Gearing up for Euro Games
THE 14th European Maccabi Games (EMG) are poised to be a profoundly historical event when they kick-off in Berlin on July 27, as more than 2000 athletes from 36 nations, including Australia, descend on the German capital for 10 action-packed days.
As the first time that Germany will host the continent’s biggest Jewish sports tournament, EMG sports director Alexander Sobotta called it “something extremely special” during an interview with The AJN while visiting relatives in Melbourne last month.
“It’s 70 years after the Shoah and 50 years since relations between Israel and Germany started,” said Sobotta. “So it’s extremely historical and, as far as I can see it, the decision for Berlin to host was highly controversial within the worldwide Jewish community.
“Especially among the older generation, who argued it’s too early, while the younger generation in Germany said, ‘It’s time we want to be presented as an important part of Germany again. We want to show that we are here’. They finally got their will.”
Sobotta, who lives in Berlin, is the only non-Jewish member of a three-person EMG committee and has been working tirelessly to coordinate the logistics of 20 sports taking place around the city.
“Each sports event we organise is together with the respective Berlin clubs and all these associations have been extremely helpful,” he said.
“The Berlin mayor is part of the board of advisors, as is the head of German sport, the head of German football, and the Minister for the Interior. Even the President of Germany, Joachim Gauck, is a patron for the games and will open it.”
After becoming acquainted with Maccabi Germany through his work for the German Football Association anti-discrimination program, Sobotta was approached when the role of EMG’s sports director came up.
While it was the games’ worth to Germany that swayed him, the position has offered some unexpected experiences.
“It’s interesting as the only non-Jew, because I really got to know the Jewish culture.”
“Like Jewish dancing, which was quite a shock for me, with the hands and dancing in a circle. It’s huge fun to look at it, but in it was quite scary.”
Once the games begin, Sobotta said that one of the events he’s most excited about is the open male futsal, where the Australian team will be defending its 2011 crown at the sports centre alongside Olympic Park, a venue of poignant significance.
“Olympic Park was the home of the 1936 Olympic Games, where Jews were not allowed to compete,” he explained.
“We don’t use the actual stadium because we can’t fill 70,000 seats, but all around is a lot of venues that were used during the Olympics.
“For instance, fencing will be in the same venue as 1936, where a Jewish Hungarian fencer won the gold medal. He died in 1944 when trying to bomb a bridge as a partisan, and we will have a big photo of him in the fencing venue and dedicate the event to him.
“Flags bearing the Maccabi insignia will replace where Nazi flags flew 80 years ago, which should be a very emotional moment.”
Next week: Interviews with European Maccabi Games’ Australian participants
ADAM BLAU
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