“Germany’s Victory over Brazil was like the Blitzkrieg”: The Sport-Politics Nexus in Israel During the 2014 World Cup

Autor/innen

  • Tal Samuel-Azran Sammy Ofer School of Communications
  • Yair Galily Sammy Ofer School of Communications
  • Amit Lavie-Dinur Sammy Ofer School of Communications
  • Yuval Karniel Sammy Ofer School of Communications

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22032/dbt.35004

Schlagworte:

football, World Cup, Germany, Brazil, Iran, Israel

Abstract

Various voices assert that the sport-politics nexus that characterized international sport events during the Cold War era is irrelevant in the current age of globalization. This study examines the validity of this argument via a case study of Jewish-Israelis’ fandom tendencies during the 2014 World Cup. A survey conducted during the World Cup games among a representative sample of the Jewish-Israeli population revealed that the Dutch team, whose popularity in Israel has been attributed to the Netherland’s perceived support of Jews during the Holocaust, was the most supported team. The teams most rooted against were Iran, Germany, and Algeria, indicating the potential role of the Holocaust and contemporary Jewish-Islamic relations on fandom tendencies. To better understand the animosity towards the German team, which is surprising in light of current improved Israel-Germany relations and the strength of the German team, we analyzed user comments on Israel’s main online newspaper following the German team’s glorious 7-1 victory against Brazil. The analysis revealed that 51 of the 287 user comments made direct or indirect references to the Holocaust, further highlighting the centrality of nationalism in contemporary sport fandom.

Autor/innen-Biografien

Tal Samuel-Azran, Sammy Ofer School of Communications

Tal Samuel-Azran (PhD, University of Melbourne; MA, New York University) is the Head of the international program at the Sammy Ofer School of Communications. His main fields of research are political communication, new media and media globalization. His book Intercultural Communication as a Clash of Civilizations was published in 2016 by Peter Lang Press. His articles were published in leading journals such as New Media and Society, American Behavioral Scientist and Computers in Human Behavior.

Yair Galily, Sammy Ofer School of Communications

Yair Galily is an applied Israeli sociologist, mass media and management researcher, founder & head of the Sport, Media and Society (SMS) Research Lab @Sammy Ofer School of Communications the Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya and former Dean of the Zinman College, Wingate Institute, Israel.

Amit Lavie-Dinur, Sammy Ofer School of Communications

Amit Lavie-Dinur is Deputy Dean and Head of the Visual Content & Persuasive Communications Specializations at the School of Communications. She has taught communications courses at leading Israeli universities and colleges and served as the dean of Student Affairs at the Media School of the College of Management in Tel Aviv.

Yuval Karniel, Sammy Ofer School of Communications

Yuval Karniel has extensive experience teaching law and communications courses on media policy, law and ethics in the media, and commercial advertising. He co-directed the Joint Program in Law and Communications at Tel Aviv University. Dr. Karniel also is on the Israel Broadcasting Authority’s board and was the general counsel of Israel’s Commercial Television and Radio Authority.

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Zitationsvorschlag

Samuel-Azran, T., Galily, Y., Lavie-Dinur, A., & Karniel, Y. (2018). “Germany’s Victory over Brazil was like the Blitzkrieg”: The Sport-Politics Nexus in Israel During the 2014 World Cup. Global Media Journal - German Edition, 8(1). https://doi.org/10.22032/dbt.35004

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Peer-Reviewed Artikel