2020 Sapora Symposium

REESE BRESSLER: Good evening to anyone joining us from Israel, and good morning to all who are joining us from the United States. My name is Reese Bressler, and I'm currently a junior studying Recreation, Sport, and Tourism at the University of Illinois. Every year, the School of a AHS, Department of RST, has the Sapora Symposium to help educate students as they move forward into their careers.

The coronavirus pandemic introduced all of us to the wonders of Zoom and allows us to host conversations like this with alumni and other influential individuals all over the world. This year, we are taking time to address and learn about social justice issues, one of those being issues with religion. Today's speaker is the gold standard of fighting for social justice and has single-handedly made a major political impact for the state of Israel and Jewish people all over the world, but I will let him get more into that side of things as we proceed with today's conversation.

He is also the star of the documentary On the Map, which I highly recommend you watch on YouTube and Amazon Prime Video. Today we are extremely excited to host University of Illinois alumni Tal Brody.

Mr. Brody is an American-Israeli former professional basketball player and a current goodwill ambassador for Israel. Mr Brody was drafted as the 12th overall pick in the 1965 NBA draft to the Baltimore Bullets, known today as the Washington Wizards, but passed on the opportunity to play basketball in Israel. He played on both national teams for the United States and Israel, and also served in the army for both countries.

While playing for Illinois, he was voted a 1965 All-American, led the Fighting Illini to a Big Ten Championship, and ultimately had his jersey retired by the University of Illinois. It is my pleasure today to introduce all of you to Tal Brody.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Good morning, Tal. My name is Mike Raycraft. I'm the faculty director [AUDIO OUT] symposium. On behalf of our faculty of the Department of Rec, Sport, and Tourism, thank you for joining us this morning. Welcome to our virtual Hoeft Hall, which I know you're very familiar with. We certainly appreciate you being here this morning and joining us.

Our other student moderator this morning is Aaron Gold. Aaron, would you like to introduce yourself?

AARON GOLD: Good morning, Tal. Thank you for joining us, or I should say good evening. I'm Aaron Gold. I'm a senior in RST, as well. I'm from California, so it's a little bit on opposite ends of the world, but I am greatly looking forward to this conversation.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Tal, we'll turn it to you.

TAL BRODY: OK. First of all, thank you. It's a normal time in Israel, at 6:00 in the evening, so it's a pleasure to talk to everybody. And it brings back great memories of Illinois. And before we open it up to Q&A, I'll just give you for those that haven't seen the On the Map movie, to run through and give you a briefing of my background and more or less my story and how I feel that sport can play such a big contribution in not only connecting people that can understand other cultures, other religions, other races, but also at this stage right now, where we are going through the Abraham Accord, the new normalization agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, how this change after 72 years of not sitting together and basically with some of the countries being at a continuous war, all of a sudden, things have changed around where most likely there's going to be about a $5 billion exchange in technology and water and agriculture and medicine, in fintech, in all fields within the next coming years.

And that's an amazing boost for Israel, but even more, it's amazing boost for peace where people, especially in the universities, like to get together and they say, well, let's boycott Israel for I don't know, what for any reason. It's not any justified any reason. But if the Muslim countries are coming together and creating this normalization agreement and friendship and trade and everything, what sense does it make for the University-- I do have to say, I was very disappointed that the University of Illinois had a referendum that was passed to boycott Israel, when there was-- especially during the Jewish holidays. But anyway, that's another story.

But I'll go back a little bit and how I got to Illinois and about my years at Illinois. And I'll start off with I was born in Trenton, New Jersey. In high school, we won the New Jersey State Championship, going 24 victories and no defeats. Had about 40 scholarship offers to play basketball all over the United States, because I had a good high school coach, very educational coach. He said choose four colleges, and don't stop running around the whole world because you're going to get really messed up. The more colleges you see, the less you'll understand and the harder your decision is going to make.

So the number one actually on my list was going down to Atlantic Coast Conference, which was considered the best basketball conference in the US. And of course, the Big Ten Conference, but it was further for me, so I first considered the Atlantic Coast Conference.

But interesting, by going down there in the '60s and getting off the plane and with me coming from Trenton, New Jersey playing in a public school with the 10 African-American ballplayers and one Jewish guy, that was me, to get off the plane and to see that the bathrooms, there's a Black bathroom, there's a white bathroom, there's a white water fountain, there's a Black water fountain.

And I said to myself, if they think that I'm going to come down to these schools in Carolina, how can I even think about it? What do you think about it after playing and being in such good relationships with the guys that I played with? And that was the main reason that I didn't even think about going further in the Atlantic Coast Conference in North Carolina, in North Carolina State at that time.

And that's when my second option was actually the University of Illinois, when the scout on the East Coast said, look, the University of Illinois has a great senior team. Jerry Colangelo is the playmaker. He's a senior, and they have 4 juniors which are very good.

And if you're coming in as a freshman, at that time, freshmen weren't allowed to play. He said, look, as a freshman, you'll be playing against Jerry Colangelo at guard for a year, and he'll give you a good training. And when he graduates, you'll be going up to take his place as a sophomore with four seniors, and you'll have an excellent team to compete for the Big Ten Championship and for the NCAA Finals.

And plus. The assembly hall was just finishing at that time to be another year or so to be built, with 16,618 at the time, a beautiful gymnasium, of course, which you know was transferred to the State Farm right now. But also with a very good freshman team, Skip Dorene, Bogy Redmond, Jim Seeley, which they needed an Eastern guard. And because of what happened when I went down to North Carolina in the early '60s, 1960, '61, when I graduated high school and what happened to me down there, I was so disappointed that Illinois was my best choice over Houston, Temple, and those schools. And that's how I got out to Illinois.

Now as I said, freshmen, we weren't allowed to play varsity my first year. But the games in Hoeft Gymnasium, if you ever saw a barn burner, what they say a barn burner game, you should see Illinois against Indiana at that time. It was unbelievable, these games in Hoeft Gymnasium. It was a small gymnasium, but what a crowd. It was so lively.

But it was such a pleasure when we moved over to the assembly hall. And as I said, I did change Jerry Colangelo when he graduated. Every time I visit the Chicago Bulls, so Michael Reinsdorf and their Chief Financial Officer says, Tal, you see this chair? You want to sit in this chair? That's where we signed Michael Jordan.

But you know, Jerry Colangelo at that time, when we took him on, he did the job, what Jerry did as the Chief Marketing Officer, 40 people they have in that position today. So that's how-- that's what Jerry Colangelo did for the Bulls, and then we went out and he created the Phoenix Suns franchise. He also won the national baseball championship, creating the baseball team in Phoenix. And he still comes back to Illinois, but I think he's one of Illinois' best and successful graduates.

So my freshman year, or my sophomore year, I did go up to the varsity team, the first team, and started with four seniors. And it was an unbelievable year for Illinois. We were number 3 in the nation. We won the greatest doubleheader ever played in the old Chicago Stadium. They had close to 25,000 people and the fire department had to make a big decision whether to have the four team tournament go on.

Loyola of Chicago, which went on to win the NCAA championship that year had a great team. And Cincinnati also with a great team. There was a period of time when Cincinnati every year had great teams after Oscar Robertson. And Illinois, and then a team from California.

So we did win that tournament. Then we went on to Kentucky. And we won the Kentucky Invitational.

When Pat Riley two years ago was in Israel and I spoke to him, one of the few things he remembers about his college career, how embarrassed their coach, Adolph Rupp, who was one of the greatest American coaches ever, and how embarrassed Pat Riley and Lou Dampierre were when University of Illinois came into Kentucky and the Kentucky Invitational, and to beat them in the Kentucky Invitational. That was amazing for us, very embarrassing for them.

Then we went on to Christmas time to play in the holiday festival in New York. The holiday festival for me was one of the greatest things because it's in Madison Square Garden. Growing up in Trenton, New Jersey, used to take a train about 50 minutes from Trenton to get directly to Madison Square Garden. I mean, for every child, that's a dream. Every kid, that's a dream to play in Madison Square Garden. And here I am, playing with Illinois.

And we beat NYU when they had great teams at that time. We went up to play West Virginia right after Jerry West graduated. They had a great player, Rod Dorn, that took his place. And we beat West Virginia in the finals, and we won also the holiday festival in New York. We wound up losing to Loyola of Chicago that year and we didn't make the NCAA finals, but Loyola went on to beat, I think, Ohio State, and they won the championship.

But it was a great season. It was a great year. And the next two years, all those guys graduated, Skip Thorne, Donny Freeman, who was a great player at Illinois, came on. We roomed together for his first year. And the first two years, I was in the Forbes dorm. A lot of the basketball players were there.

And then my second two years, I started to enjoy the Jewish life on campus, as well, with the ZPT. I went into the fraternity there with the Illini Chabad and with Illini Hillel. And so I had a well-rounded basketball life and social life, religion life, and everything, the whole complete picture of being in Illinois.

And I think as an ambassador of goodwill, where I'm speaking all over the world today, I think Illinois prepared me, when our basketball coach, Harry Combs at that time. And he would-- there was a program that he would send us out at the end of the year to speak in high school banquets, high school sports banquets.

So it's easy to play before 16,618 people, but it's much harder to speak before 500 people. But because they threw us out there and they said, well look, prepare your speech. We'll help you. Get out there. These kids are going to have get their medals and whatnot. And then give them what it takes to be a good athlete, and you'll have a half an hour, 45 minutes. And the fact that we had to do that, that prepared me for the future and everything that I did.

I mean, right before the coronavirus, I spoke out in the Beverly Hilton in California before 1,000 people. And for me today, it doesn't make any difference how many people are out there. It's because early at Illinois, I was-- not forced, but yeah, I had to-- yeah, if the coach says you have to do this, this is what you have to do.

But even though that-- all the athletes, all of us, the basketball players that participated in this program, we're all scared. It's very hard for us to go out there. But because we were scared, we got used to it. And that helped us, especially in the position that I have and what I'd been doing before in everything, in business, whether in life, or whatnot. So that's-- I think that's one of the greatest things that I appreciate so much from the University of Illinois.

So with the Fighting Illini, after I finished, very fortunate. I was honored by being on the first team, All Big Ten team, and then chosen by The Sporting News, I believe the 10 best players, the college graduates coming out of college in 1965. And if any of you that remember-- you weren't born at the time, but if you remember the names, Rick Barry and Billy Cunningham and Bill Bradley and Jerry Sloan and Gail Goodridge, I mean these were the guys that were in our graduating year.

And so later on, those that saw the movie and want to ask me, how can you go to Israel and give up a lifetime dream of playing in the NBA and to be drafted 12th, where today you receive about between $3 and 1/2 to $4 million, two years, no cut, and if you're in there third year, it just opens up, how can you do that? How can you choose going to Israel?

So basically, it wasn't a difficult decision for me, because all of those guys, which I said and the majority, and practically all of them went on to play in the NBA. But first, Rick Barry and Billy Cunningham, they went to what they called the ABA. They had the ABA and the NBA but instead of $3 to $3 and 1/2, $4 million, at that time, the salaries were $12,500 a year. So there's a big difference between even if you multiply it with the inflation, it's not going to come up to $3 and 1/2, $4 million.

So taking that into account, after-- today, it's the Wizards. At that time, it was the Baltimore Bullets, the same owner, Abe Pollin. He just passed away a few years ago. But even though that they got me a nice apartment and good conditions and living conditions and everything, but we were waiting and sort of having summer practices, and unofficially we had a training camp, officially, and then after that, unofficially, practices.

All of a sudden, I get this letter to go to Israel to participate with the USA team in the Seventh Maccabiah Olympic Games. It's the Jewish Olympics. And I talked to Buddy Ginnette and Abe Pollin. I said, well look, it's the summertime, and it's only for two weeks. And I said, a Jewish kid from Trenton that had never been out of the United States, it's a nice opportunity. Can I go and join and be with the USA team to play in these games?

And they let me go. And I didn't realize how much of influence of being two weeks in Israel, it's going to change my mind. But what was the changing of my mind and giving up a lifelong dream of playing in the NBA, when it's right-- when you're right there, actually, it was that after two weeks in Israel and seeing even though that the basketball conditions were very primitive, but the social life and the vibrosity of the life was unbelievable, with the good beach weather and the people and the social-- Israel's a very social country, with outdoor cafes. And I enjoyed it.

And then a fellow called Noah Klieger, who's a famous sportswriter, he was the president of Maccabi Tel Aviv at that time. And he came up to me and he said, that look-- and while he's talking to me, I saw on his arm numbers on his arm. And that reminded me that growing up in the States in the '60s, all we would see in the movie theaters is basically movies about World War II about what happened during the Holocaust to the Jewish communities in Europe into the concentration camps. And I felt that all the time, what could I do as a young kid in the States?

And here all of a sudden, here I'm standing and this guy's asking me to come to Israel, that our basketball team never went past the first round of the European championship, that we have boycotts all around us, and the people aren't smiling because it's a very difficult economic situation. And he's asking me to come to Israel for one year.

Now, I didn't realize that one year is going to turn into 54 years, married with my wife and I, Tirtza. We have three children, and we have now tomorrow will be the bris of our 11th grandchild. I didn't realize that all this is going to happen to me. But I said, OK, for one year I'll come and to see what I can do.

And so I told the Bullets that I'm going to take a year out and go to Israel. And that year in Israel, from a team that never went past the first round of the European championships, to a team that went to the finals of the cup of cup of Europe's.

Now, on the way to see how much pride a basketball team to give to a country and how sport can influence a nation, it was amazing. When you're talking about social justice, when we would play behind the Iron Curtain at that time, it was before the Berlin Wall. And we saw that the Jews in those communities that were suffering from anti-Semitism, that a team from Israel can come in, a basketball team, and play equally with their team and even winning. This, to see what it did for those communities and letting these people that were suffering from anti-Semitism to stand up straight and to feel proud in a moment.

And then not only in East Europe, when we would play in West Europe and Germany and France and Belgium, where I wouldn't say anti-Semitism any less today than it was at that time, but still, for the communities, for the Jewish communities, we saw what it meant for them that what a sport team can do just because of the game of basketball or whether-- it doesn't matter what sport, but the fact that it can compete and it can compete against athletes and play good and look respectable and everything. It painted a different picture, more or less, for the state of Israel.

So after that first year, the NBA sort of drifted aside. As I said, it wasn't a financial type of decision, because it wasn't-- if that decision was today with $3 and 1/2 to $4 million, most likely I would probably went to the NBA. But the fact that this fellow with the numbers on his hand, this guy asked me to take a year out of my life-- now, adding on to that that my father was born in Russia, Poland, and he immigrated to Israel and was three years in Israel from 1921 to '23, and my grandfather also was in Israel from 1921 to 1931, and they were on the crew that built the first electric station in Nazaryan in Israel, and also the first airport in Herzliya.

So putting all of those factors together for me to take one year out of my life, it wasn't really a difficult decision for me. It was a sentimental decision, but not a difficult decision.

So when I look at it, what basketball has done for the state of Israel, and when I see that taking this massah, this ride, that today we have our third basketball player is playing in the NBA after Omri Casspi played 10 years in the NBA. He's back now. He's injured, and he's playing with Maccabi Tel Aviv. Gal Mekel was chosen by the Dallas Mavericks. He played, he started to play. He got injured, and he went down to the D-League. And then he came back to Israel. Now he's playing with the national team again. And now, Deni Avdija, ninth in the all around draft. The first draft choice from the Washington Wizards. He's 6' 9". He's probably going to be playing, he could play guard or he could play forward. Most likely he's going to be a swing man, especially with Russell Westbrook and Beal-- what's Beal's first name? Anthony Beal? Or Benjamin Beal?

REESE BRESSLER: Bradley.

TAL BRODY: What? Beal. That's the other-- he's a very good ballplayer, Beal. So he has two good guards with him, and they're a little bit weaker at forward. So he's going to be the our third Israeli ball player playing in the NBA. And we also had our first Israeli girl in the NBA, Shay Doron. But when you're looking, as I say, what sport can do. I'll just take it, like I said, one year in Israel. The second year in Israel, after my second year, the social life in Israel affected me so much that I said, I want to make aliyah, to make immigration to Israel.

And as I said that, there was the time of Vietnam, and they're drafting academics. And I got my draft notice, and didn't think twice. Went back. I did two years in the United States Army, and then went back to Israel in '70 as a new immigrant. And 1977 was the most historical season for Israel. When our team went up against the Soviet Union-- it's not going up against Russia, it's going up against the Soviet Union. If you have today about 60 to 70 basketball players from Europe playing in the NBA, you have about 100 and something from all over the world, 25% of the NBA. If you're talking about social justice, integration, everything, look at the NBA, what it's done in globalization from David Stern, since he became the commissioner.

So basically in the Soviet Union, from 22 satellites, they chose for CSKA, "ches-ka," the best players from Croatia, Serbia, that you have today Russia itself, Ukraine, Slovenia. From all those countries that players are in the NBA, they chose the best. And here Israel was coming up against them. They refused seven years to play Israel.

When I would meet Sergei Belov, the captain of the Russian team, in the NBA All-Star Weekend, all the time I would ask them. I said, how come in 1977 that the Soviet Union let you play Israel? And he said that all the years they didn't let us play Israel because they were afraid. Because they were the military advisors for all the Arabic governments around us, that they would lose face if they would lose to an Israeli team. So they didn't allow them to play. But in '77, because they beat the United States team in the 1972 Munich Olympics, the government actually said, OK but we don't want you to play in Tel Aviv. And we don't want you to bring them to play in Moscow.

So they chose-- and this is what Sergei Belov said-- they made their mistake, is that they chose the smallest gymnasium. I think you have a grammar school in the United States that had a better gymnasium than this gymnasium for 500 people. And the spirit in that gymnasium, and as Sergei Belov said, it was their biggest mistake. Because when they came into the stadium, they saw so many Israeli flags. 498 of the 500 people were rooting and were people that came from Israel, and Jews from Belgium and the area, were rooting for us. And they only had two KGB agents with the team that were cheering for the Russian team. So how could we lose? How could we lose?

So we won the game 91-79, and it was like an Independence Day in Israel. Can you imagine Israel beating the Soviet Union? I mean, something that it's unthinkable for them. But what basketball has done is that, because we won that game, the sport brought for the first time that the Soviet Union team agreed to have dinner after the game with us. They never exchanged flags with us, but they exchanged flags at this game. Of course, when the game in the newspapers in Russia, they spelled Israel wrong. And it said that the Soviet Union team lost to Italy. They spelled Israel a little bit wrong, but anyway people in Russia knew that the team lost to an Israeli team.

But between the two countries, it strengthened some sort of relationship that wasn't there. And we went on that same year in Belgrade. Now, here's another thing. In Belgrade, in Yugoslavia, at that period of time, we didn't have any diplomatic relations. But we had 5,000 fans from Tel Aviv that wanted to come to the game. So the Yugoslavian government, for the first time, allowed El Al airlines to land in Belgrade so that our fans could come to the game. So that's another thing, how sport can influence countries and building relationships.

So we did win that game, 78-77, if you saw the movie. And again, it was like another Independence Day. So before I open it up to Q&A, I just want to say for me again, it's been an unbelievable massah, journey, where not only that we won our first European championship in 1977, we won our second in Strasbourg, in France, 1981.

In 2001 in Paris, we won for the third time the European Basketball Championship, beating the Russian team, beating the great teams from Spain and Italy. And that's in 2001. In 2004, it brought the European Final Four to Israel, where everybody said, well it's dangerous. You can't have Final Four in Israel. We went to Europe, and we convinced them it's the safest place to have a Final Four. And that's the way it was. The Final Four was in Europe. We beat a very excellent Italian team by 44 points in the finals. And it's the highest difference of any game between two teams in the Final Four in Europe.

Now, so that was the fourth time. The fifth time was in Moscow. President Putin put on a suit. He was ready to come to the finals. He couldn't even imagine that the Russian team would lose in the semifinals, but they lost in the semifinals. We won in the semifinals, and we went up to play a good team, TAU Vitoria from Spain, in the finals. And we won for the European Championship the fifth time.

Now the sixth time was amazing, because it was in Milano, Italy. Now who would think that a basketball team can bring 10,000 people from overseas to watch them in a basketball game in 2014 in Milano, Italy? We had 10,000 people that came from Israel, from Europe, even a few people from the United States that came to cheer on. And in the semifinals against the Russian team, we came back and we won by one or two points in an overtime. And then we went on to play Real Madrid, which is one of the best sport clubs in Europe, an amazing sport club for years. It's always been that way. We would like to have Maccabi Tel Aviv as a sport club to be as prestigious as Real Madrid. And we went on to win by 12 points. And that was our sixth time the European Championship.

And then from there, I was invited to Springfield, Massachusetts, to the James Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, where our team Maccabi Tel Aviv was the first team outside of the United States that was granted an exhibition in the James Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, between the great teams of the Los Angeles Lakers and 11 championships of the Boston Celtics. The team from Israel is in the James Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame. And I was very proud that my shirt and some of my basketball colleagues were hung at that exhibition. It was a great honor.

And so, that's basically the story, what I have seen that has basketball can do, not only for people but for nations. As I said before we started, that today the news in the Middle East is basically what they call the Abraham Accord, how the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, two countries that along with all the Muslim countries in the Middle East have never sat down and spoken at all the time that we're in conflict and all the time that they were in boycotts, divestment, sanctions against Israel. All of a sudden, changed their thinking and were very courageous to do it. And they were the first ones and say, you know what? We're going to try a different road.

And this road, we believe, in Israel can lead to peace. When two countries are normalizing an agreement, and this normalization agreement has been amazing. Israelis are going to Dubai, to Abu Dhabi, to Bahrain. The prime ministers have been coming here. Delegations are coming here, and Israeli delegations from all the sectors, whether it's in finance, in medicine, it's changing. Israel in the world has been amazing, is what we call tikkun olam, helping the world. It's an expression that we do in Israel. Let's say the last 10 years, it's not only what's happening in the Arabic world that's getting closer to Israel. Only Iran, Hamas, and Hezbollah are staying on the same road of belligerence more than trying to do a peace-type sitting down and normalizing together.

But to give you another example. Israel in relation to China. China to Israel, 10 years ago, the trade was $50 million. Today, the trade is over $15 billion in medicine, in medical devices, in agriculture, in water, in fin-tech, in autonomous driving. You have all the sectors that today are together, that has brought basically China and Israel together, in a situation. They can't vote for us in the United Nations, because most of the oil and gas is dependent on Iran in many different countries. But they don't have no problem. China is the most anti-Semitic country that's not anti-Semitic. Anti-Semitic? Yeah. There's no anti-Semitism in China in relation to Israel. And it's amazing what has been happening, this relationship. It's been growing out through the years.

So anyway, I've seen. What we do in Africa, you know what Israel does in Africa. Like in the United States, you have Black Lives Matter, but you have also Farrakhan. You have Ilhan Omar. You have Rashida Tlaib. That you have people, you have over 700,000 slaves, still black slaves in Africa that nobody's helping them in Black Lives Matter in the United States. It's amazing. Who's helping them? Israel.

Israel has a program called Innovation Africa. We're bringing light without charge to African villages that don't have light, so the kids can study in early evening, in the morning. Israel is finding water with technology. They find water so that kids, they cannot go to school because their parents say, find water first and bring water, then you can go to school. Israel is finding water, and even for simple technology for an iPhone. How does an African fill up his iPhone when it's charged? They have to send it to Kinshasa in the Congo or to the main city if they're living in a village. What's Israel been doing? They've been creating through roof collectors, electricity, so that they can just plug in in a hut and recharge their cell phone.

You have Moshav. It's another program. The relations between Africa and the African countries are amazing. Sudan will probably be the next country that will make also a normalization agreement with Israel. Other African countries are already in normalization, and we never had a problem in Africa. But this is what is happening. I mean, if people just sit down and talk. And that's what people are getting to realize. You can obtain more.

Egypt and Jordan have attained more by sitting down with Israel. That's been a peace agreement for over 30 years. It hasn't been like the same normalization agreement as the Emirates, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain, and some of the other countries which are on the way to becoming also with agreements with Israel. It's called a peace agreement with Egypt and Jordan, but they see the results. They're starting to see the results, and they say, hey, wait a minute. If that's what's happening with Bahrain and the UAE, why not us? Why can't we go to Israel and enjoy the same thing, to see the mosques? So the mosques, the churches, and the synagogues. It's for every, any religion. And Israel is a country where you have religious freedom.

So there's a lot of misconceptions out there. And the best way to solve misconceptions is by meeting people. And sport has been a door-opener, no matter where you go in the world. Where you go in the world. Today, as I said at the beginning, most people see Israel as a country of conflict. We don't feel a conflict in the country. We have very good security services. Every day we have people trying to attack Israel with terrorist activities. We have a very good army. But people within Israel, within the country, live a very good life. And our sport is first, it's going out. We just won the European windsurfing championship. We just won the European NASCAR Championship. We had our basketball team that went up to the finals of the 201 Euroleague Basketball Championships, beating Spain. Our rhythmic gymnastics girls won the European championship in Ukraine. And Linoy Ashram, three times world champion. And so, sport is a big part of life in Israel, like every place in the world.

So basically, if you talk about social justice, if you're talking about communication, sport has been one of the main connectors that I have to say that I have experienced in my life.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Well I tell you, we have several questions based on your comments. And I'd like to ask one, and I know that Reese does as well. My first one is, my question is, you had the line after that game I believe in 1977, that we're on the map. And not just in sports, but in everything. Can you talk a little bit about what was going on, in terms of what types of changes happened in Israel right from there, and how that was a pivotal point, not just in the history of sports in Israel, but the history of the whole world?

TAL BRODY: I'll tell you, it was a period of time, we're talking about 1977. Israel was created in 1948. And so, about 30 years, and every place that we would play, there were always different maps showing what Israel is not, usually. And what we know that what Israel is. They never showed a bona fide map of Israel, so maybe this was in my mind. And because we knew that this game, Israel against the Soviet Union, it's like David against Goliath in the Bible. Or you're going up against a big dove of Russia. Nobody thought that we can win this game. Nobody thought. Our players, we had confidence, but still nobody thought. I mean, you don't go into a sport game thinking up front, you're going to lose. You always know that you have a chance at least.

And after the game finished, the spirit on the floor. I mean, the crowd, even though that it was a small gymnasium, but the spirit in that gymnasium was so amazing that it just came out of my heart when the announcer just put that microphone in my face. That we are on the map, we are staying on the map, not only in sport but in everything.

And I didn't realize what impression that made on the country until the prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, when he received us at his residences, the team. He says, look Tal, in the 1973 war, we lost over 2,700 soldiers and over 4,000 wounded. And the country since then, has been many families in mourning. And here you come as a sports team, and with this victory over the Soviet Union, it gave so much pride to the country and to our athletes in the country that never thought that they can on a European, if not even a world stature, gave so much enthusiasm to them. And it will give so much enthusiasm for them to see that if our basketball team can do it, why not in other sports?

Our girls in sport are no less an achievement, and maybe even more, than our men in sports. If you look at the four-times world champion windsurfer, Lee Korzits. If you look at rhythmic gymnastics. Even in tennis, we got up to number ten, Shahar Pe'er. So our women, in fact, Israel was chosen as the number one, was picked as the number one country for women entrepreneurs. That was a nice achievement for our women in the country. [PHONE RINGING] I hope my wife answers the telephone over there. Wait one second.

So basically, it all came out of that spirit that was in the gymnasium and the period of time that it was in. And it's something that you don't write down before the game. It's something that just came out of my heart. And since then, Israel just started to blossom, because it did give encouragement to people in all fields, especially in medicine and technology and research. I mean, it just brought it out, that Israel today contributes so much to the world. It's amazing. It doesn't get credit for it in the United Nations, but still it does. It's amazing. And so, yes. So it was the period of time, that this excitement from this game, and the fact that it was the Soviet Union that we went up against. It was the good period of time.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Reese?

REESE BRESSLER: Yeah, I want to-- excuse me-- I want to ask a few questions about your current activism and some advice to students. But I know you touched on the stuff going on with the UAE and all the great things that are going on overseas with the Middle East and how we're making such great advances, but at the same time here in the United States, and especially on our campus, things might be moving in the wrong direction. What advice would you give to students who are trying to be their own activists or help the Jewish community or help their own communities grow and have better relationships with other social groups?

TAL BRODY: OK, I would say that every person should think for himself, and not to be influenced by various groups that are coming up to him. And because they're not up to date in what's happening in the world, the students are overloaded with research, with exams, with term papers, with trying to get through college, and they don't know, I would say many, about what's happening in the Middle East. And we hear interviews all the time when they're interviewing college students and when they're asked the simple questions. A lot of them don't know the answers, but they're joining organizations because they feel they have to get credit that they're in some sort of active organization. But they don't know the meaning and how much it influences, and not in a good way.

If anything, do something that's creating, creating peace, creating normalization. And if they would go deep-- they have the computers, they've got the iPhones-- and see what's happening in the Middle East, Israel should not be attacked especially for what they attack Israel for. There's a history. There's factual information, and they should not be influenced. They should do their own checking before they want to go and vote, before they want to hear all sides. But let both sides be heard. There used to be a question of debate. Not to say if somebody is against your opinion, don't let them speak.

So I believe if everything is fair, then it's great. But today, it's not fair. You have speakers that want to come in to speak. If they don't have the same type of message that agrees with their group or their organization, well they get up and make noise and don't let the person speak. So you do your own research, and really hear from people from both sides what they say before you make any type of judgment. Because we feel in Israel, it's very unfair, especially what's happening on the universities. OK, you could be liberal, you can be conservative, whatever you want to be. But be honest. Don't just join something, an organization that's hijacked and that's trying to indoctrinate you in some sort of a philosophy that's not correct.

Now we also know that also many of the universities are influenced from money that's been coming in from the Middle East. So a lot of programs in Middle Eastern studies are not really balanced, and these things we feel that have to be corrected. Now we feel that because there's the definition now of what is anti-Semitism, and it's what they call the IHRA, I-H-R-A, definition of what is anti-Semitism. Because Zionism is not a bad word. Zionism is a heritage. Zionism, you have indigenous people that have been here for thousands of years that have come home. So there's a lot of ways to look at it. But don't be judgmental if you don't really know what the situation is. And don't vote for something that is not justifiable to vote against, just because somebody came up to you and say, hey, you're my friend. Vote for this. Look into what you're voting for.

Who else is up there? Reese-- is there another question, Reese?

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Are there other questions? Reese?

REESE BRESSLER: Sure. Will you speak on some of the activism that you've done over the last couple of years, more recently?

TAL BRODY: Basically, as I said, I'm speaking as a goodwill ambassador. The most simplest thing is every day I post on Facebook and LinkedIn, about what I call the good news from Israel. And it's so important that people would see what Israel is, not what they hear, not what they see. Like in the United States, it's more balanced, the television and the news stations. But in Europe it's terrible. On France 24, for instance, they would say Israeli warplanes attack the Gaza Strip, but they don't say after rockets were fired onto cities and to kindergartens of children, and that Israeli helicopters attacked different bases in the Gaza Strip. They don't attack civilian populations. They attack specific targets. Israel is targets. And you have sometimes collateral damage, but Israel-- according to the American Army and the British Army-- has the lowest collateral damage in the world. So Israel doesn't fire indiscriminately.

So basically, Facebook, LinkedIn. That's what I do basically daily on good news from Israel. And there's so much good news from Israel out there today. It's amazing. I've been speaking around the world for the last 10 years. I've been in and out of China. And I said, China is probably the most country in the world where you don't have anti-Semitism towards Israel. The relationship is very good. I've been to South America, Brazil, Mexico City, all through the university campuses, from Penn to Temple to La Salle, all the way out to UCLA. And the most disappointing thing actually which I find is actually what's happening on the university campus. It's basically because the students don't have the right information. They're influenced with information which is not balanced.

For instance, I hosted Martin Luther King Jr. the third in Israel, and I asked him, how come you came to Israel for the two days? He says, well, look Tal, many people don't know, but it was the Jewish community and it was a person like I came to honor him for his 93rd birthday. For his 93rd birthday, that had a holding company in the States that helped my father break segregation. I said, well what did he do? He says, well first of all, he bailed my father twice out of jail.

Secondly, he helped fund the movement during the Civil Rights era in the '60s, during Martin Luther King in the '60s. And every time Martin Luther King came to New York, they didn't have the funding to stay in the hotels with the delegation. He gave them apartments that they had apartments in New York to stay in. But the biggest thing, he said, that he helped, was to break segregation. He gave the order to 1,005-- his holding company was a holding company above over 1,300, 1,500 department stores called McClory's or McCory's that it should be integrated. And this helped this helped his father Martin Luther King to break segregation.

Now as I say, Israel in Africa is helping the blacks more than Black Lives Matter is helping. You have Louis Farrakhan that is saying so many things against Israel unjustifiably. Even a fellow-- Jakob Bok. If you look under Jakob, J-A-K-O-B, Bok, B-O-K. This fellow was a slave in Africa, seven years old, from south Sudan. He was taken by north Sudan, let's say from the Muslim community. He was a slave, until he broke out of it, after about seven or eight years. He came to the United States. He asked Louis Farrakhan for help. But Louis Farrakhan refused to help him. Three times he asked him. Why? Because he's preaching against Israel. He's preaching, to basically I think it's a Christian community, but apparently it's Muslim funded or something like this.

But it's a shame that the Black Lives Matter that has a true meaning to it has been infiltrated and sometimes you see signs anti-Israel. That really-- there's no justification for it. And those people holding the signs have never been to Israel, have never seen Israel. We have so many, from the churches, from black churches, coming. Even in Atlanta, Georgia, we had a Passover Seder, 50% from the black community, 50% from the Jewish community, where the pastor talked about coming out of slavery. And the Jewish rabbi talking about coming out of slavery from the Jews. And the Jewish community and the black community have so many things together.

And it's so disappointing and frustrating when we see that a lot of people, some people from Black Lives Matter, are talking against Israel. Or the Jewish shop, that they burned the Jewish shop down. For what? Who helped the black community? So these things really frustrate many people in Israel, and because it's unjustified. So when you talk about activism, I'm talking about activism in that type of way. To showing the examples, as I said before, Innovation Africa. Who is helping Africans if it's not Israel? That's collecting money from the United States, the United Nations, and they're bringing electricity.

Dikembe Mutombo, I don't know if you know him. He was an NBA basketball player, seven foot. He came to Israel. I connected him with the program. Sylvan, an Israeli girl that's going in and out of Africa and creating light for countries in Africa. And he had a program which he built, he raised money to build a hospital in the bush areas. And him and Sylvan also did a program creating light for villages in the Congo.

So there's so many things people don't know about, and that's why we get very frustrated and disappointed when we see these people coming up with signs against Israel. Boycott Israel, boycott Israel. Boycott Israel for what? When you're at a war with the people that want to kill you, and you have border checking, you know how many borders there are in the world? Over 65 borders in the world. The only border the people talk about in the United Nations is the border for Israel that has a security check so people don't come up with suicide bombers. So try to see the big picture. That's what I'm saying.

So in activism, that's what I'm doing to try to create the true picture about the Jewish community, about Israel, because it doesn't deserve the anti-Semitism that has struck up in the universities, especially. You don't see it so much on the outside of the universities, but the universities is the biggest noise about it. Because the students are very busy, to really go into what they hear, the negative points and to really investigate. I'm not sure if I agree, but Israel takes a very soft view and doesn't do on the university campuses like the various organizations do aggressively. Israel doesn't believe that's the way to work, to do it. Because if we had to do it aggressively, we have enough children and people that were killed and stabbed and shot, without any civilians to make a big mess. But this is not the way that we do things. So anyway, so that's the activism that you say if I'm doing, that's the type of activism that I'm doing. To try to give the true picture to Israel.

And like I said, this Abraham Accord, how could people boycott Israel? When I saw that Sam Vincent is the national basketball coach of Bahrain. And I talked with Sam, and Sam and I are creating what we call the Unity Basketball Challenge with kids 16 years old from Bahrain, United Arab Emirates, from the New York City public school systems, which is one of the best leagues I think in the US. It's the best, excellent basketball players, girls and boys, U16 boys-- when I say U, I mean under 16-- girls.

And Israel, the same things. In Israel, we have three major teams: Maccabi Tel Aviv, Kafr Saba, Herzliya. But we have the Arabic Muslim team from Baqa al-Gharbiyye, from Taybeh and from Kfar Hess. We have the Arab Christian community from Nazareth, which have good girls and boys, U16 teams. And also, from the Arab, what they call [NON-ENGLISH], the girls community, which only the girls play basketball. But the boys are with soccer. So they only have a girls team U16. But it's all coming together. It's going to be pen pals. It's going to be virtual Zoom quizzes. And if you know Sam, I don't know if everybody knows him, but Sam played with the Boston Celtics with Larry Bird, and they played with Michael Jordan, during the Michael Jordan days. And now he's the national basketball coach of Bahrain. But this is what sport does, it brought four countries together in a virtual Zoom tournament that's going to start in January.

So that's, do you call it activism, or do you call it sport? I don't know. You can call it what you like, but that's what it is. I mean, you can put any type of title on it, but it's cooperation. It's communication. It's getting together, and that's the only way you're going to solve problems is to sit down. You can't say, no I don't want to sit with them. That's the easiest way to do, but then nothing is going to happen. We've been saying for years. Egypt sat down with Israel, you have a peace agreement. Jordan sat down with Israel, you have a peace agreement. The UAE and Bahrain, they were influenced by the US, and they also are very happy today. But they've been doing it for years, unofficially. These countries didn't want to do it officially, because they didn't want the whole picture. But they said, enough is enough after 72 years of conflict. Let's try a different road to peace. And that's what they're doing. That's what they're doing.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Can you comment, there was a question regarding a relationship with Palestine? And how a sport, especially basketball at various levels-- amateur, youth, et cetera-- have been used as a way to promote peace between these two groups.

TAL BRODY: Actually, there's lot going on, but with the West Bank, with the Palestinian Authority, there's programs. No problem. With Hamas in the Gaza Strip, they don't let their kids to participate in any type of programs. As far as the Arabs are concerned, on our Maccabi Tel Aviv team from Nazareth, we had an Arabic guy. The football teams, they're playing more football than they are basketball, the Arabic boys. But football, I mean soccer. So they're playing all the soccer teams. In the Jewish Olympics, the only people non-Jewish are allowed to participate, are Arabs that are living in Israel. So the relation between Arabs and Jews within Israel is fine.

The relation between Hamas in the Gaza Strip, they don't let any communication take place. The Palestinian Authority, they're more lenient. If there's some type of thing coming up, they'll let their coaches-- they have an Israeli coach was the coach of the National Palestinian team in a three-on-three contest and things. So there is communication, but between the PLO, the Palestinian Liberation Organization, and Hamas, it's two different types of thinking. Hamas doesn't want to recognize Israel, and they don't want Israel to be here. And they're doing what they're doing with their rockets periodically. And so, it's an issue. It's a conflict. But the only way it's going to be solved is by sitting down and talking. There's no other way to solve a conflict.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: There's a question in the forum from Daniel. Daniel, would you like to ask your question?

DANIEL: Hi, I'm Daniel. I'm a junior and RSD. So my question was, do you believe it's not only the job of the media, but also the job of politicians to give correct information when it comes to worldly affairs? Because most of the news we get comes from social media, especially the millennials and Gen Z.

TAL BRODY: You're 100% right. We also wish that only politicians would get the correct information, but they're politicians. I'm glad I'm not a politician. My position is voluntary, so I can do it. Yeah, if more would give not as a politician, if they could speak for themselves and just give their political view as an individual, that's fine. But like in the United Nations, these people represent nations. So they have to give a political opinion that is agreed upon by the government.

So we live in a time that you have to really think for yourself. What you're reading, if somebody is trying to give you the news and tell you how to be from the news, instead of giving you both sides and letting you decide what you want to think. But it's like, when I come to the States, I see the difference between Fox and CNN. It's like day and night, you know? So the person has to be his own judge.

It's an easy question, because you're right in what you're saying, who to believe today. You're correct. Who to believe? So that's why, we have iPhones. We have internet. We have to go in and look for ourselves, what is true. Many of the basic daily events you can find happen, but it depends on how it's presented. I don't know if you saw before, it's like when they say, Israeli helicopters attacked the Gaza Strip on the French-- they call it the French 24. So if you're in France, if you see that, God you don't like Israel. Because why does Israel attacking the Gaza Strip? It's filled with civilians, and also has the Hamas. But it doesn't say after rockets were fired upon Israeli cities in the south of Israel, civilian cities.

But Israel, when it attacks the Gaza Strip, it only attacks military sites. And if it goes after a high-level terrorist, and by coincidence there are civilian damage, collateral damage, it's not the policy of Israel. Israel tries to prevent-- and American Army and the British Army has said, who has the lowest collateral damage in the world of armies? It's basically Israel. They don't just fire, and they differentiate between civilians and the army. But a lot of these organizations in Hamas, a lot of times they don't wear uniforms. So when a person is shot and he doesn't have a uniform, it's always listed in the newspaper that a civilian was killed. But it's not so--

You have to live in the Middle East to understand the mentality of what's happening around here. It's not normal. It's not like two armies are fighting a war, like World War II or World War I, where everybody had a uniform and you stand up to the Geneva Convention. Hamas, Hezbollah, they don't have no Geneva Convention. And we as a country, we have to, we stand up, not because somebody is forcing us to stand up. We stand up morally to the Geneva Convention.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Well, this was this was absolutely fascinating, and I think a great way to end our conversation that we've gone on for the last two months. Mr. Brody, it's an honor to wish you a Happy Hanukkah.

TAL BRODY: Thank you.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: And thank you for joining us this morning, this evening. And thank you for taking the time. It was certainly a pleasure, and I thank you for sharing your perspective. It's very valuable to the conversation.

TAL BRODY: Thank you. By the way, you know Michael that on our basketball team, we had a lot of Fighting Illini through the years.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Well I know Deon Thomas.

TAL BRODY: Will Bynum played with our team. Anthony Parker. We won three European championships with Anthony Parker. You might know him, his sister was Candace Parker. Still is. But Candace Parker, she was a great WNBA ball player. Deon Thomas, of course, you know, because he's broadcasting the U of I games. And Brian Randall. Brian Randall also played with us. I think he transferred. I saw him when I was in Minnesota. I went up to the Minnesota Timberwolves, and he was there in the scouting department. But I think he got transferred to-- not transferred, I think he got another position with Denver.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: He's coaching. He's coaching with the Nuggets.

TAL BRODY: Who? Coaching the Nuggets? No, he's assistant coach, I think.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Right.

TAL BRODY: Assistant coach. And so, we had a lot of guys that would play with our team during the years. Of course, from other universities, Baston played with Michigan. Yeah. There was a fellow that wrote a book from Canada, and he interviewed 800 African-American basketball players that played in Israel. And he asked them, how come that you played in Israel? You could have got a bigger salary in Europe or in China. You could have got paid in the CBA or in Europe much more. He says, but in Israel, after basketball we have a life. Look at an answer that they gave. Very interesting. He says that we have a life in Israel, before basketball and after the basketball game, we have a life. It's interesting.

Every year I come back for the NBA All-Star Weekend. And I don't know if it's going to be this year in February. It usually is, but I doubt it. It's probably without a crowd. But all the time, I hear some of the guys that played here, they say, hey Tal, [SPEAKING HEBREW]. I look around, I see guys that-- there's a lot of ballplayers. Amar'e Stoudemire was my neighbor here. He just now got the job of the Brooklyn Nets. He got the assistant coaching job with the Brooklyn Nets right now. But we're both in quarantine together, when they had for the coronavirus. So we're only allowed 100 meters from the house. So I would do my exercise 100 meters, and he would go out and his son, he would train him with dribbling drills and everything and whatnot. That's how we spent the first quarantine together.

So anyway, Michael thank you. And I do thank for my college years at the Israel Habad, Hillel, and of course ZBT, my fraternity for many years there. It's been great. The synagogue. I don't remember the name of the synagogue, but in the high holy days, I went to the synagogue in the city, downtown in Champaign. But I really loved my time at the University of Illinois. And you've got to keep winning now. You're in the top 10. Beating Duke is something. But keep going. I'm cheering from you. I'm cheering from you from Israel.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: All right, well thank you.

TAL BRODY: Tiechtel. [SPEAKING HEBREW] Rabbi Tiechtel.

DOVID TIECHTEL: It's so good to see you. I've been looking forward to this day for a long time.

TAL BRODY: Yeah, great. Yeah, so that's it. We're ready to have Hanukkah in Israel. And I hope we don't have another lockdown. Because they have good beach weather, people like to go to restaurants on the beach without the masks. But now everybody is disciplined with the mask.

But one thing, we have over 90% recovery rate. We had about 330,000 that were infected by the coronavirus, but 90% had recovered. From 337,000, we only have 13,000 that are still sick in mild, medium, and about 200 in the breathing situation. So we're OK. It's like every place in the world. You don't know what's going to kill you first, the economic situation or the coronavirus. Everybody, it's a balance. And all over the world, nobody knows which way to go. So we all hope the vaccine will be OK.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: OK. Well stay safe, everyone. Thank you again, and I think we'll cut it off here. Have a great day. Thank you.

TAL BRODY: OK, thank you. Bye bye.