Shimon Mizrachi

Shimon Mizrachi was born in 1939 in Tel Aviv

Mizrahi was born in Tel Aviv on October 16, 1939. His father was a banker who played tennis and football for Maccabi Tel Aviv, and his mother also played tennis. He went to school in Jerusalem for some years and later attended the Carmel school in Tel Aviv.

He enlisted in the IDF in 1957 and worked as an investigator in the Military Police Criminal Investigation Division. He began studying law near the end of his service and finished his degree at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He kept serving in the unit as a reservist and reached the rank of colonel.

In 1979 he founded his own law office, which focuses on traffic cases. In 2006 he represented Dori Klagsbald in a manslaughter case after a crash that killed a mother and her child.

He became chairman of Maccabi Tel Aviv basketball in 1969, when the club had financial problems. He started charging for tickets and signed American players. Under his leadership the club won the EuroLeague in 1977, 1981, 2004, 2005 and 2014, and the FIBA SuproLeague in 2001.

He received the Israel Prize for sports in 2011, and the Supreme Court upheld the award after it was contested. He was named Yakir Tel Aviv-Yafo in 2014 and a EuroLeague Basketball Legend in 2018.