TEL AVIV — In the fall of 2017, the Israeli judo team set out for Abu Dhabi, to take part in the International Judo Federation’s Grand Slam. To get there meant an unexpected and unexplained wait at the airport. The wait stretched to hours.
Among the Israeli team, no one needed to recite the history of what is what in this part of the world. Everyone knew, and understood. How, though, in such a situation, one naturally filled with any number of anxieties, to keep everyone focused? Calm? Together?
Moshe Ponte, president of the Israel Judo Association, was having nothing but focus. Concentrate on the competition, he kept saying, and indeed the clearance finally came through, the Israelis were allowed into the United Arab Emirates and, in a memorable scene, Tal Flicker won gold in the men’s under-66 category, singing the Israeli anthem — HaTikvah, or “The Hope” — on the stand even though organizers did not play it.
Recalling it all now, Peter Paltchik, the Israeli standout in the under 100-kilo category who in 2018 would win gold at the Abu Dhabi tour stop, said of Ponte, affectionately, “He is a bulldozer.”
Indeed, the 63-year-old Ponte is one of the leading personalities in world judo.