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The Australian Jewish News – jewishnews.net.au
Friday, August 14, 2015
Who was the first Jewish VFL player?
JOSHUA LEVI
THE first Jewish footballer to compete in the top Aussie Rules competition in Australia took the field in
1897, more than 60 years earlier than
previously thought.
For decades people have thought
that St Kilda premiership defender
Ian Synman, who made his debut for
the Saints in 1958, was the first Jew to
play at the top level.
But Ashley Browne, a former editor of The AJN and now a senior
reporter for the AFL, discovered that
Herbert ‘Bert’ Rapiport played three
games for Fitzroy in the first season
of the VFL in 1897. Browne, with the
help of genealogist Bernie Kuran and
the Australian Jewish Historical
Society (AJHS), also discovered that
Barney Lazarus, who played seven
games for Carlton, took the field in
1902.
“I always thought that there had to
be more Jewish footballers, perhaps
because they were halachically Jewish
without either knowing or acknowledging it,” Browne told The AJN.
Browne said that had no trouble
discovering Bert Rapiport’s football
career, but it was hard to verify his
Jewish heritage because his real first
name was Henry.
“In the case of Bert Rapiport, whose
name I found on the (AFL historical)
database last year, I needed the AJHS to
determine that he and Henry Rapiport
were one and the same,” he said.
“I’d love to understand why he was
known in sporting circles as Bert and
in the Jewish community as Henry.”
Rapiport didn’t play in the VFL
until he was 31, but in his early career
he was a regular for Normanby, the
club considered to be the forerunner
of Fitzroy, and before that played for
the Maroons in the VFA.
He also turned out for a few nonofficial games for Carlton in the late
1880s, including one at the MCG.
Browne credited his friend Kuran
for the Lazarus find because Kuran
found Barnet Lazarus’s listing at
Sydney’s Rookwood Jewish Cemetery
and his birth details matched those in
the AFL archives.
Rapiport and Lazarus join Synman,
Keith Baskin, Henry Ritterman,
Michael Zemski, Mordy Bromberg,
Trevor Korn, Julian Kirzner, Ezra Poyas
and Todd Goldstein, whose father is
Jewish, on the list of Jewish league
footballers.
Browne, who has a deep love of
AFL and the Jewish community, said
there was a sense of satisfaction in the
research to find the first footballer.
27
“We take pride in Jewish athletes
who do well,” he said.
“I am (slowly) writing a book on
Jews in footy, so this all helps. I’m sure
there are others. There’s a book coming out soon that will list the names of
all registered footballers in Melbourne
in the last part of the 19th century
which I’m looking forward to reading
and identifying more players.”
The Immigration Museum in Melbourne has
a photographic exhibition showcasing
multiculturalism in Australian football.It is
on display from August 14 to October 31.
Enquires:www.museumvictoria.com.au/im
migrationmuseum/
Israeli granted visa for Basketballers win silver in America
world badminton titles
JOSHUA LEVI
ALLON SINAI
ISRAELI badminton player Misha
Zilberman was due to face Jen Hao
Hsu of Taiwan in the first round of
the world championships only a
day after arriving in Jakarta,
Indonesia, under tight security.
The 26-year-old, who represented Israel at the London 2012
Olympics and the 2015 European
Games, was escorted from
Singapore to the world’s most
populous Muslim country by badminton
World
Federation
Secretary General Thomas Lund,
who flew to Singapore especially
in order to ensure the Israeli
would be able to enter Indonesia.
Zilberman, who is only allowed
to leave his hotel for training and
games, spent recent weeks practicing in Singapore while waiting for
his visa request to be approved.
Despite filing his initial application six months ago, Zilberman
was turned down by Indonesian
officials time and again.
Israel and Indonesia do not
have formal diplomatic ties and it
is difficult for Israelis to visit the
country.
Zilberman’s pleas to the
Badminton World Federation fell
on deaf ears until recent days
when pressure from the Olympic
Committee of Israel and Israeli
International Olympic committee
member Alex Gilady, who also rallied fellow IOC members, forced
the BWF into action.
However, with the championships already beginning on
Monday and Zilberman scheduled
to play his first round match on
Tuesday, the Israeli, ranked No. 44
in the world, enters his contest
with Hsu (24) in a very tough
position.
The Olympic Committee of
Israel said on Sunday that it will
demand to compensate Zilberman
with ranking points due to the
ordeal he was forced to endure
over recent weeks.
Zilberman’s world ranking will
ultimately decide if he participates
at the Rio 2016 Olympics.
“Our victory and your victory
is the fact that you will be playing
in Indonesia,” Olympic committee
of Israel Secretary General Gili
Lustig told Zilberman on Monday.
“Anything you manage to
achieve beyond that is a bonus.”
Zilberman’s last major title was
in 2014 when he won a gold medal
at a World Tour event in Lagos,
Nigeria.
THE JERUSALEM POST
MACCABI Australia’s under-16 basketball team has won a silver medal at
the American Jewish Community
Centre (JCC) Games in Dallas, Texas.
The competition started with 17
basketball teams competing, but they
were split into two divisions and the
Australian team won silver in the
second-tier competition when they
lost to the home team, Dallas, 61-37
in the final.
Australia had an amazing result in
the pool competition in Dallas where
it completed a trifecta in the 50-yard
backstroke event. Australia’s Judd
Katz won the event ahead of fellow
Aussie Samuel Penkin and teammate
Jarred Elbourne.
After competing in Dallas last
week the team has now moved to Fort
Lauderdale in Florida where they will
compete in a second round of competition.
Australian
team
manager
Michelle Israel said that American
athletes only compete in one JCC
Games competition, but because the
Australian team travels so far they are
allowed to compete against two different opponents at two different
events.
“The kids have had an amazing
money-can’t-buy experience because
they have come to America and been
billeted by families,” Israel told The
AJN from America.
She said that competitors have
learned about how they are part of
Greg Diamond works his way through the Greater Washington defence.
the bigger Jewish community around
the world.
“Some of the kids are too young
for Maccabiah, because they are as
young as 13, and so this is a great
Jewish and competitive experience for
them.
“It’s been great to watch then grow
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as athletes and hopefully this will
ignite some sort of passion for them
to compete in Israel.”
The Australian athletes are competing against teams from a variety of
American cities, as well as international delegations from Panama,
Israel and Mexico.