No Warm Greeting for Israel

As the curtain rose on a meeting of 199 Olympic committees from around the globe, the president of the International Olympic Committee on Wednesday indicated he would reject a bid from Iranian officials--irate at hostilities in the Middle East--to expel Israel from the session and from the IOC.

Meantime, because of the Israeli presence at the meeting, senior officials in the Malaysian government--which, like several nations with a strong Islamic tradition, does not formally recognize Israel’s existence--did not take part in the traditional ceremonial welcome at the start of the session.

Israeli passport holders were grudgingly admitted into Malaysia on special visas only after pressure from leading Olympic officials, it was disclosed. Moreover, the Israeli flag did not hang from the ceiling of the grand ballroom at the Mandarin Oriental hotel--while the flags of all other Olympic committees, including a Palestinian flag, fluttered above the gathering.

The events Wednesday served to illuminate the uneasy intersection of politics and sport.

“This belongs in the United Nations and other high political bodies, not the sports world,” said Pal Schmitt, an IOC member for nearly 20 years who serves as Hungary’s ambassador to Switzerland.

“This is not an issue we should enter into,” said R. Kevan Gosper of Australia, the IOC’s ranking vice president. “We’re here for sport.”

The rhetoric from some quarters Wednesday was sharp and the symbolism impossible to ignore as the Assn. of National Olympic Committee session--held every two years--began.

At the last meeting, in Rio de Janeiro in May 2000, Israeli and Palestinian delegates argued in the halls. The issue then was whether the Sydney Games that year ought to include a memorial to the 11 Israeli athletes and officials kidnapped and murdered by Palestinian terrorists at the 1972 Munich Olympics.

Three weeks ago, the president of Iran’s Olympic committee, Mostafa Hashemi Taba, wrote IOC President Jacques Rogge, urging the IOC’s ruling executive board to keep the Israelis from the Kuala Lumpur meeting and then expel them from the IOC.

He said the letter did not have the official backing of Iran’s government.

Asked why he sent such a letter on behalf of Iran’s Olympic establishment, he told reporters, “One of the most important roles of the IOC is making peace around the world. With genocide you cannot make peace. Now Israel makes genocide.”

Zaher Akram, assistant secretary general of the Palestinian Olympic committee, said in the room, “For me, it’s not a big problem.” But he added, “You know, if the IOC decided to cut Israel out of the IOC, that would be good.”

When told of the Iranian Hashemi’s remarks, Rogge issued a statement acknowledging receipt of the letter and saying it would be forwarded “in due course” to the executive board, which meets here later in the week. He added, “This doesn’t mean the IOC will change its position. The IOC has always had a policy of not letting politics interfere with sport.”

It had been rumored for months that Israeli passport holders might not gain visas for entry to Malaysia. When such rumors gained credibility, Mexico’s Mario Vazquez Rana, president of the Assn. of National Olympic Committees and also a member of the IOC executive board, said he had recently sent a strongly worded letter to Malaysian officials. A principle was at stake, he said--all Olympic committees in good standing ought to take part.

“I am daring to take the delegates from Israel in my own plane [to the meeting],” Vazquez Rana said Wednesday, recounting the letter.

Kuala Lumpur bid unsuccessfully for the 2008 Summer Games, and bids for future Games are sure to be forthcoming. The head of Malaysia’s Olympic committee, Prince Tunku Imran, sought to downplay the issue of the visas, saying, “They understand as the Malaysian government that if they want to be involved in international events like the Olympics, the rule is everyone gets in.”

When the conference opened, however, no Malaysian dignitaries but Imran were on hand. The head of a host nation’s government or the country’s head of state typically appears to open a large-scale Olympic event. Imran, a member of Malaysia’s royal family, was in the room in his Olympic role.

There was one last symbolic note. The Israelis were seated not in protocol order--in the section of the alphabet beginning with I, near Iran and Iraq--but with the J nations, between Japan and Jamaica.

The Israelis seemed to take it in stride. A small Israeli flag, the blue-and-white field emblazoned with the Star of David, appeared on the table in front of the delegation--just like the small, table-sized flags placed in front of the other delegations. “Everything,” said Zvi Varshaviak, president of the Israeli Olympic Committee, “is OK here.”