Posted on 06/02/2006 11:46:01 PM PDT by NZerFromHK
JERUSALEM -- With the soccer World Cup games about to begin next week, the question of which team you are going to support becomes crucial. For an American, it's simple: You support the American team, and if you're Hispanic, you get a bonus, because you can also enjoy Argentina, Costa Rica, Paraguay and Ecuador playing against the rest of the world -- not to mention favorite Brazil.
However, for fans whose country didn't qualify, like Israel, it's not so easy. Of course, people who have immigrated from Argentina or the Ukraine, and there are many of those in Israel, the question is settled. But what about the rest? Should we support Holland, because Dutchmen saved some Jews during the Holocaust? Or Ivory Coast, to stand by the underdog? Or Italy, because their players all look like Leonardo Di Caprio? Tough decision.
We know, though, which team all Israelis are going to hate: Iran. You watch these people chasing the ball and you pray that they stumble, thinking, of course, about a different game, the one their scientists and politicians are playing back home, aimed at destroying Israel. The day will come when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his lieutenants will be coerced to drop their deadly nuclear scheme. In the meantime, let their soccer players suffer a humiliating defeat every time they show up in the stadium.
Recently, however, another team has made itself a candidate to be the most disliked by Israelis: England. The reason? The British National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education has just adopted a resolution calling for a boycott on Israeli universities, because of Israel's policies toward the Palestinians.
That such a resolution should be adopted when Israel has shown its will to stop ruling the Palestinians -- first by pulling out of Gaza and then by indicating its intention for more withdrawals in the West Bank -- is a testimony to the hypocrisy of these so-called educators.
But is this just a criticism of Israel's policies? Anti-Defamation League National Director Abraham Foxman, author of Never Again? The Threat of the New Anti-Semitism, believes that there is more. Writing in the International Herald Tribune in April 2005, when the British organization initiated this sinister resolution, he wrote, ``The call to boycott Israeli academic institutions has hundreds of supporters in Europe, nourished by a growing climate of anti-Zionism that is often indistinguishable from anti-Semitism.''
Alexander Yacobson, a columnist in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, concurs. Last week he wrote that coalition forces in Iraq kill civilians ''much more easily'' than Israeli troops in the occupied territories, but that Israeli universities were nevertheless singled out for sanction. ''There is no escaping the conclusion that beyond any legitimate political criticism, the emotional stance of Europe toward Israel is influenced -- and not only on the margins -- by the deep and ancient European obsession and pathology regarding the Jewish nation,'' he wrote.
Hotbeds of free thinking
Indeed, I would have liked to see those Brits, who uphold human rights so much, pass a resolution boycotting Iran because of its president's threats to eliminate Israel and for denying the Holocaust. But that, of course, is asking too much.
Also, there is something totalitarian and McCarthyite in this British approach. Obviously trying to recycle the boycott that worked against South Africa, the British boycotters ignore the fact that unlike in South Africa, where the universities were part and parcel of the apartheid system, the universities in Israel are hotbeds of free thinking and many of their faculty and students are critical of the government's policies. By indiscriminately boycotting the Israeli universities, the British educators will only strengthen those in Israel, mainly from the right, who have always said, ``Why bother, the world is against us anyway.''
Many Israeli academicians are trying to cooperate with their Palestinian colleagues, believing that big politics aside, people of goodwill and capabilities from both sides should work together for a better future for their peoples. By their senseless and vicious motion, the British educators will only undermine such efforts.
That's it. When David Beckham, Wayne Rooney and the other English players walk into the stadium, I'll pray for their defeat, even by Iran. Well, maybe that's too harsh. Let Saudi Arabia beat them.
I understand the author's intentions. But let's dose some reality with the tournament's arrangements: England won't meet Saudi Arabia until the semi-finals, and I'm certain Saudi Arabia won't make it far and it will be less than 1/3 chance England will make it to the semis.
If Iran makes to to the final 8, it may meet England in the Quarter-finals, but again it is highly doubtful if Iran will make it past the group stage.
Time to read the schedules first, Mr Dromi.
Israel and soccer ping!
Official website: http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com/06/en/
As most of you know, USA qualified for the World Cup and will play their first game against the second-ranked Czech Republic on June 12 in Gelsenkirchen. After facing the Czechs, the U.S. plays Italy in Kaiserslautern on June 17 and concludes group play against Ghana in Nuremberg on June 22.
I'm not optimistic the US will get out of the group stage this time - and day by day it seems it could be 1998 deja vu. In contarst I think Australia will have a large chance to surprise everyone, with Hiddink as their coach and all first XI choices that play at a higher level (Premiership, Bundesliga, Durch league, and Serie A) than many of the US team's 1st XI.
Secondly, if he believes that academics in the United States are any different from those in Britain, he hasn't really been paying attention recently. Edward Said made his home at Columbia University, not Oxford.
Regards, Ivan
Really, are we supposed to care who wins? If so, why? If the winner got to push the button on Iran I would care.Until then I don't,
Group E tactics (great article)
http://soccernet.espn.go.com/columns/story?id=368729&root=worldcup&cc=5901
...When it comes to soccer....not really...
(but then we don't root for any one in soccer)
Given recent difficulties, one should at least hope that humiliation is repeated.
Addtionally, they are really quite good.
Regards, Ivan
Doesn't matter if those two are on the England squad or not - it's just such a catchy tune, you can't help but sing along!
This is right, but let me be the devil's advocate here: one crucial difference is that American pro-Palestinian academics (which basically means almost all of US academics in humanities etc) at least still invite Israel's Chomsky clones to conferences that they organize, while they would be treated as personae non grata among members of the British National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education, notwithstanding these Israeli academics are just as self-loathing anti-Israel as they themselves.
I just bought my England jersey today. I hope the Israeli's out there can forgive me ;)
I do also wonder about what this fellow feels about the Sorbonne. Whatever British academics have said, that's nothing compared to the vitriolic hatred they'd get from French academia.
Regards, Ivan
Did the American have "INS" on there jersey?
Probably the hatred stems from the days of Palestinian Mandate, I don't know. I think they have spoken out against France's Muslim and white far right and left-wing anti-Semitism as well.
Anyway, so much with politics about the World Cup. At least because HK was a former British colony we grew up watching English football. I know many of my friends in HK root for England in the competition. Let's see who wins LOL.
It was a burning humiliation for the Mexicans, truly.
Regards, Ivan
Stupid article, if you are hispanic.... and they don't name Mexico?
As for me, I'm a huge football fan, love the American team. We have a super tough group that we probably won't make out of, no slight on our team, but the Czechs and the Italians are the cream of the crop.
Barring the US and given the fact that my other country, Ireland didn't make it, I will cheer for England, the Netherlands and the "new" African teams, Togo, Cote'de Ivorie, and Ghana and some respect for Tunisia.
I will be, as always against Mexico, France, Argentina, Spain, Croatia and Serbia (still with Montenegro....for now), as well as Iran.
But that is the fun of World Cup, the whole world, the whole spectacle, the rivals, and the groups of death.
The US Mexico game last cup was a thing of beauty. Only matched by our qualifier in the ice and snow of Columbus when the Mexicans were befuddled by the ice and more importantly by the fans, who, unlike 4 years earlier in LA were all American, and all rooting for their side.
That being said...
We have a great team, but is it good enough to beat or draw CZ and Italy? I don't think so, but that is the luck of the draw every 4 years. If we beat Ghana, and draw Italy, we might qualify, but we would need CZ to draw Italy.
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