london | Was the only Israeli on the International Olympic Committee instrumental in stopping a tribute to the Munich 11 at the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Games?
In the past few weeks, a war of words has erupted between the official, Alex Gilady, and the families of the 11 Israeli athletes and coaches murdered by Palestinian terrorists at the 1972 Munich Games. They allege that his opposition hurt their cause.
Gilady covered the Munich Games for Israel TV and today is senior vice president of NBC Sports, where he focuses on international business. In 2006, he was inducted into Israel’s International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, which gave him a lifetime achievement award.
The families failed in their bid for a minute of silence during the London Olympics opening ceremonies to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the terror attack. Their campaign could not persuade the IOC — which currently has 109 members and 32 honorary members — despite garnering more than 111,000 signatures from more than 105 countries on a petition. President Barack Obama and many other national leaders and legislators around the world also expressed their support.
Some Jewish activists have been pointing the finger directly at Gilady for the outcome.
“I believe he was part of the decision” not to go ahead, said Steve Gold, chair of the Munich 11 Minute of Silence Petition and vice president of the JCC Rockland in suburban New York. “By having an Israeli who’s on the IOC not supporting the minute of silence, it gave the IOC a bit more credibility.”
For his part, Gilady told InsideTheGames.biz in May that when it came to the moment of silence, “The unity of the Olympic movement is the most important one” and “Therefore, I am not supporting such a move.” He added that “such an act may harm the unity of the Olympics.”
Days before the London Olympics opened, the Chicago Tribune quoted Gilady as saying that he was acting “in [the] best interest of Israeli sport. For me, the most important thing at the moment is that Israel have [sic] stages to compete on.”
Others, to put it lightly, disagree.
In a recent Foxnews.com piece that went viral, Guri Weinberg, son of the murdered wrestling coach Moshe Weinberg, published his own account of a 1996 meeting with Gilady, two years after Gilady was appointed to the IOC.
Weinberg alleged that Gilady told him that any memorial for the Israelis would necessitate a similar one for the Palestinian terrorists who died in the attack.
As one of the Munich 11 widows recalled her husband’s torture and murder, Gilady listened “stone cold with no emotion,” then excused himself from the meeting “without a hint of empathy,” Weinberg wrote.
Gilady denied Weinberg’s story.
Weinberg did not reply to an interview request for this article, but Ilana Romano, widow of murdered weightlifter Yossef Romano, was at the 1996 meeting and said that Weinberg’s account was accurate, although it was her and another widow, Ankie Spitzer, who walked out and not Gilady.
“We got up and went because he was so insulting and hurtful,” she said.
Gilady, born in Tehran in 1942, was a sports journalist for Israeli television. In 1981 he moved to New York to join NBC Sports, and much of his work centered on helping NBC buy broadcast rights to the Olympic Games.
Gilady’s IOC involvement dates back to 1984, when he joined its radio and television commission. He was appointed an IOC member in 1994 and has been on the Coordination for the Games Committee for every Olympics since 2004. He received Emmy Awards for NBC’s coverage of the Barcelona Olympics in 1992 and the Atlanta Olympics in 1996, according to the Jerusalem Post.
Much of the Jewish anger against Gilady stems from the expectation that as an Israeli he would have the country’s interests at heart.
At a ceremony for Israel’s Olympics delegation in July, Sport and Culture Minister Limor Livnat bluntly complained about him.
“We would have expected him to have been the representative of the bereaved families, the representative of the entire Israeli society,” she said.
Gilady, however, insists that his critics have it wrong.
“I was elected to the IOC on a private basis,” he said. “I do not represent countries — I represent specifics the IOC is concerned about. I happen to be an Israeli.”
Romano only partially accepts the explanation.
“I think he has a commitment to the IOC, he represents their interests — I can’t argue with that,” she said. “But I can’t understand it, either, because Alex came back with the coffins … Could it really be that he has no heart or feeling?”
In Israel, Romano said, Gilady does occasionally come to the periodic Munich families’ ceremonies and that he “tries to be very nice.”
Still, she is puzzled at his failure to “repent” his longstanding objection to the silence.