The Score is no Longer ‘Love’

Sweden’s reception of Israeli tennis team full of violence and hate
March 11, 2009

Tennis isn’t what it used to be. And neither is anti-Semitism. Both have undergone a revolution in the Scandinavian country of Sweden where Israel’s tennis team was greeted with protests fit for an evil tyrant or aggressor.

Once upon a time politics stayed out of sports. But for Israel, that ended in a fury in Munich when Palestinian terrorists executed 11 members of the Israeli Olympic team in 1972. Perhaps it is that memory which, for Israelis, makes the Swedish riots last weekend even more poignant when the Israeli Davis Cup team played its match.

The riots come just a few weeks after Israeli tennis player Shahar Pe’er was barred from the Dubai Open by the United Arab Emirates. And just before that, Sweden recommended that an Israeli tae kwondo delegation -- 45 athletes and five coaches on the way to the Swedish championship -- stay home due to Muslim threats against them. They did.

The tennis team didn’t. In the supposed bucolic, neutral country of Sweden, up to 10,000 protestors and masked rioters gave tennis a new face. The protest was dangerous enough that the city banned spectators from the game in Malmo, Sweden’s third largest city with a large Musilm population, saying it could not guarantee the Israeli players‘ safety. The game was played to about 400 media representatives, sponsors and guests in attendance, according to reports. But no fans.

The masked rioters threw paint bottles, stones and firecrackers at police in riot squad vans and on horseback. One of the demonstrators climbed onto a police van and stomped on its flashing lights, smashing them to bits.

“We are ... anarchists who want to protest against the fact that there are this many police officers to protect the representatives of a repressive occupying force that massacred so many innocent people in Gaza,“ a demonstrator named Jan told AFP.

The demonstration was to protest against Israel's recent offensive in Gaza.

For Israel athletes who played the Swedish team, it was all a bit surreal playing to an empty stadium. Israel player Andy Ram described the intense security surrounding the team from the Jewish state, where it is more higher than it was in Dubai.

“At any given moment, we are surrounded by police vehicles, undercover police officers, and anti-terror forces,” Ram wrote in a Ynet editorial. “Every morning, they take us from the hotel to the stadium via another route, through an underground parking lot, with part of the ride being undertaken in armored vehicles. Since we landed here, almost a week ago, we left the hotel only three times.”

He continues: “The feelings within the Israel team are very grim. All the innocence that prompted us to play tennis has disappeared, and this match, which was supposed to be a beautiful moment of sports, has become completely worthless. Nothing here is reminiscent of the Davis Cup; what we have is a war atmosphere, tension, and the feeling that something very bad may happen at any moment.”

Yes, I know sports these days is rarely for the love of the game any more. Fat contracts and glamorous lifestyles add to the allure. But being whisked around by security and playing to empty stands surely curtails the glamor.

If the vitriol and protests continue, its safe to assume that other cities with large Muslim populations will follow suit. This could lead to a ban on Israeli athletes and teams in the name of national security in other countries.

The protests, isolated as they may seem now, could lead to the isolation of Israel, first through its sports.