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news
Israel - Premier Tech (ASO/Billy Ceusters)"We continue to race proudly as Israel – Premier Tech": Israel name removed from cycling team's vehicles as "precautionary measure"
Israel – Premier Tech have removed mention of Israel from team vehicles for the 2024 season as a "precautionary measure". The UCI ProTour team of Chris Froome and Michael Woods this afternoon told road.cc that they "continue to race proudly as Israel – Premier Tech" but took the decision to replace explicit mention of Israel with an "IPT monogram, comprised of the Star of David and the Premier Tech 'PT', on the team vehicles and other branded elements".
The team was keen to stress that this is not a recent development and has been the case since the start of the season, pictures and videos shared on social media from training camps in January and February showing the vehicles with their new branding.
However, the explanation comes following a story published in Barcelona-based daily newspaper SPORT, who are reporting from the Volta a Catalunya and said the team had removed mention of Israel from its cars, buses and mechanic trucks following safety advice from "European police authorities".
An Israel – Premier Tech spokesperson told road.cc: "We continue to race proudly as Israel – Premier Tech with the team name and Israel branding on the racing kit as it was in previous years. As previously stated, the team adopted a number of precautionary measures ahead of the 2024 season.
"The decision was made to use the IPT monogram, comprised of the Star of David and the Premier Tech 'PT', on the team vehicles and other branded elements. The team monogram has been an integral part of the Israel – Premier Tech brand identity since 2023 when it was first adopted on the back of the team jersey and this vehicle branding has been on display since IPT's first races in Europe in February this year."
[Zac Williams/SWpix.com]
The team referenced "a number of precautionary measures ahead of the 2024 season" which were taken to try to ensure rider safety amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, one such measure being that riders were given unmarked training kit in November.
In January, the team's most famous rider, four-time Tour de France winner Chris Froome appeared in a video posted on social media by Israel's Foreign Ministry and the official State of Israel to promote a cycling event to support Gaza hostages.
In a follow-up interview posted on Israel — Premier Tech's website, Froome added: "As a human being, as a father myself – I cannot stand idly by". The team says Froome was "moved to action by the story of the Calderon family, whose father Ofer and 12-year-old son Erez, both cyclists, were abducted on 7 October. The son, Erez, was released after 51 days in captivity, but his father is still being held by Hamas".
Froome continued: "Their suffering and that of all the other captives deeply affects me, and I call on all cyclists to come out for a solidarity ride that day – just as I will myself – in the hope that this show of support will bring them closer to returning home."
The family of the unreleased hostage Ofer praised Froome for his support, calling his backing "incredibly important", but his involvement also drew criticism, some of the reaction to the official video accusing him of "sportswashing" and others questioning the actions of the Israeli government since the October 7 attack.
Dan is the road.cc news editor and joined in 2020 having previously written about nearly every other sport under the sun for the Express, and the weird and wonderful world of non-league football for The Non-League Paper. Dan has been at road.cc for four years and mainly writes news and tech articles as well as the occasional feature. He has hopefully kept you entertained on the live blog too.
Never fast enough to take things on the bike too seriously, when he's not working you'll find him exploring the south of England by two wheels at a leisurely weekend pace, or enjoying his favourite Scottish roads when visiting family. Sometimes he'll even load up the bags and ride up the whole way, he's a bit strange like that.
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60 comments
Mods, time to close this thread now? Everyone's had their say and now you're getting people who have never been on this site before clearly joining just to promote their political views… I know we go off on tangents all the time here but I'm feeling like this one has gone far enough now. There's a difference between a bunch of cyclists arguing over Israel/Palestine, or the EU, or whatever, and the discussion boards just turning into a free for all including people with no interest in cycling.
It certainly does seem that "Judith Acre" has gone along and replied on every single thread.
(I'm not blameless, I responded to them).
Seconded. Not wanting to "censor discussion" but I think this thread has just become part of a continuous one that's been going on for longer than "helmet row" and anything cycle-related left the chat time back.
I do not wish any of you to be subject to southnds of rockets, murders, torture, rape or kidnapping as Israelis have been in recent months. And if it happened to you, wouldn't you expect your country to fight the terrorists back and bring you or your loved ones back? Very easy to judge from the safety of your home and be blind to the sad truth that the terrorists act from among civilians and rejoice in their high death toll. Nothing like Russia and never will be.
So if someone had been murdering, torturing, raping, kidnapping your people, and also stealing your land, bulldozing your olive trees and houses, pouring cement down your wells, then you are saying one should *expect* those subjected to that to fight back against those terrorists?
You are well aware that Israel has been doing those things for decades, right?
Israel has not been doing those things. And the victims of Hamas' actions on 7 October were not terrorists.
Did Bahrain feel the need to be ambrassed when they shot protestors in the arab spring?
As for poor treatment of the 'palastinians', perhaps people should ask why the Lebaneese/ Egyptions/Syrians/Jordanians don't welcome them with open arms. In fact when they did show hospitality in the past it often ended in conflict and violence.
Wow, that's an incredble take on the situation. I'm guessing with you use of quotes you don't recognise Palestinians as legitimate? So does that excuse that Israel are carrying out mass extermination of them?
Neither Bahrain or Israel's namesake and money should be allowed in the sport. Same thing goes for the UAE too
Palestine doesn't seem to have clearly defined borders, it seems to me it should include the residents of Israel too (see Golda Meir). That's why I put it in quotes.
There is no extermination, there are terrorists holding hostages under schools, hospitals and in homes, and an army disarming terror infrastructures.
Condemning Israel alone is supporting terror. Wake up.
You are Benjamin Netanyahu and I claim my £5
Apparently he's got rather mixed personal support but there is generally support for the war (I'm not sure if that's the right word here). And far fewer people there are terribly concerned about the other side - if it means they don't feel safe from people killing them or their loved ones. And the same is apparently true for popular support for Hamas in the Gaza strip.
Did you see this, back in February? Scary.
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2024/feb/06/israelis-ca...
If, as one assumes you are, you are referring to Bahrain Victorious, they wouldn't have had a chance to be embarrassed because the team has only existed since 2017, long after the events of the Arab spring. If, as one further assumes, you are contrasting the treatment of IPT with that of teams sponsored by other Middle Eastern regimes, there have been plenty of comments here and elsewhere about the human rights records of those sponsors, in fact until the latest outbreak of hostilities there was far more focus on their sportswashing activities than there was on Israel's.
Fair enough, although they continue to repress the minority groups with arbitrary detention and behaviour not dissimilar to that in Israel. I can't help but wonder if that fact that both the oppressor and the oppressed are both Muslim (albeit different sects) makes it difficult to pass judgement on in comparison.
Wrong forum
I think everyone is missing the million dollar question. Do you reckon this gesture is enough to get Froome a place on the IPT, sorry I mean PT, Tour De France squad?
In all seriousness, this is Froome spaffing up the wall the last vestige of what little credibility he still had. He should stick to b*tching about disc brakes and saddle height.
Once Froome is recovered from his recent crash, he will move his saddle an additional 3cm and win 4 more Tours.
Israel should be excluded from representation in international sport, just as Russia has been.
That the UCI allows Israeli registered teams to race, given the precedent of its actions against Russian registered entities, is sheer hypocrisy. IPT should be banned from UCI racing.
Definitely all for that. Of course, the US should also be removed. They had similar doping coverups and never got even a slap on the wrist. Plus, Israel wouldn't be able to do any of what they're doing without the US.
Yeah right. Another Putin apologist who can't see any difference between Hamas and the Ukrainian government.
You can't read very well can you? Of course they're different. That doesn't mean that they shouldn't both be excluded. Also, why did you bring Hamas up out of nowhere?
Hamas atrocities are the only reason for the current situation in Gaza. "Out of nowhere"?? Ridiculous
Excluded for what? Going to war with an enemy that entered its own territory illegally to murder over a thousand civilians. I've no skin in the game, but Israel's retaliation against an aggressor is in no way comparable to Russia's invasion of peaceful sovereign country.
True
We have to admit that all these moral superiority games rely mostly on what your environment is.
Just a year earlier, Russian citizens living in western countries faced extreme oppression when Russia tried to do for Russians at Eastern Ukraine more or less what West did for Albanians living in Southern Serbia (this area may be now heard more familiar to you as Kosovo). But not really elsewhere else. On contrary the West has been several times been demonized when a nation (usually somehow related with oil trade) needs "help" whereas right now Haitians right next to US live a nightmare life many years now.
I feel sorry both nations in Middle East. In Gaza life was already absolutely miserable even before last October, and while Israelis have an extremely high level of life, they didn't have a land to feel free to stay without the risk facing a pongrom or a genocide but the one they picked was in the middle of practically single nation, that in turn weren't that happy to see their lands lost. But whether they will be hated or not, depends mostly when they are.
More or less? That's bold. Any Russians in east Ukraine were free to leave. Do you mean Ukrainians born and bred? You are equating NATO saving civilians from detention camps where they were shown on the news starving and found buried in mass graves in the forrests with the Russian military which slaughtered a hundred people on the streets of Bucha and kidnapped mayors and politicians in occupied Ukraine and tortured them leaving them dead in ditches. They also enforced a rigged election and kidnapped 20,000 children who were taken to Russia. More or less??
It is more or less for me. The door was always open to Albania, cities were bombed. I am no history buff, so I just googled for "kosovo war detainment camps" and the first to appear was that https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lapu%C5%A1nik_prison_camp . There is no scale to weight and compare crimes, war is war and invasion or revisionism or borders are no good things.
@john_smith not really. Getting originally greeted with a smile and when telling being a Russian facing an immense bullying out of nowhere or getting stuck in a country abroad while being there legally with banned access to your money and it will not seem very nice. I have friends from Russia very far from war mentality and trust me they have been humiliated out of nowhere just for being born and now facing many practical difficulties.
Israelis have had and probably have similar problems in even greater extent, as they can be the subject of hate anywhere possible for the most minor of reasons. But at least they can compensate with being financially very strong and always open to developmen and that is how they managed to survive all these years.
End putting labels on people just by seeing them or hearing information about them that they cannot control and the world will be better.
The only Russian citizens facing oppression in the west are the ones who speak out against Mr Putin.
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