Ehud "Udi" Vaks (; born 27 June 1979) is an Israeli
judoka
is an unarmed gendai budō, modern Japanese martial art, combat sport, Olympic sport (since 1964), and the most prominent form of jacket wrestling competed internationally.『日本大百科全書』電子版【柔道】(CD-ROM version of Encyc ...
.
Vaks won a bronze medal at the
1998 World Juniors Championships in the under 60 kg weight class.
2004 Olympics
In the
2004 Summer Olympics
The 2004 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad (), and officially branded as Athens 2004 (), were an international multi-sport event held from 13 to 29 August 2004 in Athens, Greece.
The Games saw 10,625 athletes ...
, competing in the
half lightweight (66 kg) weight class, Vaks was scheduled to fight Iranian competitor
Arash Miresmaeili in the first round. Miresmaeili was disqualified from the competition because he was above the allowable weight limit for his class.
It is widely believed that Miresmaili deliberately set out to be disqualified for political reasons, which is supported by his own comments: ''“Although I have trained for months and was in good shape I refused to fight my Israeli opponent to sympathise with the suffering of the
people of Palestine and I do not feel upset at all."''
Comments from Iranian officials also supported this view. The Iranian state news agency quoted Iranian President
Mohammad Khatami
Mohammad Khatami (born 14 October 1943) is an Iranian politician and Shia cleric who served as the fifth president of Iran from 3 August 1997 to 3 August 2005. He also served as Iran's Minister of Culture from 1982 to 1992. Later, he was critic ...
as saying that Miresmaeili's actions would be ''"recorded in the history of Iranian glories,"'' and that the nation considered him to be ''"the champion of the 2004 Olympic Games."''
Iranian Olympic team chairman Nassrollah Sajadi told the ''Sharq'' newspaper that the government should give the athlete a $115,000 bonus for his actions, the same amount it gave to gold medalists.
Miresmaeili's disqualification resulted in Vaks being awarded a bye into the 2nd round, where he was defeated by Algerian judoka
Amar Meridja.
See also
*
List of select Jewish judokas
*
List of Israelis
Israelis ( ''Yiśraʾelim'') are the citizens or permanent residents of the State of Israel. The largest ethnic groups in Israel are Israeli Jews, Jews (75%), followed by Arab-Israelis, Palestinians and Arabs (20%) and other minorities (5%).
_ ...
*
Arash Miresmaeili § Athens Olympic Games; controversy
References
External links
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1979 births
Living people
Israeli male judoka
Olympic judoka for Israel
Judoka at the 2004 Summer Olympics
Israeli Ashkenazi Jews
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