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2021
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
AUGUST 5, 2021
b”pst
The Week In News
Second Gold for Israel – Ever
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Israeli gymnast Artem Dolgopyat, 24, took home the gold in floor gymnastics and is already planning for the 2025 Olympics. Dolgopyat’s medal is Israel’s second-ever gold at the Olympics. Speaking at a Monday press conference, Dolgopyat said, “We’re not going to stop; we’re going to move forward with our focus on Paris and get ready for that and bring honor to the country. We need to start thinking of a new routine and check all the new rules, and we’ll start working and see what scores we get.” Sergey Weissburg, Dolgopyat’s longtime coach, added, “We’ll take a week, or a month, and then we’ll start working again. We have a plan to continue to the next Olympics — the whole gymnastics team as well as Artem.” Dolgopyat himself is unassuming and uninterested in his newfound fame, and when he returns to Israel he wants to continue to focus on his sport. “I don’t know what it will be like when I go back to Israel — until now, I definitely wasn’t well-known or recognized. I want to continue to be modest the way I am, and not think about the things around me and just do my work,” he said. “I don’t really want all that other stuff,” he added. “I think it will only put more pressure on me. I think bringing honor to the country and getting medals … is much more important than everything else.” Though he said his parents believed in him from his first day, Dolgopyat said, “When I think about it
now, I want to cry. I didn’t totally believe it would happen … but all the people around me supported me, and I’m so happy that I’m surrounded by them and they always pushed me further and believed in me.” About the prize, he added, “My dream was to get the medal, not how much money I’ll make. Everything else is just a bonus.” Dolgopyat is not Jewish, although his father is Jewish. In Israel, he is not able to marry a Jew. The media has taken Dolgopyat and made his situation a cause célèbre for taking marriage in the Jewish state away from the rabbinate. Dolgopyat notes that his marriage plans should not be nabbing headlines and swaying public opinion. “It’s my personal life and I think it’s not so appropriate to talk about in front of the whole country,” he said, when asked about it. “These are things that are in my heart and my own personal issues so I’d rather not answer that.”
More Quarantine for Travelers
Those coming to Israel from 18 countries will be required to undergo stricter quarantine protocols starting next week, said the Knesset on Tuesday. The coronavirus cabinet is slated to convene at the Knesset on Tuesday afternoon, amid a sharp rise in new COVID-19 cases. On Monday, 3,818 new cases of COVID-19 were confirmed in Israel, with a test positivity rate of 3.79 percent. There are currently 22,375 active cases in the country, with 420 of them hospitalized; 221 patients are in serious condition with 46 of them on ventilators. In an effort to thwart another far-reaching pandemic, the Knesset Labor, Health and Welfare Committee approved the Health Ministry’s request to add 18 more countries to the
