"HaPoel was about to sign a player who tried to rape me"

"Football is a disgusting place for women. It's exciting to see the bond of silence broken."

"It's easy to brand all fans as hooligans, but we must fight police violence."

Keti Piasetsky is tired of getting hot on the lines, now she is running for a place in the Knesset

Ehrle Weisberg

12/08/2022

Friday, August 12, 2022, 12:00

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While the government of Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid was experiencing death palpitations, there was almost one MK who felt like the player who is on the lines and hopes to get in, even if it is already the 93rd minute. But she stayed with her tracksuit on, and is now preparing for the next round. Or as who defined it herself: "I planned to buy shoes for the swearing-in, and in the end I am an answer in the questionnaire 'Who is not a member of the Knesset.'" A

member of Meretz, Kati Piasetsky, had a prominent personal interest in Jida Rinavi-Zoevi from her party resigning, because she was next in line to become a member of the Knesset in her place But she testifies that she preferred to stay on the sidelines, if only so that the government would survive. "And in the end, as always happens with my favorite team, neither did I enter and the government fell," she smiles a bitter smile that is so familiar to Hapoel Tel Aviv fans.

Piasetsky (38), a former volleyball player, who currently works for a startup company in the cyber field, has served for the past nine years as a member of the Bat Yam city council - and now she is running in the Meretz primary ahead of the Knesset elections.

In a comprehensive interview, she talks about the loss she experienced on the field (and especially in the operating rooms), the health difficulties she faces to this day, the sexist world of Israeli football and the future she still dreams of building.

"One of the goals I am most dedicated to is the fight against sexual violence."

Katy Piasetsky (photo: official website, Yanai Yehiel)

The pitch and me

"As a child, I was athletic and even came third in Israel in figure skating. In the fifth grade, a friend told me that there was a cute coach in the volleyball club, so we went and I fell in love. In the game, of course. I'm extremely short for volleyball, only 1.57 m, but in the end they accepted me To high school just so I could play on the team, despite the green hair and the earring in my nose.

"After a few years I started having pain in my right shoulder, and it was when I received a call-up to the youth team that I discovered I had a tear in one of the tendons.

I found myself at the age of 17, lying in a hospital bed, and the doctor tells me: 'You won't be able to play anymore'.

I'm talking about it now and crying.

It is a loss that a girl of this age cannot experience.

I was majoring in volleyball, I already played in Hapoel Bat Yam's senior team, I went to school with a Diadora bag and knee pads.

Everything was about that, and suddenly it was over.

"I insisted on returning to play. A few months later I started running, got in shape, and then they discovered another tendon tear in the same shoulder. And I underwent surgery again. I changed from right-handed to left-handed and returned to the field again, but it was in the second or third league and I realized that I would no longer fulfill my dream. I recognized that I was not I will be the one who falls on the last ball that brings a championship. It was simply important to me to play, until I came to the conclusion that I was going to destroy my life, and that I would not even be able to raise my children, when I have them. Only then did I really stop.

"The pain and limitations accompany me to this day.

I underwent more surgeries, and recently celebrated five years of my new shoulder... I suffer from pain every night and during seasons, I can't lift my shoulder all the way, and I developed inflammation in my other shoulder as well, because all the load was on it.

I am being treated with medical cannabis, and it was only after my mother knocked on the tables at the hospital and I was cleared to receive it that I realized I hadn't slept in 16 years.

"From my retirement until 2008, when I was interpreting volleyball in Beijing, I couldn't watch the games. For three years I wasn't able to. I was traumatized. I resigned myself to the loss at some point, and I regret today that I didn't go to psychological treatment then."

"They cannot wear the national team uniform, and no professional football club should employ them."

Generation of Micah and Omar Atzili (Photo: Barney Ardov)

Hapoel and I

"I grew up in a sporty home, and I was an ultra hardcore. Gate 5, a tattoo of Hapoel, I go to every game at home and away, in the league and the Toto Cup, flares, police. There is something very anti-establishment in Hapoel's audience, on the anarchic border, and I like to have a little fun in these places.

"At some point I started working at Hapoel.

I was in barracks and in the administration, and it was not good.

You're involved inside, you know about a lot of bad things that happen, and also being a young woman in such a male place - it wasn't easy."

"Definitely, I was harassed.

It took me a long time to recover from the experience of working in a place that I love and admire.

It was not good.

After about a year I was fired, and at some point Hapoel was about to sign a footballer who tried to rape me.

The thought of him playing, and everyone around me cheering him on, was impossible for me.

I had a hand in him not making it to the team, and I don't want to elaborate on that.

"Then I worked as a producer at the Sports Channel, and there a similar experience continued - you know the people closely, and they are no longer the idols running on the field and you admire them. Israeli football is a disgusting place for women. It is a very masculine world, saturated with hormones, sexism and chauvinism. When I produced the One of the big broadcasters, they came and told me 'so and so', no names are important, 'take into account that he is a bit sexually harassing'. And it amazed me. Why even bring and invite someone I have to be wary of? To this day, one of the goals I am most devoted to is the war with sexual violence. And the situation is much better than it was in my time. It's exciting to see this bond of silence breaking."

"I wasn't surprised at all. I heard the players' conversations in the dressing rooms and I'm also not surprised by the alleged use of drugs. Seeing the correspondence with the eyes was difficult. We are in a different era than today, with zero tolerance for sexual harassment, sexual exploitation and objectification. Azili and Micah can no longer wear the uniform The Israel national team, and I think that no professional football club should employ them. Our society cannot allow such people to be role models and to receive applause from tens of thousands of people."

"She said, 'You will be my candidate in Bat Yam.' I had a look of 'Madam, what is going on with you?'"

Zahva Galon (Photo: Flash 90, Avshalom Sassooni)

Politics and me

"My parents immigrated from Poland in 1968, and were very active politically. My father was with the Black Panthers and made a mess, my mother was active in Four Mothers and Peacemakers, and I remember as a child being taken to peace demonstrations now. My heart was always on this side, and always I was interested in politics.

"About ten years ago, a friend of mine started dating Zehava Galon's son.

We were sitting in a pub before the elections in 2013, and Vazhava came to me and said: 'You will be my candidate in Bat Yam.'

I looked at her with a 'lady, what's going on with you?' look.

When the elections were over she called and I said 'you know what, let's do it'.

"As soon as I was elected to the council, with 1,400 votes, I was the tip of the scales. The mayor at the time, Shlomi Lahiani, was under indictment, and he said, 'Hamuda, come be my deputy.' It is important to have clean and ethical people in politics, who maintain purity of character and proper administration. It is easy to influence council members, because they do the job voluntarily. I fight, and usually lose, but manage to change the discourse in the city. And that is no less important."

"If you look at Hapoel or Maccabi, then they have sponsors, subscribers, broadcasting rights, advertisers. But if we go down to Hapoel Bat Yam in volleyball, it is an empire, and precisely in these teams, in the esoteric branches on the face of it, we have to come and invest. As is happening in Rishon Lezion with Handball, which has become a brand in the city. In most places, children do not have the opportunity to maximize their potential, and they need to be given this opportunity. You get tools for life from it: teamwork, dealing with disappointments, being successful. This is something that should be made available in more branches and in more places."

"He's dying to get rid of me, but I'll surprise you: we're good friends. It's true that we're not on the same side right now, and we argue a lot in council meetings, and still, know how to separate. You have to know how to separate in order to create collaborations on all kinds of issues."

"There is something anti-establishment in Hapoel's audience, bordering on anarchist, and I like to have fun in these places" (Photo: Kobi Eliyahu)

- Bat Yam is known as a very right-wing city, and you are most of the time in the opposition.

Do you have any influence at all?

"In the beginning I received threats, and they said that they would kill and rape me. Every horrible wish that could go through your mind - I suffered. But over time, people realized that there can be cooperation even if the opinions are opposite. Just as Maccabi has no right to exist without Hapoel, and Hapoel has no right to exist without Maccabi, Although we won't be opposed to seeing them relegated for a year or two, for the experience. In the last election, I already got to 2,500 votes, and again, I'm talking about Meretz in Bat Yam, yes? That's how you create a conversation, and I want to do it at the national level as well."

"I fly over everyone who came from the municipal arena. Consistently, these are the best parliamentarians among all factions of the house. I believe that I will find a common language with anyone I sit down with to watch major sporting events or games in the Toto Cup. Whether it's Yariv Levin or Avigdor Lieberman And whether it's Ahmed Tibi."

"Just like a soccer team, Meretz is not a party of one person. It is a group of people with a very clear set of values. The public votes for Bibi, votes for Lieberman and votes for Meretz. Show me one fan organization that says there is a player who is above the club. That's why I'm busy dealing with Self and aimed as high as possible."

"I like to control what happens around me, and it wasn't fun. But because I was an athlete, and I understand that things take time. It's running long distances, and that's part of politics. I know I'm different from the usual landscape in the party, but I see what's happening in the Knesset and want to be there And to answer. When Zoevi said she was staying, I understood that it was the most important thing, because I wanted the government to survive and I knew what was waiting around the corner. Yes, of course I wanted to enter the Knesset. I won't say it was my childhood dream, but that's where I aspired from the moment I entered politics."

She warmed up on the lines, and did not enter

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The future and me

- If you are elected to the Knesset, what will your agenda be?

"Freedom. Freedom. Freedom. We live in a reality where men and women cannot do what they want, when they want, with whom they want and how they want. I don't drive, and if I want to take my daughters to a Hapoel game - I have no A road when there is no public transportation on the weekends.

"When there was the tender to build a stadium for Hapoel Tel Aviv in Bat Yam, the Shas faction voted in favor in the council, subject to the fact that they would not play on the Sabbath. What kind of thing is this? People want to see football, they cross half the country to follow the team that They are fans and want to prevent it from them.

"I will promote civil marriages, opening businesses on the weekends, civil burial - that way everyone can choose how they spend their weekend without being decided for them.

Another thing I will advance is relief for medical marijuana patients and legalization.

We need to stop with all the difficulties that are heaped on medical cannabis patients, because it is immoral.

I am in favor of legalization, because it will make us a better society, less criminal and it will improve the Israeli economy.

"I also want to fight police violence. The violence against fans, all fans, should not exist. I know what I'm talking about, because I was once kidnapped at Vasermil Stadium. It's easy to get into football fans and brand them as hooligans, and that doesn't make sense. It doesn't matter if they are Fans of Hapoel or Maccabi Tel Aviv, Beitar Jerusalem or Maccabi Haifa".

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