Israel withdraws Olympic bobsleigh team after false illness claim

Israeli Olympic officials have withdrawn the country’s bobsleigh team for the final day of competition at the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics after a team member falsely claimed to be ill in an effort to allow a Druze reserve athlete to compete.

The decision was taken by the Olympic Committee of Israel (OCI) after it emerged that one athlete had declared himself unwell to enable Ward Fawarseh – a Druze athlete travelling with the team as an official substitute – to take part in Sunday’s four-man event.

Had he competed, Fawarseh would have become Israel’s first-ever Druze Olympian. Under Olympic rules, however, a reserve may only replace a competitor in cases of genuine illness or injury.

In a statement, the Olympic Committee of Israel said: “The bobsleigh team asked to include Ward, the substitute, in the competition. According to the rules, this is only permitted if one of the athletes is injured or ill.”

The committee added: “In order to make this possible, one of the team members – encouraged by his teammates – declared that he was unwell. He even went for a medical examination and signed an affidavit so that the Olympic Committee could request approval for a substitution.”

The OCI said the conduct was “improper” and “goes against fair and sportsmanlike conduct.” It confirmed that Uri Zisman, the athlete who requested the substitution, later “admitted to the head of the delegation that he had acted improperly”, prompting the decision to bar the team from taking part in Sunday’s event.

A further statement cited by Israeli broadcaster Kan News said: “The Olympic Committee of Israel views any deviation from principles of fair play with great severity and cannot accept conduct that is unbecoming.”

The Israeli bobsleigh team – the country’s first ever to compete at an Olympic Games – had completed two runs on Saturday with a line-up of AJ Edelman, Menachem Chen, Uri Zisman and Omer Katz. The team sat 24th out of 27 sleds after crashes disrupted the second run, leaving them outside the top 20 required to reach the final heat.

Writing on Instagram on Sunday, team pilot Edelman acknowledged the failed substitution attempt, saying that as the team was no longer competitive, “it was more important to us that our alternate could have the opportunity to compete in the Olympics.”

He added: “The circumstances under which we made the substitution did not meet the high bar that allows a team to make a lineup change, and we withdrew from our final run.”

“While we are sorry that this will not end for all of us in the way we had hoped, we are proud of the history we made representing Israel and setting the table for further Israeli representation in the sport for years to come,” Edelman wrote.

The withdrawal comes amid heightened attention on the Israeli delegation at the Games, following controversy last week when a Swiss television commentator spoke over the team’s run during the two-man event, accusing Edelman of “supporting genocide” and questioning whether he should be allowed to compete because of his Zionist views.

Despite the premature exit, the team’s appearance in Milan marked a first for Israel in Olympic bobsleigh – a milestone officials say will help lay the groundwork for future participation in the sport.