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Pascale Bercovitch

Pascale Bercovitch is a French-born Israeli Paralympic athlete, journalist, writer and film director who competed in rowing, handcycling and kayak.

born 1967Paralympic rowing, handcycling and kayakFirst wheelchair volunteer in the IDFDocumentaries on disabled people

Born: 21 August 1967, Angers
Occupation: film director, rower, writer, canoeist

Pascale Bercovitch was born in 1967 in Angers

Bercovitch was born in Angers, France, to a Jewish father who was hidden as a child during the Holocaust and a mother from a Christian family. She grew up in Chambly, north of Paris, and won the Picardy title in floor gymnastics in 1980 and 1981. In July 1984 she came to Israel as a volunteer on an IDF base.

On 13 December 1984 she slipped at a train station and fell under a train, and both of her legs were amputated. In July 1985 she immigrated to Israel and volunteered in the IDF, the first volunteer in a wheelchair.

From the early 1990s she worked as a journalist, writer and film director, often on the subject of disabled people. She directed documentaries, including one on Israel's team at the 2000 Paralympics, and in 2008 the film Three Hundredths of a Second. In 1999 she published a book in Paris.

She joined Israel's Paralympic rowing team in 2007 and rowed at the 2008 Paralympics. She competed in handcycling at the 2012 Paralympics and in kayak at the 2016 Paralympics. In 2014 she was a torchbearer at the Independence Day ceremony.