“A win should be doable” – that was the prediction of 22-year-old Oberliga player Lev Magazanik. And that’s how it turned out. The central defender from Saxony won the football tournament of the 14th Maccabi Games with Germany on Tuesday in Berlin. After wins against Mexico and Denmark and a 9-0 win over Sweden, they then beat France 4-1 in the final. DFB president Wolfgang Niersbach presented the trophy.
“Congratulations to Maccabi Germany on the gold medal,” said Niersbach. “The team put in an impressive performance on the day. The European Maccabi Games are going to end with a great sense of achievement. Congratulations also go to the organisers of this special sporting festival which has put an important emphasis on sport in the past few days.”
2300 athletes from 38 nations have spent eight days battling for 166 medals in 19 sporting disciplines – whilst always keeping the community in focus. “Fair and peaceful cooperation was just as important as the results,” stresses Magazanik. During the tough competition, he completed a move from Dynamo Dresden II to Oberliga side FSV Union Fürstenwalde. Matthias Maucksch, 46 years old and Dynamo’s record Bundesliga appearance holder with 118 games, will be his coach there. In this “semi-professional environment”, the 22-year-old wants to completely concentrate on his sport. “I give myself a year. A lot can happen, but if I’m successful this season in making the leap to the Regionalliga then I will continue with football.”
German delegation used to arrive without a flag
He has now played at his third Maccabi Games, and twice he had to fly to Israel. “The community of athletes is like a family,” he says to describe the special atmosphere. 40,000 spectators flocked to the games in Israel, and Barack Obama sent a pre-recorded message. Despite a clear fall in numbers in Berlin, the Maccabi Games still had their special moments. German President had opened the games in front of 10,000 spectators at the Waldbühne. “The way the spectators cheered on the German team was a great experience,” says Magazanik. Germany were the largest delegation with 365 athletes. For many years, Jewish German athletes were not allowed to enter under their country’s own flag, but with every step the burden of the past has been lifted – a lot has changed.
Deborah Rosenthal is the granddaughter of Hans Rosenthal, who presented the ZDF quiz show “Dalli, Dalli” from 1971 to 1986. The student of media and cultural studies from Cologne was in Berlin as part of the German hockey team. “To be able to step out here as a German Jewish team is inconceivably great,” said Rosenthal in an interview. From the hockey stadium you can also see the Olympic Stadium, from where many Jewish athletes were excluded in 1936 and vilified as “non-Aryan”. “Hitler would be getting annoyed at this. But it pains me to refer everything back to Hitler.” The young student is hoping that the Maccabi Games in Germany will give a signal that “Germany is not more anti-Semitic than other countries”.
"The third generation think and feel differently"
ARD journalist Norbert Kron, who in spring published a collection of texts by Israeli and German authors called “We don’t forget, we go dancing”, is banking on the fact that the European Maccabi Games 2015 will be effective. “Maccabi Games in here in Berlin, on the burdened grounds of the Olympic Stadium, would not have been possible ten years ago,” says Kron.
He has already travelled to Israel ten times, most recently to present his anthology, supported by the DFB Culture Foundation, at the book fair in Jerusalem. “An uncertainty still plagues so many acquaintances when it comes to encounters with Jewish people. This laxness in dealing with one another in Israel struck me. That doesn’t mean that you forget what used to be. But it is hugely different from the business of politics, which is always actually about the Holocaust or the conflict in the Middle East.” Today 20,000 Israelis live in the German capital. From Berlin himself, Kron says, “many people have moved here in recent years because of completely non-political reasons – because the rent is cheap, because the city is so creative. Ten years ago Israelis mainly came to Berlin to face up to history. But the third generation think and feel differently. I know many Israelis who do not want to forget the Holocaust, but they do not want to highlight the grief, but more the joy or survival.”
Still 51 violent anti-Semitic acts in present-day Germany
Anti-Semitism isn’t a relic in a museum, but is still alive in Germany today. Barely ten percent admit to using anti-Semitic utterances, something that Jews bare part of the blame for through their own behaviour. The Amadeu Antonio Foundation has a continually updated online list of anti-Semitic incidents. It is a long list of insults, scribbling and desecrations of cemeteries. And although the German centre for political education has analysed that anti-Semitic attitudes are “barely still compatible with mainstream society”, there were still 51 acts of violence and 1275 offences connected to anti-Semitism in 2013.
“A win should be doable” – that was the prediction of 22-year-old Oberliga player Lev Magazanik. And that’s how it turned out. The central defender from Saxony won the football tournament of the 14th Maccabi Games with Germany on Tuesday in Berlin. After wins against Mexico and Denmark and a 9-0 win over Sweden, they then beat France 4-1 in the final. DFB president Wolfgang Niersbach presented the trophy.
“Congratulations to Maccabi Germany on the gold medal,” said Niersbach. “The team put in an impressive performance on the day. The European Maccabi Games are going to end with a great sense of achievement. Congratulations also go to the organisers of this special sporting festival which has put an important emphasis on sport in the past few days.”
2300 athletes from 38 nations have spent eight days battling for 166 medals in 19 sporting disciplines – whilst always keeping the community in focus. “Fair and peaceful cooperation was just as important as the results,” stresses Magazanik. During the tough competition, he completed a move from Dynamo Dresden II to Oberliga side FSV Union Fürstenwalde. Matthias Maucksch, 46 years old and Dynamo’s record Bundesliga appearance holder with 118 games, will be his coach there. In this “semi-professional environment”, the 22-year-old wants to completely concentrate on his sport. “I give myself a year. A lot can happen, but if I’m successful this season in making the leap to the Regionalliga then I will continue with football.”
German delegation used to arrive without a flag
He has now played at his third Maccabi Games, and twice he had to fly to Israel. “The community of athletes is like a family,” he says to describe the special atmosphere. 40,000 spectators flocked to the games in Israel, and Barack Obama sent a pre-recorded message. Despite a clear fall in numbers in Berlin, the Maccabi Games still had their special moments. German President had opened the games in front of 10,000 spectators at the Waldbühne. “The way the spectators cheered on the German team was a great experience,” says Magazanik. Germany were the largest delegation with 365 athletes. For many years, Jewish German athletes were not allowed to enter under their country’s own flag, but with every step the burden of the past has been lifted – a lot has changed.
Deborah Rosenthal is the granddaughter of Hans Rosenthal, who presented the ZDF quiz show “Dalli, Dalli” from 1971 to 1986. The student of media and cultural studies from Cologne was in Berlin as part of the German hockey team. “To be able to step out here as a German Jewish team is inconceivably great,” said Rosenthal in an interview. From the hockey stadium you can also see the Olympic Stadium, from where many Jewish athletes were excluded in 1936 and vilified as “non-Aryan”. “Hitler would be getting annoyed at this. But it pains me to refer everything back to Hitler.” The young student is hoping that the Maccabi Games in Germany will give a signal that “Germany is not more anti-Semitic than other countries”.
"The third generation think and feel differently"
ARD journalist Norbert Kron, who in spring published a collection of texts by Israeli and German authors called “We don’t forget, we go dancing”, is banking on the fact that the European Maccabi Games 2015 will be effective. “Maccabi Games in here in Berlin, on the burdened grounds of the Olympic Stadium, would not have been possible ten years ago,” says Kron.
He has already travelled to Israel ten times, most recently to present his anthology, supported by the DFB Culture Foundation, at the book fair in Jerusalem. “An uncertainty still plagues so many acquaintances when it comes to encounters with Jewish people. This laxness in dealing with one another in Israel struck me. That doesn’t mean that you forget what used to be. But it is hugely different from the business of politics, which is always actually about the Holocaust or the conflict in the Middle East.” Today 20,000 Israelis live in the German capital. From Berlin himself, Kron says, “many people have moved here in recent years because of completely non-political reasons – because the rent is cheap, because the city is so creative. Ten years ago Israelis mainly came to Berlin to face up to history. But the third generation think and feel differently. I know many Israelis who do not want to forget the Holocaust, but they do not want to highlight the grief, but more the joy or survival.”
Still 51 violent anti-Semitic acts in present-day Germany
Anti-Semitism isn’t a relic in a museum, but is still alive in Germany today. Barely ten percent admit to using anti-Semitic utterances, something that Jews bare part of the blame for through their own behaviour. The Amadeu Antonio Foundation has a continually updated online list of anti-Semitic incidents. It is a long list of insults, scribbling and desecrations of cemeteries. And although the German centre for political education has analysed that anti-Semitic attitudes are “barely still compatible with mainstream society”, there were still 51 acts of violence and 1275 offences connected to anti-Semitism in 2013.
Lev Magazanik, who played junior football in Dresden, sees it differently: “My Jewish belief is not a large part of my everyday life, but I’m still glad to be part of the Jewish community.” The Dynamo fans knew that their young central defender is Jewish, but they were never hostile towards him. The European Maccabi Games end on Wednesday, and there were many moving moments, such as when 61-year-old Nancy Glickman lit the flame at the opening ceremony in her father’s football shirt. Marty Glickman, a world class sprinter of Jewish faith, was axed from the US relay team just before the games 1936 Games, probably as a submissive gesture to the Nazis. Now there were 2300 Jewish athletes from all over the world, and no one stopped her. Nancy Glickman says, “My father would’ve been very happy if he knew that I’d lit the flame.”
Lev Magazanik finds it somewhat excessive that around €900,000 was budgeted for the first Maccabi Games in Germany. There was no outrage, no graffiti, only sport and matches. Lev Magazanik says, “It was the first Maccabi in Germany. Next time we will know better how much money needs to be invested in security.” Can sport be a builder of bridges? The 14th European Maccabi Games is ending in any case on a positive, and also with a 4-1 win over France in the final.
