Israel's unbridled joy at first gold

The wave of joy that swept through Israel as windsurfer Gal Fridman won the Jewish state's first ever Olympic gold medal crashes onto the pages of the press.

But some commentators look at the wider significance of the victory amid Israel's seemingly unanswerable problems.

The main Hebrew newspapers all lead with Mr Fridman and his Olympic victory. Yediot Aharonot and Ha'aretz have an identical photograph of the 28-year-old windsurfer kissing his gold medal.

"Gal Grabs Gold", bellows the headline in Ha'aretz.

In remarks to Yediot Aharonot, Mr Fridman says he thought of the Israeli athletes killed at the 1972 Munich Olympics. The paper says that only when standing at the podium did he just slightly lose his composure.

According to the paper, he will receive about a million shekels (�123,000) in grants - but the income tax authorities say the funds will be taxed.

Shimrit Berman, writing for Ha'aretz, sums up how many Israelis felt:

"After receiving the gold medal from International Olympic Committee member Alex Giladi, and after singing the national anthem Hatikva, the ceremony turned into an event that is hard to describe."

"Most of the audience descended on the awards podium, enveloping the silver and bronze medalists along with Fridman."

Wrapped in the flag

Herb Keinon, a columnist writing for The Jerusalem Post, says, "Special midday news coverage on Channel 1 generally sends shudders up and down my spine.

At a time when Jews in France are afraid to walk out their doors there was something deeply moving about watching Fridman proudly wrap himself in an Israeli flag The Jerusalem Post

"When Channel 1 interrupts its regularly scheduled programming and trots out breathless reporters to give on-the-spot coverage, it is usually a sign of disaster - of a bus blown to bits, of torn bodies on the road. That is why it was so refreshing watching Channel 1's special coverage of Gal Fridman's gold medal."

Just like any "normal" country, Keinon says.

"The wires will predictably write that Fridman brought joy to Israel at a time where there is little to cheer about. But that's not it, there is something deeper, more symbolic, at play in our joy over Fridman.

"At a time when Jews in France are afraid to walk out their doors displaying any sign of their Jewishness, when the Foreign Ministry tells Israelis going abroad not to wear T-shirts with Hebrew writing, there was something deeply moving about watching Fridman proudly wrap himself in an Israeli flag," Keinon writes.

"This achievement speaks volumes about this country's vast reserves of resiliency. Thirty-two years after the Munich massacre, the Israeli flag was raised at the Olympics in victory, not lowered to half mast in mourning."

"Four years after the current war that has sapped so much time, energy, and treasure, the country retains trappings of normality - and nothing is more normal than sporting events, and a preoccupation with them - and that itself is a partial victory."

Tide of bureaucracy

In a Ha'aretz editorial, Ron Koffman says Mr Fridman has joined a select group of athletes "who confounded the Israeli athletic ethos that enshrines mediocrity and even aggrandizes it".

Youngsters who excel at athletics and swimming look for a way to escape the paralysing and paralysed system by going overseas to study on sports scholarships Ha'aretz

"Only in Israel does an eclectic bunch of bureaucrats, some of them state functionaries, determine an athlete's needs - how many training units he'll receive, and how many competitions he will attend.

"Youngsters who excel at athletics and swimming look for a way to escape the paralysing and paralysed system by going overseas to study on sports scholarships."

He concludes it is imperative that Israel appreciate every athlete whose sheer powers of perseverance push him beyond mediocrity.

BBC Monitoring, based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.