Israel performing during the team free preliminary competition in the 2023 European Games at the Aquatics Centre, Oswiecim, Poland. Photo: …
by Shiryn Ghermezian
An Israeli team of artistic swimmers won the gold medal on Friday at the 2023 European Games in Oswiecim, Poland, near the site of the former Auschwitz concentration camp.
The 11-person female team took home the top honor in the team free routine combination finals, marking Israel’s first-ever European gold and second European team medal overall, according to the European Games. The team swam to the theme of “Modern Spanish Dance” and became European champions with a score of 248.6083, while their performance was also awarded the full Degree of Difficulty (DD) of 35.0.
Israeli Olympic Association Chairperson Yael Arad, who won Israel’s first Olympic medal in 1992 in judo, noted the symbolism of Israel’s historic gold medal win near the site of the Auschwitz concentration camp, where nearly 1 million Jews were murdered during the Holocaust.
“There is nothing more symbolic than standing with your head held high and singing [the Israeli national anthem] Hatikvah just 10 minutes from Auschwitz,” said Arad, according to Israel’s Channel 13. She added that the whole team had “tears in our eyes.”
“We promised to carry the memory of our Jewish brethren and that is what we are doing,” she noted.
Germany won the silver with a score of 163.3205 for its “Monster Party – Greetings from the Addams Family” routine and Turkey took home the bronze medal with a score of 135.7999 after swimming to the theme of “The Rhythm.” Only three countries participated in the finals.
While this year’s European Games are officially being held in Krakow, the aquatics competitions took place at the Aquatics Centre in the city of Oswiecim, where the former Nazi concentration camp is located, which is now the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum.
“We were very focused before the competition as we knew we had a chance to win this event and that gave us huge motivation,” said Israeli swimmer Shelly Bobritsky following her team’s gold medal win. “We were really determined, felt the energy in the water so I think our swim was quite good. We wanted to catch the judges’ eyes, do our best and we just did that. It was so nice to hear our national anthem played at the end.”
On Sunday, a smaller team of Israeli artistic swimmers won the bronze medal in the team free finals at the 2023 European Games, which is taking place from June 21 to July 2.
