World Rummikub Championship returns to J’lem

Tournament for Israel-created game attracts contestants from 31 countries to the capital

Twenty-seven years after the first-ever World Rummikub Championship was hosted in Jerusalem, the tournament will return once again to the capital next month.

The four-day championship, to be held November 9-12, is set to bring competitors from 31 other countries to Israel. Most of them have qualified by winning the national championships in their home country; Israel will be represented by Sasha Erlich.

Holding the championship in Israel makes a great deal of sense, considering the game is an Israeli invention. Rummikub – a game based on the card game of rummy and played with numbered tiles – was created over 70 years ago by Ephraim Hertzano, a Romanian immigrant to Israel. He developed the game in his backyard in Bat Yam, and went on to found his own games company, which today is known as Lemada and run by Hertzano’s children.

Rummikub went on to be sold around the globe, distributed in more than 50 languages in 26 countries – and based in a factory in Arad.

The championship – which is held every three years – premiered in 1991 in Jerusalem, with 12 countries participating. Israel has never won a championship; the Netherlands has won four times, Japan three times and Brazil and Egypt have each won once.

Egypt will not be attending the 2018 World Rummikub Championship, but it did participate in the 2015 event in Berlin.

The 2018 competition will host contestants from Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, China, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, the UK and the US.