Palestinian athlete is forced to be resourceful

Teenager trains in a frigid, makeshift pool for Olympics

Associated Press

Palestinian athlete is forced to be resourceful — The Daily Progress, 10 January 2004 — The Daily Progress · Charlottesville, Virginia · 10 January 2004

Transcribed from the clipping

“JERUSALEM — Teeth chattering and lips blue from the cold, 17-year-old Palestinian Raad Aweisat took a deep breath and dived back into the chilly three-lane swimming pool for a few more laps.

Huge nylon sheets surround the pool on all sides, creating a makeshift natatorium and keeping in the minimal heat, but the room has no ventilation, and the smell of chlorine soaked the hall. ‘It’s not perfect, but it’s made an Olympian of my son,’ said Aweisat’s mother, Amaal. Aweisat is training for the Aug.

13-29 Athens Olympics, where he plans to compete in the 100-meter butterfly. He will be the first Palestinian swimmer to represent his people at the Olympics. Palestinians gained International Olympic Committee recognition in 1993 after the Israeli-Palestinian peace accords. A Palestinian team competed at their first Olympics in Atlanta in 1996.

The thought of representing Palestine in the Olympics is enough motivation for Aweisat to dive into cold water in the middle of winter. Winning a medal, however, is another matter. The qualifying speed for the Olympic 100-meter butterfly event is 58 seconds.

Aweisat, with limited financial resources, a primitive swimming pool and only three hours of training a day, finished the 100 in 58.95 seconds during the Palestinian national swimming competition. Nevertheless, Aweisat will be at the Olympics, said Ibrahim Tawil, head of the Palestinian Swimming Federation.

The world record for the 100-meter butterfly is 50.98 seconds, held by Ian Crocker. Palestine, not yet a state, its people locked in a bloody conflict with the Israelis, has sent only a few athletes to the Olympics. Aweisat’s father introduced him to swimming at age 4. Two years later, Aweisat was not just a swimmer but training to become a competitor.

By age 10, he was winning all the local Palestinian competitions, collecting dozens of medals and trophies that adorn the family’s living room. At 14, Aweisat was traveling throughout the Middle East, and then to Europe and Asia, to compete in international competitions.

He trains in a village on the outskirts of Jerusalem in a pool that was built in less than a week in a joint effort of residents, family, and friends, Tawil said. They asked that the location of the pool be kept a secret, because it has no building permit from the Israelis, who control this area.

With a corrugated tin roof and no temperature control, the swimming conditions are hardly optimal, Tawil said. ‘In the summer, it gets way too hot, and in the winter, it’s freezing in here,’ said Tawil, wearing a wool hat and a thick winter coat while Aweisat did laps in chilly water. Aweisat used to practice at the YMCA on the Jewish side of Jerusalem.

But after violence broke out more than three years ago, the YMCA told Aweisat to either join the Israeli Swimming Federation, or find somewhere else to swim, according to his father.

So the Aweisats and the Palestinian Swimming Federation extended a 17-meter village pool, located in the back yard of several connected homes, to a 25-meter pool, more proper for Olympic training.”

Context added by this archive

Raad Aweisat, 17, training to be the first Palestinian swimmer at an Olympics, in a 25-metre pool in the back yard of several connected houses outside Jerusalem. It was built in under a week by residents, family and friends, and

they asked the reporter not to say where it is, because it has no building permit from the Israelis who control the area. Corrugated tin roof, no ventilation, no temperature control. His coach gives laps in a wool hat and a winter coat. He used to swim at the YMCA on the Jewish side of Jerusalem.

After the violence began, the YMCA told him to join the Israeli Swimming Federation or swim somewhere else. The pool with no permit is what somewhere else turned out to mean. His mother Amaal supplies the line the headline is a euphemism for: It’s not perfect, but it’s made an Olympian of my son.

Cite this item

"Palestinian athlete is forced to be resourceful," The Daily Progress, 10 January 2004. Covering Palestine archive, CP-2004-010. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-2004-010