The complete lack of scandal in the Judo match everyone is so scandalized by
There was a bit of outrage last week when Egyptian Judo Olympic competitor Islam El Shehaby refused to shake the hand of his Israeli opponent Or Sasson, after Sasson beat him in their match. Disapproving reactions ranged from U.S. coach Jimmy Pedro who called the snub extremely rare and especially disrespectful given that the match was clean, to online commentators and meme-makers absurdly claiming Shehaby’s religion of Islam taught him to not shake hands.
Analysis like that of Pedro’s is reasonable, while the Islamaphobic ones certainly are not. For his part, El Shehaby gave no indication before or after that the reason he didn’t shake Sasson’s hand was because he found his opponent’s faith or ethnicity odious.
In fact, we have no idea if that was the case, or if he felt it was a symbolic statement he could make to object to Israel’s treatment of Palestinian people and failure to recognize the state of Palestine. Perhaps Shehaby was upset at some perceived slight or foul within the competition, or maybe he just wasn’t in the mood to shake the hand of the person who just crushed his professional dreams, and so acted a bit jerkish.
Whatever the reason, the unreciprocated handshake isn’t a big deal, in and of itself. Let’s look at what we know, for certain, to put things into perspective.
Two athletes representing nations openly hostile to one another put all that aside and agreed to face one another within a sporting contest to test their skills, despite pressure on at least Muslim athletes like El Shehaby not to engage in sport with athletes representing Israel.
Still, they met on the mat, acknowledged one another and then competed against one another, hard but fairly and without apparent cheating or fouls, until resolution had been achieved under the rules of the game. Afterwards, a gracious Or Sasson bowed in respect to El Shehaby and the bested opponent nodded back.
All that happened before Sasson walked across the mat to shake hands and El Shehaby backed away, demurring. The judo fans in attendance booed and that makes sense.
Though it isn’t required by the rules, shaking hands after a match is tradition in Judo. Fans and practitioners of martial arts often put a lot of importance into ceremony and superficial displays of respect, believing there should or at least could be deeper meanings behind them and auxiliary benefits from engaging in the rituals.
So, Judo purists may not have liked El Shehaby’s non-shake, and purists of another type from the Egyptian’s home didn’t like the fact that he competed against Sasson to begin with. The Judoka likely displeased just about every side and stance in this circumstance, for different reasons, putting him in an all-around lonely position.
They are entitled to all of their opinions but ultimately the plain, dry, reality can’t be denied. El Shehaby showed up, competed hard, and followed the rules.
Afterwards, he either showed a bit of petulance or made some symbolic political stance. In any case, in a world where we’re killing one another because of philosophical differences and fear, and where athletes routinely cheat, El Shehaby quietly refusing a handshake shouldn’t scandalize anyone.
About the author:
Elias Cepeda has served as a writer and editor covering mixed martial arts and combat sports, as well as public and cultural affairs, since 2005. He began as a staff writer for InsideFighting, and not long thereafter became publisher and editor of the page. Cepeda then went to write for Yahoo! Sports’ boxing and MMA pages, and edited their Cagewriter blog. He was hired away by FOX Sports, but after several years departed over philosophical differences with the executive leadership around important issues of journalism ethics. A student of and sometime competitor in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and MMA since 1999, Elias brings a unique and vibrant presence to reporting, and enjoys trying to highlight shared humanity and connect common experiences from seemingly different worlds.
We are honored to announce that Elias will be writing a weekly column for The UnderGround.
