Courts: Channel 1 must give a little
By Tzviel Blankchtein
(Thursday, August 31, 2000) - Channel 5 viewers will now get expanded Olympic coverage, following a Tel Aviv district court ruling yesterday.
Channel 5 entered into an agreement with Channel 1, whereby the sports channel would receive accreditation at the Sydney Olympics in exchange for ceding rights to exclusive coverage of the Final Four of the European Basketball Championships.
The number of accreditations, however, came into dispute, with Channel 1 claiming that it had agreed to one crew with four personnel. Channel 5 says that two crews were to be accredited.
Following the court ruling, Channel 5 has the right to send two crews with 12 individual accreditations.
Channel 1 had initiated the exchange by offering Channel 5 $400,000 and the Olympic spot in exchange for the European hoops semifinals last year.
Channel 1 had owned the rights to the final four in recent years, but relinquished it when Maccabi Tel Aviv was conspicuously absent from the semifinalists.
Now that the perennial local basketball champions, who are covered by
Channel 1, are back in the limelight, the venerable channel wanted to undue the agreement.
Justice Yehuda Zaft ordered Channel 1 to immediately announce a further eight accreditations for the sports channel.
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