she qualified and will not be making the trip on this occasion – but there’s always 2016 and plenty of other prestigious international competitions between now and then.
■ IT’S NOT exactly the most clement time to be in Israel, especially for people who suffer in the heat, but there is relief for visitors who stay within the confines of their hotels. For those who stay inside, the air conditioning system provides blessed relief; and for those who prefer to be outside, there’s always the hotel swimming pool.
Guests at the Tel Aviv Hilton have an added advantage as Italian conductor and music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Riccardo Muti, has discovered.
In addition to the pool, the Hilton is right on the Tel Aviv seashore. Muti is in Israel for a series of concerts with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, and most of his concerts were sold out long before his arrival.
■ AMONG VACATIONERS who apparently don’t mind the heat is comedian, actor, writer and filmmaker Sasha Baron Cohen, who is also an avid bike rider. Baron Cohen, who has been coming to Israel since he was a child because he has relatives here, is thrilled with the ease with which he can rent a bike in Tel Aviv and ride to his heart’s delight. During his current vacation, Baron Cohen and members of his family went to one of the restaurants in the Yemenite Quarter to celebrate his father’s 80th birthday.