|
December 10, 2010
How to say “hut” in Hebrew
Israelis and Palestinians huddle, as football finds some new fans.
ARIEH O’SULLIVAN THE MEDIA LINE
On a warm November night at Jerusalem’s Kraft Stadium, the Israel Football League’s (IFL) Judean Rebels demolished the Herzliyah Hammers in a rowdy American-style football game.
The two teams couldn’t be more contrasting. The veteran Rebels, in their orange jerseys, is made up of a gumbo of characters, including Jewish settlers, Palestinians, American-born seminary students and ultra-Orthodox Jews. The Hammers, a new expansion team donning white shirts with hand-drawn numbers, are mainly native-born and many are veterans of elite Israeli army combat units.
It quickly became a massacre as the Rebels shut down the Hammers, who had ventured up to Jerusalem from the Tel Aviv suburb of Herzilyah, on the Mediterranean coast.
The evening’s game leader, the Judean Rebels, staged a revolution of sorts. Nowhere is the cliché that sports brings people together more apparent than on this team, which has Jewish settlers playing side by side with West Bank Palestinians.
This is a serious contact sport and there’s a reason the padding is so heavy. Bones can be and are broken. On the first play of this game, a player from the Herzliyah Hammers suffered a fracture and had to be taken out by an ambulance crew.
“I love this game, because we get to hit people,” said Shlomo Schachter, a heavy offensive lineman on the Judean Rebels.
“We don’t get hurt,” chimed in his teammate, Musa Elyyan. “We hurt the other people.”
Schachter, his long and sweaty peyot (side curls) framing the sides of his face, was pumped up. His team was having a great night against the hapless Hammers as they rocked touchdown after touchdown. Schachter played college football in the United States in his earlier life and dreamed about playing in the Holy Land.
“One of the ways we are a rebellion is that we’re trying to create a new path in the world and create a coexistence between Palestinians and settlers together in the West Bank, that we have people together to play football,” Schachter said.
Elyyan lives in the village of Beit Hanina, north of Jerusalem. He grew up in the United States and moved to the West Bank with his three brothers a few years ago. Hooked on football, they began searching out the sport. One team – the Jerusalem Lions – were hesitant about letting them join, fearing it would bring tensions. But Schachter’s team scooped them up, all of them putting aside the fact that the Rebels were mostly religious residents of Jewish settlements.
Elyyan said no one hassles him or his brothers about playing on a team with settlers. “We are as [Schachter] says a revolution. This is a rebellion. We are the first team of Israelis and Palestinians who get along and work as a team unit. We can create a model on the field and we can create one off the field,” Elyyan insisted.
Though one could say that this particular game was about coexistence, about bringing Jews and Arabs together, about bringing religious and secular together, really football seems to be about killing your opponent with the ball.
“Israelis find American-style football so interesting both because it is physical and because it is strategic. There are all sorts of strategic moves. We especially have a lot of combat soldiers playing, also Israeli Arabs. We have foreign workers and also Russian immigrants, and a whole core of Americans, including some who played organized football back in the U.S.,” said Steve Lebowitz, the president of American Football in Israel, which runs IFL.
On the night of the Rebels-Hammers match-up, the small stadium was filled with spectators, who paid about the price of a movie to watch. Hotdogs and beer added to the American atmosphere. The IFL plays on a 60-yard field instead of the 100-yard ones in the United States and 110-yard fields in Canada. The Kraft stadium and its Astroturf in Jerusalem were sponsored by Robert Kraft, the American Jewish owner of the New England Patriots.
“[Football] isn’t a Jewish sport, although there have been great Jewish players. Bob Kraft once said to me that when you reach your bar mitzvah age, that is when you realize you have more of a chance of owning a football team than playing on one in the NFL,” Lebowitz said.
The sport is growing in popularity in Israel and is soon to expand to high schools.
“We have five high schools who will be taking part in our first-ever season in our Kraft IFL high school league, which will be kicking off in January,” said Uriel Sturm, IFL commissioner. “This is the future of the sport. It’s not about bringing professional football here. It’s about bringing football to Israeli youth and Israeli players.”
Sturm added that he believes American-style football would be great preparation for high school students for their military service.
The IFL, now in its fourth season, is gaining popularity, with eight teams from across the country. IFL teams come from as far north as Haifa and south as Beersheba. It draws natives of Russia and Ukraine as much as from the United States and Canada. One quarterback is the son of the current chief of the Israel Defence Forces. The average age of the players is mid-20s, but some are older.
“I never even saw this game on TV before, but it seemed to me to be a lot of fun and it’s a blast,” said Guy, a player with the Haifa Underdogs. “I’m the oldest. I’m
43 – and I’m the rookie. I’m the water boy.”
“Big Mike” Gondelman is a drug addiction counselor during the day and veteran college player. He now plays for the Jerusalem Kings.
“I think people love us because we are a beacon of light in dark times. When people look at the news, they aren’t used to seeing Palestinians and Israelis getting along, having fun together. You know, the last thing you expect to see when you turn on the news is the two of us, you know, sitting down for [American] Thanksgiving dinner together. And that’s exactly what is happening tonight,” he said.
“I’m the biggest guy in the league, six-foot-nine, 400-plus,” continued the ultra-Orthodox man. “We have guys who are yeshivah students. We have guys who are in college. All sorts. We range all over, you know. It’s really beautiful. Everyone sort of just blends together and we make a great team,” he concluded, before rushing off to change into his football gear.
Lebowitz said he hopes to see competition with regional football leagues from places like Turkey, but, for the time being, just getting Israelis hooked on the sport is something to cheer about.
“I think there’s a great potential, not only for people to play the game, but also for spectators to come out and watch,” he said.
And, in Hebrew, the word for hut, which snaps the ball into play, is ached.
^TOP
|
