In two games organized by the private Israel Elite Hockey League (IEHL), Israeli and Canadian players wore the white-and-blue Magen David as the IEHL’s Israel Selects for a friendly series March 2 and March 4 in Toronto.
The Israel Selects’ games against the team from Redeemer University, a Christian college in Hamilton, Ont., came days after a decision by the disciplinary board of the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), the sport’s governing body, overturned previous rulings that barred the Israeli teams from participating in 2024 IIHF Championships over safety and security concerns.
The decision Feb. 29 held that the bans on the Israeli team (one from November, another Jan. 9) should not have happened in the first place. Israel’s national teams will play in the remaining tournaments in Spain, Serbia, and Estonia in March and April, after the ban on the under-20 team had been reversed less than a week before the Jan. 22-24 tournament in Bulgaria. Israel ended up winning its division in a tournament it was originally set to host, before the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks in Israel and subsequent Gaza war led to moving the tournament.
Along with present and fellow former national team members, longtime Israeli hockey organizer Oded Orgil helped the Ice Hockey Federation of Israel (IHFI) in its appeal to overturn the IIHF decisions barring Israel from competition.
Orgil’s son Benji, who played with the IEHL Israel Selects at Scotiabank Pond on March 2, plays for Ontario’s Niagara University, and has been a member of Israel’s under-18 team in the Maccabiah Games, and more recently for the Canadian Maccabiah team. Orgil says his son is considering his options playing in Europe and Israel.
“This [IIHF disciplinary panel] decision now allows the Israeli national teams—the men’s under-20, the men’s under-18, and the [women’s and men’s] national teams—to participate where they should be able to participate,” said Orgil of the remaining IIHF tournaments in March and April.
“These sorts of decisions have never been made for other instances in the world, and to use a legal term, it was arbitrary and capricious.”
Yair Castel, the Consul of Israel in Toronto who performed the ceremonial puck drop at Scotiabank Pond on March 2, said the IIHF reversal indicated “at least one voice of reason,” referencing the ruling by Canadian Nancy Orr, the sole panel member who reversed the ban.
“In the under-20 hockey team, in any sport or any event, Israel should not be banned, should not be discriminated against,” he said. “Israel is a valid member of the international community. We always have been. We didn’t ask for this war, it was imposed on us, and Israel should not be punished for defending itself.”
Castel called IIHF’s statements around their inability to guarantee adequate security as the reason to bar Israel from competition “an excuse.”
“[It’s] a gateway to ban Israel from any other events … if there is alleged security jeopardy, then they should provide the security to the team and not ban them,” he said.
“The next thing would be ‘let’s just cancel everything, because there might be a riot outside.’”
The IEHL is separate from Israel’s national hockey federation (IHFI), and was established as a private league.
Typically made up of players at American, Canadian, and European clubs, collegiate and junior leagues, the league puts together about eight teams to play a 10-game season over about a month. It gives players a way to keep active in the off-season and to meet new teammates.
While the IEHL exists separately from the national federation, the summer league’s rosters include national team members as well as high-level players based in North America and Europe.
The league has organized charity games in Dallas, New York, and Colorado.
Dan Yaron, a Laurier University student, grew up playing for the Vaughan Rangers AA hockey club and was playing his first IEHL game on March 2.
In 2018, he played for Team Canada at the JCC Maccabi Games in Anaheim, California.
“That was my first experience with Jewish hockey, and not just being the only Jewish [person] on my Italian, Vaughan Rangers hockey team,” Yaron said.
“It’s super-special meeting new Jewish faces from all over North America,” he says. “You automatically feel connected as soon as you get in the dressing room with them. Even though it’s your first time meeting, that’s our religion and culture.”
As the league’s fourth season is planned for June and July, a new arena complex is nearly finished in Israel, according to the IEHL. The rink in Ashdod is being built with private financing from Canada.
Shlomi Levy, a former Israeli national team player who lives in Montreal and suited up March 4 for the Israel Selects, hopes the arena will become the “premiere ice facility in the country.”
Isaac Levy, Shlomi’s brother, was the Selects’ team captain for the Toronto games. He was among the longtime national team members who recalled a special 2007 tournament in France, when Israel found itself in a division with Great Britain and Germany.
The game between Israel and Germany carried many layers of special significance, he said.
“That a country like Israel got to play against Germany—they had a lineup with a bunch of NHL players–and it was right on the Yom ha-Shoah. That was a special moment, years after the war,” says Levy.
“The German fans started singing for us. It was unbelievable.”
Sergei Frenkel is a Toronto-based IEHL player who’s played 23 years with the Israeli national team and now runs a hockey school.
He also recalls that special moment with the team in France.
“Obviously from a level competition, we weren’t at par. But at the same time, it showed that Israel can get there,” he says.
Frenkel, who holds the national team record for most games played, hopes his four young sons, who all play, continue the family hockey legacy.
“I really hope my kids if they do play [for the national team], they’re the ones that kind of break the records and set new ones.”
The IEHL’s North American games help introduce Canadian players to the league, he says.
“[The league]’s reaching different parts of the world and bringing it all back into Israel,” he says.
The IEHL exposing Israeli hockey to international players “is going to become a feeder to the national team, which is a big deal, because that’s a world stage,” he says.
While it might take some time for Israel to make it to the top 16 hockey nations, he hopes to see the national team climb to the top division.
Frenkel references another country’s example of what’s possible.
“If you look at South Korea, because they used to play against us all the time, now they’re in the top 16 loop almost every year. They’ve built a culture of hockey where hockey wasn’t big, and now they’re a national team that everybody’s aware of,” says Frenkel.
“You’re seeing things starting to develop and starting to happen in Israel. And this rink being put up [in Ashdod] is going to be the starting line.”
The Redeemer Royals won the friendly game by a score of 5-2 on March 2 at Scotiabank Pond. Israel Selects then beat the Royals 7-3 at Herbert H. Carnegie (formerly Centennial) Arena on March 4.
Israel’s national hockey teams are set to participate in three series in the remaining IIHF 2024 Championships, following the Israeli under-20 men’s team’s undefeated run and gold medal win in Division III, Group A in Sofia, Bulgaria in January.
The Israeli men’s under-18 team competes in Division II, Group B of the World Championship in Puigcierda, Spain, starting March 17; the women’s national team in Division II, Group B of the Women’s World Championship in Kohtla-Jarve, Estonia, starting on March 24; and the men’s national team in Division II, Group A of the World Championship in Belgrade, Serbia, starting on April 21.
