Israeli president Shimon Peres is trying to recruit Amar’e Stoudemire to join Israel’s national basketball team.
Peres hopes Stoudemire, who has traveled to Israel since joining the Knicks and has said he believes he has some Jewish ancestry, will be able to help lead the country’s basketball team back to the Olympics for the first time since 1952, when Israel made its only appearance.
It would seem unlikely Stoudemire would be allowed to play for Israel because of his prior commitments to USA Basketball. Stoudemire was a member of the bronze medal Olympic team in 2004, and also played for Team USA when it won the gold medal at the FIBA Americas tournament in 2007.
Once players have played at the senior national level for one country, they usually are tied to playing for only that country, except in rare instances.There’s also the legitimate question of whether Stoudemire, who has played in a combined 66 regular-season games the past two years, would be healthy enough to play internationally during the offseason at this point in his career.