By JANICE ARNOLD, Staff Reporter
MONTREAL ? For the first time, a peewee hockey team from Israel will compete in an
international tournament in Quebec City next month.
Coach Dima Gromkov is bringing his peewee hockey team from Bat Yam, Israel, to the BSR international tournament in Quebec City.
The 10- to 12-year-olds from Bat Yam, south of Tel Aviv, are joining teams from across Canada, the United
States, Finland, France, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Switzerland at the 35th edition of the BSR International Peewee Tournament taking place Feb. 11 to 21 in suburban
Lévis.
Twenty-two players, including two girls, and three coaches will make up the delegation. Bat Yam will play a minimum of two games, in the B division.
The Israeli youngsters' participation is due in large part to Jonathan Hawey, the Lévis resident who has for the past five years been a key figure in the development of ice hockey in
Israel.
Hawey, a past president of Quebec City's only synagogue, has been involved in hockey all his life, from his playing days with the Ottawa Gee-Gees to a brief professional stint in Japan, through
to his current role as a scout for the Val d'Or Foreurs of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League (QMJHL).
Peewee is the youngest level of organized hockey in Israel and still in its infancy there, but Hawey is confident the Israeli team will not be humiliated in Quebec.
Bat Yam, which is on the Mediterranean coast, has a large number of residents from the former Soviet Union. The peewee team's president is Eugeny Fusin, a former goalie on the Soviet national
junior hockey team who played in the early 1990s for Thunder Bay in the old Colonial Hockey League.
Last summer, at Hawey's invitation, the Bat Yam club's head coach Dima Gromkov spent two months in Quebec upgrading his skills, spending much of that time with Lévis' Midget AAA team, Les
Commandeurs.
Montrealer Alan Maislin, chair of the Israel Ice Hockey Federation, is honorary president of the team, and former Montreal Canadiens coach Jean Perron, who has coached Israel's national team, is
honorary captain.
Bat Yam, however, does not have its own arena; to play on ice, players must make the two-hour drive to and from Metullah in the north, Hawey said. That will soon change with the beginning of
construction in March on Bat Yam's own rink, a project Hawey also has a hand in.
The Quebec tournament is a big attraction: there'll be 128 teams this year, and all games will sell out at the 2,000-seat arena. The BSR is the little cousin of the Quebec International Peewee
Hockey Tournament, now in its 51st year, which will take place concurrently and includes 16 countries and over 2,000 players.
?Bat Yam's participation is important for the future of hockey in Israel,? Hawey said. ?It will give the kids a goal. If they are good enough, they will get to go to Canada each year,? he
said.
Hockey has a following among Israeli adults with roots in hockey-playing countries, but it's a little harder to interest children of the Middle East in the sport.
Currently, there are about 40 or 50 peewee players, but Hawey predicts that will double next year because of Bat Yam's being in the Quebec tournament.
He also thinks it's good public relations for Israel when Quebecers see that the Jewish state is so keen on their national obsession.
There's a lot of curiosity about the Israeli team, he said. Bat Yam has been asked to play three exhibition games, and Hawey expects more requests. The local Chambre de Commerce wants to host
them for meals.
Hawey is helping to organize the team's visit, including raising funds. He has budgeted for $20,000, excluding the airfare, which the Israelis are responsible for. Bus travel and extra security
will account for a large part of the costs.
The players will be billeted with local families. Five on the team keep kosher and their needs will be met through www.kosherquebec.com, a local kosher catering service. The synagogue,
Congrégation Beth Israel Ohev Sholem, which has about 125 families, including four Hebrew-speaking Israeli families, will host the Israelis at a Shabbaton Feb. 12.
To offer help, e-mail Rabbi Dovid Lewin at rabbi@jquebec.com.
The team's uniforms have been donated by a local non-Jewish businessman, owner of the sports store Jersey City. The colours are light blue, grey, black and white, with Bat Yam on the front and
the menorah, the symbol of Israel, on the shoulders. The players will come with their own skates and equipment.
Hawey is also procuring winter clothing for the Israelis. Avalanche Skiwear has offered a deep discount on jackets and pants, and he's still looking for hats, gloves and boots to help the
Israelis withstand Quebec City's temperatures, usually several degrees colder than Montreal.
The kids will also be treated to outings in the area during their stay, including outdoor activities like snow-tubing and dog-sledding, and they will be around for the last few days of the Winter
Carnival. They will attend a QMJHL Quebec Remparts game.
The team will spend one day in Montreal before going home, hosted for brunch by Farrell Miller, owner of the Montreal Juniors of the same league, who is also taking them to a Juniors
game.
Hawey, who was raised a not very observant Catholic in a typically Québécois milieu, converted to Judaism in 1983 when he was in his 20s. His father told him that they were descended from Isaac
Hawey, a Scottish Jew, who, according to family lore, settled in Lower Canada in the 18th century before Aaron Hart, whom historians generally cite as the first Jewish resident.
Hawey, whose story is told in the travelling exhibition ?Same Cloth/Different Threads: The Jews of Quebec,? created for Quebec City's 400th anniversary, confirmed the link through genealogical
research.
In the past five years, he has been closely associated with Israel's hockey program and spent a total of four months in the country last year, mainly helping organize an international tournament
of professional Jewish players. Officially, he is vice-president of international relations and special events. He has become close to fluent in Hebrew.
Fortunately, his paying job at Université Laval as a recruiter of post-graduate students, allows him considerable time off.
Hawey is now working on organizing a trip to Israel in 2011 for young hockey players from Lévis.
