You don’t look Judokish

Sudoku, Soduko, Joduko? 

Judoka…. I didn’t know what that meant until the story about Or Sasson hit the headlines. As Craig noted, (great to have you back) (how was Aleppo?) the BBC also got confused, mistaking “Or” for “Os”, which - although it must be quite hard to make a mistake in at two-letter word (or possibly a three-letter word) - was probably because the BBC’s massive Olympic team of reporters and journalists are more familiar with the latter, which is a slang word for Australia, and I suppose also an abbreviation for “Ossie”, as in Oswald, Oscar or Ostrich. 

(No such mistake was made with the opponent’s name, "Islam el-Shehaby" which is obviously more familiar to the Beeb.) 

There have been quite a few political incidents in Rio, which the BBC has reported in their scrupulously impartial manner, not wanting to be caught out while making an unseemly value-judgement. The Lebanese bus incident, in particular, was notable for this,  and the subsequent reprimand -  did the BBC mention the reprimand? 

However my point is that several commenters have defended Egyptian Islam el-Shehaby (or possibly Islam el-Shebaby) on the premise that he made a ground-breaking, nay, defiant  decision by actually appearing with Or (or Ori ) the Israeli in the first place, and he certainly wasn’t going to risk adding insult to injury by looking pleased about it as well.

Since the BBC has made such a big deal about Saudi and other hijabbed women being ‘allowed’ to compete,  I thought they might at least have taken an interest in the cultures that let their political and religious cultural customs override those noble Olympian principles. 

But, no. All that nonsense is accepted without a murmur.  Nary a value judgment to be seen.

I think I said this once before, and I might say it several times more, but we’re not the only ones who regard the BBC as you-know-what.  Do look at the comments below Rod Liddle’s piece here, about those Norwegians. 

Is it time for Craig and me to retire? Nothing would please me more than to become redundant. 

From this blog, anyway. 

We could start another blog entitled “The BBC isn’t Biased”. Catchy though, eh?

Wall-to-wall Olympics

I’m not a fan of competitive sport - or any other type of competitive pursuit, so watching the Olympics is not my thing, but I couldn’t help noticing these Olympics-related stories. 

Obviously, there’s the bus war. 

 

Proud to be Lebanese. No normalization with Israel in any form!

The Lebanese contingent refused to let the Israeli contingent board ‘their’ bus. (Or perhaps it was just a bus that the organisers had laid on for -  you know - athletes)

Well, the BBC did at least report this incident , and what’s more they gave it a reasonably fair headline.

Lebanese athletes refuse to travel with Israeli team. 

It’s better than “Israeli athletes invade Lebanese bus” or some such. After all, aren’t Israelis renowned for Jewifying everything? “Judaisation”, Yolande Knell calls it.

The main body of the article dives straight into a kind of justification for the Lebanese contingent’s appalling behaviour:

 “Lebanon and Israel are officially at war and have no diplomatic relations.”

So that’s okay then?

The BBC didn’t include any of the Lebanese team leader’s gloating:

“Lebanese Minister of Youth and Sport Abdel Motaleb Hannawi told a Lebanese news site that this was not the first time Israel has attempted to embarrass a Lebanese delegation in this kind of circumstance. He praised the delegation’s behavior, Nakoula’s specifically. “His stance was principled and patriotic,” he said. 

Nakoula became the hero of the day in Lebanon after the incident was publicized. The Al Mayadeen and Al-Manar news networks, both associated with Hezbollah, gave Nakoula praise, with the latter also interviewing him. Hezbollah supporters and officials praised him on social media, with one Al-Manar broadcaster tweeting, “The Israelis were sent away from the bus because normalization (with Israel) is not to be had in any  form, and because the Lebanese identity (is that of) resistance. Be proud to be Lebanese.”

 …… and left the impression that Israelis should, once again, be regarded as interlopers on ‘other people’s’ buses. 

Another story caught my eye, this time about problems concerning swimming pools. 

" The Palestinian Olympic Swimming Pool-Sized Lie."

“Introducing the Palestinian swimmer Mary al-Atrash, media outlets were quick to note that the young athlete was challenged not only by the rigors of training for the Olympics but also by the fact that the occupation had cut off her access to a proper 50-meter-long pool, the standard Olympic size. Such stately facilities, the media informed its outraged viewers, were simply not available in Palestine.”

According to ‘Tablet’, this wasn’t quite the case, as she could have had access to a number of suitable pools. But Palestinians never miss an opportunity to blame Israel for all their woes, especially when there’s a sympathetic ear to hear it and a willing voice to spread it around. 

Oddly though, certain women in Luton, yes, that’s Luton UK., are denied access to their Olympic size pool  (for cultural reasons) but not to worry. It’s only on Fridays.

Update:

It seems that the IOC has reprimanded the head of the Lebanese delegation, Al-Haj Nakoula, who apparently responded that the whole incident was the result of a misunderstanding.

Doesn’t say precisely what the nature of the misunderstanding was, but a separate source said that Lebanese athletes are "committed to the national position in refusing to be in the same place as the Israelis." He added that Lebanon will remain part of the resistance against Israel. 

I fail to see where a misunderstanding comes into the picture. Am I missing something?