The Iranian swimmer who withdrew from a heat featuring an Israeli at the world championships maintains the move was not political.

“My flight was exactly the day before my race, so I was so tired and drowsy. Because I had to wait for my visa,” Mohammed Alirezaei told AP two days after not starting a 100-metre breaststroke heat that featured Gal Nevo of Israel.

Speaking after completing his 50m breaststroke heat on Tuesday, Alirezaei added that he had “no problem” competing against Israeli athletes, saying he did so at junior worlds.

However, Alirezaei also pulled out of an event against another Israeli, Tom Beeri, in the 100m breaststroke at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

The International Olympic Committee accepted the explanation then that he was ill.

Alirezaei said the fact that both withdrawals came against Israelis was merely a coincidence.

Asked about the latest withdrawal, IOC president Jacques Rogge told AP on Monday: “I’m sure knowing the rules of FINA, the athletes will have to explain why and that most likely the athletes will have to come up with very good reasons.”

I guess there is some truth to his explanation in that Israelis make him sick.

“A large proportion of Britain’s Asian population fail to pass the cricket test. Which side do they cheer for? It’s an interesting test. Are you still harking back to where you came from or where you are?” he said in an interview with the Los Angeles Times.

He was largely referring to the Bangladeshi and Pakistani Muslims and especially those in the Birmingham area. When teams from those two countries come to the UK they are always given a very warm welcome when playing matches against England in Birmingham and other times with high proportions of immigrants and their decendants.

Recently Pamela Geller posted the following story on Atlas Shrugs:

US SOCCER TEAM VICIOUSLY BOOED IN L.A. — MEXICO WAS “HOME TEAM”
ENEMEDIA CALLS IT “UNIQUELY AMERICAN”

“Obviously … the support that Mexico has on the night like tonight makes it a home game for them,” said U.S. Coach Bob Bradley, choosing his words carefully. “It’s part of something we have to deal with on the night.”

The US soccer team booed, its players on the receiving end of vile obscenities in LA’s Rose Bowl, and the left-wing media calls this a marvelous moment for America. Yes, the LA Times is at it again (where’s the Rashid Khalidi tape, traitors?).

Obviously, as I showed above, this isn’t a uniquely American problem.

In 2009 I went to see Israel play Russia in the Davis Cup Tennis. Davis Cup is the international World Cup of Tennis: it’s played by individuals representing countries against countries. It’s no Wimbledon I can tell you and the crowd is always noisy between points. I had supported Israel in the UK a couple of years earlier where, obviously, the Israeli team support had been greatly in the minority. On that occasion I failed the Tebbit test, loudly cheering for Israel, while sitting in the UK!

As I’ve written about before on Israellycool, after the fall of the old Soviet empire, Israel took in and absorbed one million or more Russian Jews. They represented an immigration wave of 20% of the existing population of Israel in just 10 years.

If Israel were like the UK with it’s Asian Muslims or L.A. and it’s Mexicans you would expect an Israeli tennis match against Russia to raise a bit of noise for the foreign side.

Not a bit of it! There were a few travelling Russians for sure but I can assure you that the very great majority of the Israelis in the audience for that match (which Israel won!)

Russian Jews came to Israel to be Jews and Israelis. In another generation they won’t even remember they were ever Russians. That is a melting pot and that is the success story of immigration in Israel today.

Incidentally, the player who took that unbelievable mark is Nic Naitanui. My nickname for him is Netanyahu.

New hotness: Egyptian bad sports!

AFP

Judoka Arik Ze’evi secured a second medal for Israel in Moscow’s Judo Grand Slam on Sunday, after Yarden Gerbi won a bronze medal on Saturday.

Ze’evi, who competed in the -100kg category, picked a gold medal in the final against France’s Cyrille Maret, who is ranked 25th in the world and even won the recent Judo World Cup in Warsaw. He beat his rival three second before the end of the match with a wazari which turned into an ippon and gave him the gold.

The Israeli judoka won $5,000 and 3,000 points, which bring him very close to the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

Ze’evi began his day by beating his young Belarusian rival with an ippon, one minute and 46 seconds into the fight.

In the final 16, Ze’evi was faced by Abdurakhmonov Mukhamadmurod of Tajikistan. Five minutes into the fight, the scoreboard pointed to a yuko in favor of the Israeli, which was enough to send him to the quarter-final against Egypt’s Darwish, who is ranked eighth in the world.

The fight saw each side using his own tactics to overcome the rival. Forty second before the end of the match, Ze’evi managed to score a yuko and win. 

The drama began at the end of the fight, when the referee signaled a handshake between the contestants. But Darwish ignored the order and began leaving. Several moments later, after repeated requests, the Egyptian walked to the center of the mattress, bowed to the referee and left.

In the semi-final, Ze’evi beat Kazakhstan’s Maxim Rakov, the world champion, with an ippon in one of his greatest achievements so far.   

Last time Israel kicked Egypt’s ass, we got a peace treaty out of it.

It is now that peace treaty that seems to be lying down and out on the floor.

Courtesy of University of Toledo

Naama Shafir, a junior guard, poured in a career-high 40 points to lead the University of Toledo to victory in the Women’s National Invitation Tournament championship. She was crowned the basketball tournament’s MVP. And then she walked about two miles home.

Shafir, an Orthodox Jew from Israel, did not want to break the Sabbath.

The University of Toledo’s 76–68 triumph over the University of Southern California on April 2 marked a historic moment for Toledo — its first postseason championship in school history. The win also marked the climax of a historic season for Shafir, the first female Orthodox Jew to earn an NCAA scholarship and to play American women’s Division I basketball.

Indeed, Shafir is arguably the only Orthodox woman athlete prominent in the public eye right now. But to get to this point, she had to overcome unique barriers of language, religion and gender.

“The game was one of the most incredible moments of my life,” Shafir told the Forward. “There were over 7,000 people there, and during those seconds when the game was over and the whole crowd ran to the court, I experienced an unbelievable high.”

The 21-year-old star is the fourth of nine children born to a family in the town of Hoshaya in Emek Israel in the Galilee. Like Shafir, almost all of Hoshaya’s residents are traditionally observant. Shafir began playing basketball in the Emek Israel girls’ basketball league when she was in fourth grade, and her talent became readily apparent. Outside the league, she often played with the boys where, her father recalled, she also excelled.

“Naama was always a very special girl, and she has grown into a wonderful young woman,” gushed her coach from Emek Israel, Liran Barel. “She is a natural leader, and she is very creative in her game, very courageous and very humble.”

The Emek Israel league, a mixed club of religious Jews, secular Jews and Arabs from around the Galilee, is considered one of the best in Israel (more apartheid, huh? – ed.). The league’s makeup has imbued it with a commitment to pluralism and accommodation that respectfully nurtured Shafir’s talents. Out of consideration for its observant members, the league refrains from practice on the Sabbath.

“To coach someone with this kind of talent and ambition is a gift that most coaches don’t get in their lives,” Barel said. “It’s a privilege.”

It was late on a Saturday night in Israel when the Toledo Rockets faced off against USC in the championship game. In Hoshaya, the Shafir house was packed with people, and after the game, celebrations continued long into the night. The family had to wait until 4:30 a.m., when the Sabbath was over in Toledo, to call Shafir and congratulate her personally.

In Toledo, the entire basketball program adapted its practices to accommodate Shafir’s religious needs. There are no practices on the Sabbath, and whenever there is an away game, the team travels together on a Friday, before sundown. To mitigate religious concern regarding modesty, Shafir also wears a T-shirt under her sleeveless jersey. The team stocks a storage freezer in a nearby eatery with kosher meals. The Rockets are also planning a trip to Israel this year.

“The college has been incredibly supportive,” said Itzik Shafir, Naama’s father, who visited different colleges with his daughter before she settled on Toledo. She had been offered several scholarships, but he wanted to ensure that the one she chose would respect her lifestyle.

Shafir, who is 5-foot-7 and led the Rockets with an average 15.3 points and 5 assists per game this season, is not the first Orthodox Jew to play American basketball. Tamir Goodman, an Orthodox Jew from Baltimore once ranked among the top 25 U.S. high school players, and he received public attention for refusing to play on the Sabbath. But he has since moved to Israel and retired from basketball.

More than Orthodox men, women face additional challenges, such as religious demands to wear loose clothing that covers knees and elbows, and in some circles, an expectation not to play in front of men, as Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, a prominent Orthodox Zionist religious leader, has ruled.

Shafir received rabbinic approval to pursue her dream from Chaim Burgansky, rabbi of Hoshaya. “The halachic rationale is based on the fact that although the Halacha says that it’s forbidden to jump and run on Shabbat, someone who derives pleasure from it can do it. But exercise is forbidden,” he told the Forward in an e-mail. “Practice is in the category of ‘exercise’ and therefore forbidden, but the game itself is fun for the player. Who wants to sit on the bench?”

This would not be possible in Israel, Burgansky hastened to explain, since holding a mass-spectator sport there on the Sabbath would involve Jews in desecrating the holy day. “But outside of Israel, it’s non-Jews, so it’s not a problem,” he said.

Burgansky stressed that his ruling was a personal one for Shafir, addressing the specific situation confronting her. “I would under no circumstance give permission to hold a basketball tournament on Shabbat from the outset,” he said.

Few Orthodox women have made such strides in sports. According to the Jewish Women’s Archive, although Jewish women and girls have participated in sports throughout American history — in fact, Senda Berenson was known as the “Mother of Women’s Basketball” in the 1890s — there is little if any history of Orthodox women with advanced athletic careers.

“Religious girls are not exactly encouraged in sports,” said Shira Amsel, founder of a basketball league in Israel for observant Orthodox women and girls. “Sports are not considered ‘feminine’ or ‘religious.’ We’re taught to be quiet and modest and to get married, which is nice, but it’s also important for girls to have a positive body image.” Shafir is a “great role model for girls in general, and especially religious girls,” Amsel said.

Shafir’s athletic achievements in America stem from a decision she made at 18 that required considerable courage: to leave her small community, where everyone knows her and follows her career closely, for Toledo, where she knew no one. At a time when many of her classmates were entering the Israeli army or going to Sherut Leumi, the voluntary national service, Shafir headed for a town in the American heartland with only a small Jewish community and few who are traditionally observant.

“Coming here was the most important decision of my life,” Shafir said.

“She barely knew English,” her father recalled. “The first few weeks there were very difficult. It took her months before she was able to sit in class and understand a lecture.”

Three years later, her English is excellent, her studies are going well and she is majoring in business. And in the process she has taught people a bit about Israel.

“She is Israel’s best ambassador,” her father said.

Like the University of Toledo, Israel has adapted its practices for Shafir. After she left for America, Science and Technology Minister Daniel Hershkowitz expanded the regulation that said women could serve in Sherut Leumi only until the age of 20, allowing them to serve until age 24. This was done explicitly to accommodate Shafir, who felt that she could not pass up the opportunity Toledo offered her but wanted to return after college to serve.

After Sherut Leumi, though, Shafir doesn’t know what she will do. “Anything is possible,” she said.

Meanwhile, her advice for athletic Orthodox girls is this: “If you have a dream, it’s not a question of ‘either-or.’ You can do both. You can be religious and fulfill your dreams.”

It makes for an interesting read.

It’s wild to think that just a year ago my Cornell teammates and I were on center stage of March Madness; that’s what happens when you are the first Ivy League team to advance to the Sweet 16 since 1979. Thanks to Cornell’s historic success last March and my upbringing as a Jewish-American, an opportunity to play basketball professionally in Israel essentially fell into my lap. I had no illusions of my pilgrimage to the Holy Land coming close to matching the excitement of my senior season at Cornell. Still, I wasn’t at all prepared for how far removed the cramped, cookie-cutter gyms of Israel are from a stage like the Carrier Dome, where I played my last college game.

When Allen Iverson signed a two-year contract with the Turkish basketball club Besiktas in late October, the first thought that popped into my head shockingly wasn’t about how far the former perennial NBA all-star and league MVP had fallen. Instead, I immediately questioned whether “The Answer” knew what he was getting himself into. Though my brief two-and-a-half months spent living the life of a pro athlete in the Middle East have been fascinating, it certainly hasn’t been what I expected when I signed on for this adventure.

It might seem like a stretch to compare the basketball experience of a future Hall of Famer playing in Turkey to that of a first-year pro out of the Ivy League playing for Ironi “Eldan” Ashkelon in the Israeli Super League. But the two situations are more similar than they seem. The common denominator of the two basketball abroad experiences: the ABROAD part. Though every country (not named the United States) with a professional basketball league has it’s own perplexing/absorbing culture to become accustomed to, finding your comfort zone in the new surroundings is way more than half the battle to achieving success on the court … whether you are playing in Istanbul or Ashkelon.

It’s an adjustment that’s nearly seven months in the making for me and started on August 15 when I touched down at Ben Gurion International Airport. As a Jewish-American making Aliyah (the name of the process for a foreigner becoming an Israeli citizen), my acclimation is not typical of the American basketball player playing overseas. There is hoop after hoop to jump through, both at home and in Israel to officially gain citizenship. Within minutes of landing in Tel-Aviv, I was escorted to the ominous sounding “Ministry of Absorption” inside the airport. A few forms and photos later, I was welcomed into the country as an Israeli citizen.

The most memorable and eye-opening “Welcome to Israel!” moment was my visit to the Israeli army headquarters in Beer Sheba. Every Israeli citizen is required to serve in the army. Most do so when they graduate high school, unless there are extenuating circumstances that delay or clear their army obligations. I was told upon my arrival that there was a very simple and standard procedure American basketball players making Aliyah go through to waive the army responsibilities inherited by other Israeli citizens.

In order to be cleared or get an exemption from the army, you first have to go through the daylong army placement system. This process, which makes a trip to the DMV look like a day at Disneyland, was a nightmare. First, I was interviewed. Among other things, they prodded me about my family history and asked me to read and write in Hebrew (which I hadn’t done since I was Bar Mitzvahed at age 13). My interviewer then really caught my attention by asking me to whom I would like to give my pension if I die in battle. I was then given a physical, where I scored a 93 (out of 100) on the army’s official medical exam. This meant I could choose any division of the army I wish to participate in (this is considered a huge honor for most Israelis). After a computer aptitude test, the two basketball team managers accompanying me saved me from near enlistment. If it wasn’t for them and their somewhat pushy tactics (Israelis have a knack for making every conversation seem like an argument), I could have easily been drafted right then and there. The managers were able to receive confirmation in writing that I would not be enlisted for at least one year.

*****

I’m used to living and playing basketball in a town where everyone seems to know each other. But while Ashkelon and Ithaca, N.Y., may be similar in size, the similarities end there. If moving to Tel Aviv or Jerusalem for a whole year is a culture shock, then moving to Ashkelon is the equivalent of a cultural ice bath. In a lot of ways, Ashkelon is unlike the bigger, more citylike parts of Israel, and for that reason the cultural adjustment to living here is probably as big as it could have possibly been. But the small-town feel of Ashkelon is one of the characteristics I appreciate most. Whether it’s because I always eat at the same five or six places or because I am the out-of-place-looking professional basketball player, people recognize my face, know I’m on the basketball team, and don’t hesitate to talk with me about basketball and my life in their city. While I don’t speak Hebrew well enough and most of them don’t speak English well enough to carry on a conversation for longer than 30 seconds, it’s nice to feel welcome in a really strange environment. Ashkelon basketball fans, like I’d imagine most fans of small-town/lower budget European teams, are extremely passionate about the team. They are everything a basketball player could ask for in a fan base: loyal, proud, and feverishly supportive. The fans, which are mostly made up of adolescent boys, travel to all away games, bang drums in the stands, paint their chests and blow vuvuzelas. They pack the energy and enthusiasm of European soccer into basketball arenas wherever we travel.

On the flip side, like most Israelis, they are also not shy about voicing their displeasure when things don’t go well. It’s wrong to call it rudeness, but some Israelis possess this unbridled honesty that enables them to ask questions and make comments that many Americans would keep to themselves. For example, after we lost our opening game of the season to local rival Ashdod, I returned home to order a pizza. Before handing me my food, the deliveryman greeted me with, “It’s you! How’d you guys lose tonight? I was embarrassed to watch the game.” That’s pretty bold coming from a man whom I had yet to tip, but that is the reality of life as a professional basketball player. I am living in a small, modest Israeli town where the basketball team is a huge source of pride. Ashkelon can’t offer the amenities or leisure activities of Jerusalem or Tel Aviv, so after the beach, Ashkelonians can basically look forward to basketball and soccer. After I realized how uniquely important my team’s success was to the Ashkelon basketball fans, I could appreciate how the “Blue Wave,” as the fans are called, can be so loving and fiery all at once.

Outside of basketball, I love that Ashkelon is the most unlikely of cultural melting pots. I naively expected to meet exclusively white Jews in Israel, but in the entire country (and Ashkelon especially) that is not the case. There are sizable populations of Moroccan, Ethiopian and Russian immigrants in Ashkelon, the latter of whom aren’t even all Jewish. My apartment building houses Spaniards, Frenchmen, Americans and Israelis. These different groups make living in Ashkelon more interesting, but it doesn’t make it any easier to interact with my neighbors. For whatever reason, it’s difficult to find people in Ashkelon who speak very good English. Many speak it well enough to understand a food order or a request at a store, but in a country that requires its students to take English classes starting in fourth grade, it’s odd that many locals struggle with the language.

It is interesting though to see the differences in English fluency among my Israeli teammates. After years of playing European basketball, where English is the universal language, the veterans speak decent to very good English. The young players, on the other hand (and by young I mean younger than I am), are mostly local and have a hard time talking in English beyond basic basketball terminology. It doesn’t make it any less fun to talk, hang out, or play with them, it just makes communicating both on and off the court more of a challenge.

Surprisingly, the most difficult adjustment of all has been the basketball. It’s exciting to be playing alongside players I grew up watching (on my team are former NBA players Gabe Pruitt, Desmond Farmer and Tim Pickett) and with heady European league veterans, both Israeli and American, that can show a young rookie the ropes. What I wasn’t expecting, however, was the intense pressure to win that comes along with being paid to play basketball. I’ve been watching the NBA nearly my whole life, so the fact that pro basketball is a business first is not some grand revelation for me. I’ve just never appreciated it until now.

Maybe it’s because there are only 27 games in the Israeli regular season and only one game per week (so each game is scrutinized and magnified much more than a single NBA regular-season game is), but after each of my team’s losses so far this season the stress level of each practice and workout was something I never came close to experiencing in my four years of college. With each loss, the chance someone gets cut or traded spikes, and with each win you can tangibly sense the relief in the locker room. After talking with my college teammates playing in Germany, Spain, and Italy, I know this impatience isn’t unique to Israel. In college, losses were purely heartbreaking, but in the pros, a loss goes beyond emotion.

There are days when I try to imagine what it was like for Americans to play basketball abroad before the Internet, laptops, or iPods … and simply can’t. Without these luxuries, staying connected to home, family, friends, and what is going on outside this New Jersey-sized Middle Eastern country would be a challenge. Of course, for my American teammates and I, new media is a lifesaver: everyone is on Facebook now, Twitter is essentially a customizable e-newspaper, and Skype keeps me in touch with my family, friends back home and college teammates playing abroad without worrying about a huge phone bill. I probably couldn’t have picked a bigger cultural adjustment than Ashkelon — the entire city shuts down from 3 p.m. on Friday to Saturday night at sundown for Shabbat.

While the college basketball season is approaching its one-of-a-kind climax, the Israeli basketball calendar is lagging a couple of months behind. After our regular season ends on April 21, the top eight teams in the 10-team league advance to the playoffs. Unless things change in a hurry, I could be flying home sooner rather than later. Ashkelon is 5-17 on the season, sitting in ninth place, and three games out of the final playoff spot with five games to go. So, yeah … a year removed from being near the top of college basketball I am at the bottom of Israeli basketball.

As a first-year pro that wasn’t planning on a career in basketball three months before this all started, I couldn’t be prouder of my individual performance and effort this season. The numbers aren’t great or even decent (I’m averaging only 3 points, 3 boards in about 12 minutes a game), but this season was way more about personal growth than stats for me anyway. Plus, I can always tell my grandchildren someday that I led the Israeli Premier League in fouls per minute (like a wise man once said, “If you’re not fouling, you’re not playing defense”). There’s a chance I will retire from pro basketball after one season, though I haven’t decided anything officially yet. My ultimate goal for the future, whenever I do decide to call it quits, is to have a successful career writing about the sport. If I can write a college basketball blog while playing professional basketball overseas, I’m excited to see what I can do when I’m living in the same hemisphere as the games I’m covering.

Meanwhile, I have checked out his Twitter feed, which perhaps reveals some other feelings about certain Israeli experiences.

Trip to an Israeli bank. I will try really hard not to let this ruin my day

As for the rockets..

Another day, another couple of rockets from Gaza landing near Ashkelon. Ho-hum.

Full story here.

Israel on Saturday denounced Iran’s fueling up of its first nuclear power plant as “totally unacceptable” and called for more international pressure to force Tehran to cease any uranium enrichment.

Israel, widely assumed to be the only Middle East country to have nuclear weapons, has said a nuclear-armed Iran would be a threat to its existence, raising concerns Israel could attack Iran’s nuclear sites.

In a statement issued after the Islamic Republic celebrated the launch of its reactor in Bushehr, Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yossi Levy said: “It is totally unacceptable that a country that so blatantly violates resolutions of the (United Nations) Security Council, decisions of the International Atomic Energy Agency and its commitments under the NPT (non-proliferation treaty) should enjoy the fruits of using nuclear energy.”

“The international community should increase pressure on to force Iran to abide by international decisions and cease its enrichment activities and its construction of reactors,” Levy said.

The United States, Israel and some other Western countries fear Iran’s nuclear is aimed at produce atomic weapons. Iran says it wants nuclear power solely for energy production.

Meanwhile, Iran’s threat against the world if attacked indicates the cause for concern with their nuclear program to begin with.

Earlier Saturday, Iran’s hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promised a global response if his country is attacked.

“Our options will have no limits… They will touch the entire planet,” he said.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

7:26PM: RIP Gaza’s “Crazy Water” water park? (hat tip: Michael).

Hamas ordered the “Crazy Water,” water park in Gaza closed due to men and women mixing at parties held in the park, Israel Radio reported on Sunday.

A spokesperson for the Hamas government claimed that the park was actually closed for only three days, because it did not have a proper permit. “Men and women are mixed throughout Gaza,” the spokesperson said. “The closing is just a warning.”

3:15PM: Irish Israeli supporter Cliona Campbell has hit back at an anti-Israel tool who called her a “brainwashed, ill-educated grunt” (see final update).

2:40PM: Let the direct talks begin!

1:20PM: Introducing the Zionist-Conspiracy-O-Matic.

11:18AM: Here is Itay Shechter’s “Yamulke” goal during the Hapoel Tel Aviv vs Red Bull Salzburg Champions League qualifying soccer match.

Believe it or not, he received a yellow card for this.

After scoring the third goal for his team, Shechter pulled one of his half a kippah (cap worn by Jewish ritual), it was placed on his head and ran to the center court, where he knelt and began to pray. After that, the match referee, the Portuguese Pedro Proença took out a yellow card.

The Israeli daily Jewish Chronicle, the Austrian public protested the festivities to consider it as an act of provocation. The Israeli player said he did so because a fan presented him with a yarmulke and made a promise to put it if you score a goal.

“I had no intention to provoke anyone, just in how the entire Jewish people, watching the game on television, would be happy,” said the striker.

10:00AM: How Hizbullah’s Al-Manar TV reports the news:

[click on image to enlarge]

9:48AM: According to Kuwait’s al-Rai newspaper, US officials have said damning evidence demonstrating Hizbullah’s involvement in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri is expected to be published by American newspapers in the next few days.

9:34AM: Richard Landes looks at the CNN reporting of the recent Lebanon-Israel border clash.

7:52AM: A future new immigrant?

American Jewish astronaut Garrett Reisman is considering aliyah (immigration) to Israel, according to Minister of Science and Technology Daniel Hershkowitz, who met with Reisman during a recent trip to the United States.

Reisman, 42, told Hershkowitz that the question of whether or not he will live in Israel will be decided based on his ability to find suitable work.

I somehow don’t think that will be a problem.

7:35AM: Trust AFP to turn a graphic on Israel’s painful disengagement from Gaza in to another example of their bias.

Graphic on the 2005 evacuation of Israeli settlers from the Gaza Strip. Today the coastal territory is run by the militant Islamist movement Hamas while Israel has an iron grip on its airspace and sea lanes, maintaining a total blockade on both while tightly restricting land access. (AFP/Graphic)

In other words, Hamas – who not only rule Gaza but interfere in almost all aspects of life there – are said to “run” Gaza, and Israel – who withdrew 5 years ago but regulates the passage of certain goods that could be used as weapons – “has an iron grip on its airspace and sea lanes, maintaining a total blockade on both while tightly restricting land access.”

7:18AM: Last week, I posted about Iranian taekwondo fighter Mohammed Soleimani’s refusal to compete against Israel’s Gili Haimovich in the championship match of the 2010 Summer Youth Olympics in Singapore.

Now more of the same at the 2010 WPC Swimming World Championships.

Israel added two golds to its medal haul on Saturday at the 2010 WPC Swimming World Championships in Eindhoven behind the performances of Inbal Pezaro and Itzhak Mamistvalov. During the heats, two Iranians refused to enter the pool with Israeli blind swimmer Zohar Batar, who joked afterward that she never saw her Persian rivals.

Can someone please explain to me why Iran is even allowed to compete in international sports events?

6:35AM: Latma channels Tom Jones for their latest song parody.

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