Israel-Hamas war hits home for former UM basketball players Julian Gamble, Durand Scott

Nothing Julian Gamble or Durand Scott experienced as University of Miami basketball players, or in the following decade playing professionally abroad, prepared them for the anxiety and sadness that overcame them this week.

Scott, 33, enjoyed three successful stints in the Israeli Basketball Premier League, with Hapoel Tel Aviv, Gilboa Galil and most recently with Maccabi Ashdod, just outside the city of Ashkalon, where in May 2021 he frequently had to hide in safe rooms during rocket attacks from Gaza.

The images of the Israel-Hamas war this week hit Scott hard.

“When the news broke this week, I was quite stunned and it gave me traumatic flashback because it’s not something you normally talk about,” he said by phone on Friday from New York, where he is rehabbing an injury. “It’s not an easy conversation, bringing up to someone that you were literally in the middle of a war in the city they were primarily attacking again. It was shocking and mind-boggling.”

Gamble, 34, spent the past year playing for B’nei Herzliya, just outside of Tel Aviv, and recently joined Beirut Sports Club in Lebanon. After spending many years enjoying the adventures — and six-figure salaries — of playing overseas, he finds himself feeling alone and nervous in a war-torn region.

He moved to Beirut in late-September, and the team spent the past few weeks in Qatar, where it won The Arab Club Championship tournament against Moroccan team AS Sale on Wednesday night.

The team was scheduled to fly back to Beirut on Thursday night and tip off the domestic league on Oct. 21, but after consulting with his agent, family, and friends, he decided to head home to Raleigh, North Carolina, until he feels safe returning to the Middle East.

“I want to be as safe as possible, and nothing has happened in Beirut at this moment, but these things can be so unpredictable and something could change,” Gamble told the Miami Herald by phone Thursday. “I pray that it doesn’t, not only for myself, but for everyone.”

His wife L’Oreal and three sons Jaycian (7), Laithan (4) and Leelan (2) are in Raleigh. He said his wife pleaded with him to return home, as did his mother.

“There’s definitely anxiety, not just from me, because I’m by myself over here, but from my family back home, former teammates, everyone,” Gamble said. “Everyone’s calling, checking on me, texting me, asking `Are you safe? Are you safe?’ Coach L [UM coach Jim Larranaga] just texted me and I spoke to him. They’ve all reiterated the same point, that they would feel more comfortable if I was home.”

Gamble said it is a difficult decision because he has a contract, makes a good salary and feels a responsibility to his new club, coach and teammates, all of whom have treated him with great respect since his arrival. Although officials from the Beirut club have assured him that he is safe, he has concerns.

“Being as how nothing has happened in Lebanon yet, for sure my team wouldn’t be happy with me saying, `Hey, I need to go home for a little bit to see how this all plays out,’’’ he said. “We have a very, very good team. From a sport perspective, I don’t want to disturb that. I want to continue to build, but our safety is the most important thing at the end of the day.”

Gamble, who played on Miami’s 2013 Sweet 16 team, scored 18 points and had nine rebounds in the Arab Championship game on Wednesday. He is one of three Americans on the team. The average salary for a U.S. import player in the Israeli league is reportedly $140,000 to $350,000, with some top players making more than that.

“For me, the amount of money I’m making, it’s not like I can just walk away from it because I have a family to support,” he said. “If I were to go home and work any kind of 9 to 5, there’s no way I am getting anywhere near the salary I’m making playing overseas.”

Scott could relate to Gamble’s dilemma. When violence broke out in Israel and Gaza in 2021, Scott’s team, Maccabi Ashdod, was in second place in the league standings and a contender for the championship. Although team officials took precautions to keep players safe, moving them to another part of the country, Scott opted to fly home to the United States despite feeling some pressure to stay.

“When I was going through the war, they were talking about resuming the league and getting back to playing, and it was scary, especially for those of us who were not from there and only see stuff like that on T.V.” Scott said. “You are talking about people’s lives, the majority of the best players are imports, and we the last thing on our minds was basketball.”

Scott recalled diving to the floor during practice when the first bomb went off in May 2021, and then rushing to a safe room.

“We never left the country, and even though we were moved to a different city, sometimes you’d see the smoke in the air at night from after effect of a bomb,” he said. “You’d see the news. You can feel it. One thing struck me is that people there continue living their lives, driving around going to supermarket, going out to eat. I didn’t want to leave my house at all. I stayed in my safe room.”

Scott said he was relieved to see that this week, the league took more drastic measures, suspending the season and allowing players to leave the country.

“It’s a shame because Israel is beautiful; I love Israel,” Scott said. “It’s a great league, beautiful place, beautiful food, beautiful people. Beaches, city life, night life, history. I was able to not only play basketball there, but enjoy life outside basketball and make new friends. If people ask me what is my favorite country outside of the U.S., where I’d want to live if they didn’t have a war, it would be Israel. I’m a New Yorker and Miamian at heart, so coming from those two places, the adjustment was quite easy.”

Gamble and Scott have a lot of friends and former teammates still living in Israel, although the majority have taken refuge for the time being in Cyprus, Greece and back home in the United States while the league is suspended.

“I have a lot of Israeli friends and former teammates there, and there’s a concern, for sure,” Gamble said. “The amount of chaos in the region, the amount of innocent people suffering, that’s the most heartbreaking thing for me, as a father of three young sons, seeing so many children injured and losing their lives on both sides is the worst thing for any parent to experience.

“I can’t say I am educated enough on the history of things that have been going on in this region to make a strong stance, but the loss of innocent life is what sticks out to me.”

Gamble and Scott are among several former Hurricanes who have played in the Israeli league in recent years, along with Rion Brown (Hapoel Tel Aviv), Angel Rodriguez (Maccabi Haifa), Jack McClinton (Gilboa Galil), and Keith Stone (Elitzur Shomron).

Israel is a popular destination for professional basketball players, who can make good money and lead a comfortable lifestyle in a country that has many English speakers. Like Italy, Spain, Greece and Turkey, Israel offers the chance to play in prestigious tournaments such as the Euro League and the Euro Cup.

Since the 1990 season, 15 Americans and three dual U.S.-Israeli citizens have been named MVP of the league. Last season, the MVP was former Xavier center Zach Hankins of Hapoel Tel Aviv and the year before that it was former Louisville center Chinanu Onuaku.

“The experience playing there was very nice, the people were very nice, just one time there was an incident with rockets, and they were explaining all the iron dome stuff to us,” Gamble said.

Gamble learned as soon as he moved to Israel that every house and every building has a safe room in which to take cover if the sirens go off.

“That was foreign to me, never having had to deal with anything like that in the past,” he said. “They said, `This is normal, this happens sometimes, everything is safe,’ but obviously, being a foreigner in a foreign land, there’s a little bit of anxiety because you are thousands of miles away from your family and home. In my case, I had my family with me in Israel, so I had to make sure my wife and three young kids were as safe as possible.”

As for the Israel league, “it’s the typical European basketball vibe,” Gamble said. “Road games are very passionate. Home games, these people take a lot of pride in their team because the fans come from the city where you play, so you take on that pride. It was a great experience. I hope and pray there can be peace again there soon.”