Published: 24 March 2023
Last updated: 5 March 2024
The Jewish community is justifiably proud of young AFL recruit Harry Sheezel but are Israeli flags the best way to show it?
The Jewish people, the State of Israel, and the North Melbourne Football Club share team colours.
Blue and white has had a meaning for Jews since Biblical times, originating in the practice described in the shema, our holiest prayer, of attaching a thread of blue to the fringes of (typically white) garments as a reminder of the commandments.
Israel’s colours and symbols derive directly from Jewish tradition. The flag combines the Star of David and the tallit, the prayer shawl which developed from the Biblical fringed garments.
The choice of colours for North Melbourne is more obscure but it has been suggested that it, too, has a religious origin. The club had an early association with St Mary’s Anglican Church, and Mary is traditionally depicted with a blue veil and white robe – a colour scheme which may itself derive from the Jewish origins of Christianity.
The chromatic confluence must have made it seem natural for some supporters of young Jewish player Harry Sheezel to illustrate their loyalties with clearly home-made blue and white Israeli flags when he played his debut game for North Melbourne last weekend.
Aesthetically, the combination was certainly effective and the communal support for Sheezel was strongly articulated by the flag, as it was by a sign reading “Mazel tov Harry”.
But the appearance of the flag prompted at least one complaint and, in a kneejerk response, AFL security lead Alistair Meldrum wrote an email opining that the AFL should not have permitted the flag at the game.
The AFL promptly repudiated opposition to the flags, releasing a statement on Wednesday saying it had “no issue with the flag and signs supporting North Melbourne’s Harry Sheezel on the weekend”.
“An AFL match day is a place for everyone, we want fans to celebrate their clubs and players, and if that includes displaying national flags that amplify any of their team’s player heritage then the AFL is fully supportive. We should celebrate our players and the game any chance we get," it said.
The Star of David is the primary symbol of Jewish community, blue and white the only colours appropriate in the context. An Israeli flag is the natural incarnation of those symbols.
National flags have been displayed in the past to support players in various sporting codes across Australia and they are one of many ways in which fans connect with particular players.
Certainly, there is potential for conflict when international politics meets sporting competition. The Australian Open has been the site of conflict between Serbs and Croats in the past and over support of Russia’s war in Ukraine this year.
AFL players represent their clubs, not ethnic or national groups, and the AFL would be within its rights to ban national flags if they created a problem. Ticket and entry conditions already require that patrons must not “wear or otherwise display commercial, political, religious or offensive signage or logos of any kind”.
The AFL’s firm endorsement of the Israeli flags for Sheezel shows an understanding that, in the context of the game, these flags are neither political nor religious symbols. They are a way for fans to express pride and support for a member of their tribe – tribes being variously ethnic, cultural, religious, national and sporting.
The Jewish community, which embraces football as enthusiastically as most Australians, is justifiably proud of Sheezel, the first Jewish player to be drafted in almost 25 years. He is an excellent ambassador for his community, not least in his calm dismissal of antisemitic abuse.
A Star of David is the primary symbol of Jewish community, blue and white the only colours appropriate in the context. An Israeli flag is a natural incarnation of those symbols.
For the AFL, the matter ends there. But for those interested in Jewish community and Diaspora-Israel relations, the flap over the flag has opened up a broader conversation on the nature of contemporary Jewish identity.
The Star of David on the stylised white tallit is the national flag of a sovereign state, but it is also a contemporary representation of Jewish religious and cultural symbols that are thousands of years old.
It is a symbol of pride and liberation to Jews, but also a symbol of dispossession and oppression to many Palestinians.
Like many patriotic symbols, it has been used by the Right to symbolise nationalist positions but in the context of the current pro-democracy movement, it has been reclaimed as a symbol of protest and democratic values. Just this week a man was prevented from bringing a flag into the Tel Aviv Expo because it was considered a protest symbol.
Such semiotics are far too opaque for the world of football fandom, and it is not the role of the AFL to adjudicate them.
But for Jews, it is appropriate to ask whether an Israeli flag is the best way to support an Australian Jew.
Since the establishment of the State, Jewish life has become inextricably tied up with Israel. A third of Jews live there and, with a few exceptions, the rest recognise deep historical, cultural and often personal links to Israel.
The degree of comfort with this connection – like everything else in Jewish life – is the subject of debate.
Some Diaspora Jews, despairing over the current Israeli government and the stalemate of the Occupation, are now talking about disengaging from Israel and rebuilding a separate Diaspora Jewish identity. Looking for ways of expressing our Jewish connections without hanging them on Israel may be the new wave of Jewish life. Stranger twists have happened in the millennia of Jewish history.
But for many Jews, Zionism – the support of Israel as the Jewish homeland – remains a core part of their culture and the intertwined symbols are a potent expression of an integrated history and culture. Jews are the People of Israel, a designation that has lasted almost 4000 years. We gather under the Star of David, wrap ourselves in the tallit and, most powerfully, share what Rabbi Jonathan Sacks called the “covenant of fate”.
For the same reason as football fans wear their colours and sing their team songs, Jews will continue to coalesce around shared symbols as expressions of communal connection and pride but, being Jews, we will also continue to argue about the best way to do so.
Photo: Harry Sheezel signs autographs as fans wave an Israeli flag at his AFL debut last weekend (Peter Haskin, Australian Jewish News)