Chaim Glovinsky, secretary of the Israel Olympic Committee, en route to Brazil for a conference of the 30-odd nations comprising Intertoto, the international soccer lottery prevailing in those countries, stopped off in New York long enough to have dinner with this reporter last night.
Glovinsky revealed that the International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF) has advised Thailand that if Israel is not invited to participate in the Asian Games to be held in Bangkok in December, all competitors in the Games will be barred from competing in the 1980 Olympics.
“We have learned that Thailand has no intention of inviting us and will defy the International Olympic Committee which has ruled that the Games cannot take place under IOC auspices unless we are invited, Glovinsky advised the JTA.
Israel’s “Mr. Sport,” recuperating from a mild infection, informed this correspondent that at the IAAF world congress, held last week in San Juan, Puerto Rico, the 138 delegates, representing 75 countries, voted by an overwhelming margin not to sanction the athletic events in the Asian Games in Bangkok or the Asian championships in Tokyo next year unless Israeli athletes are invited.
The vote was taken after the IAAF’s executive council told the congress that the 19-member council had decided unanimously “that Israel must be invited” or a permit will not be issued by the IAAF, the ruling body for track and field sports. The organizing committee for the Asian Games had requested permission from the IAAF congress to stage the games without inviting Israel on the grounds that no Asian country was willing to compete if Israel is invited.
Glovinsky, a founding member of the Asian Games Federation in 1952, revealed that Israel has participated in all of the Games since they began and has competed twice before in Bangkok, taking sixth place there in 1970. While Glovinsky wouldn’t comment on the 30 Asian nations’ fear of reprisal (the barring of their athletes from the 1980 Moscow Olympics), it is this writer’s conviction that the Games will take place, unsanctioned in Bangkok, with the competing countries taking the risk of being refused entry to the Russian-held Olympiada.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
