BASKETBALL: Iran has a troubling record of withdrawing from events whenever Israel is competing. Last month, Iranian swimmer Mohammad Alirezaei withdrew from a 100m breaststroke heat when Tom Be'eri (ISR) was scheduled to swim against him. The country's Olympic committee stated that Alirezaei withdrew because of illness, and the IOC bought it. Perhaps the IOC had forgotten that Iranian football player for German club team Bayern Munich pulled out of an international match with Maccabi Tel Aviv several years ago, and Arash Miresmaeili refused to go up against an Israeli in the Athens 2004 judo tournament -- which earned him no medal but a hero's bonus of US $125,000 from his country's government.

This unspoken policy seems to extend to the Paralympics as well. Before its basketball quarterfinal against the United States, the Iranian team pulled out of the games altogether. It was originally thought that this was over simmering tensions with the U.S., but the bracket indicated a virtually assured possible matchup with Israel if they both had won (semifinals) or both lost (classification round). Israel played defending Olympic champions Canada in the opposing bracket, losing 55-47. Indeed, the classification game between Iran and Israel, scheduled for Monday, has already been registered as a 20-0 walkover for the Israeli team. Iran will automatically finish eighth in the tournament.

As has been the pattern, Iran denied the pullout was for political reasons. Their officials announced that the team had forfeited because the U.S.-Iran and Canada-Israel games, originally scheduled for 9:15 and 11:15, had been switched without notice. The International Wheelchair Basketball Federation stated that the quarterfinal A and B game switch was made on Sept. 5.

Perhaps it's due to London 2012 fever, but the most thoughtful and thorough English-language coverage of the 2008 Paralympics is coming from Great Britain (or perhaps it's the nation's second-place showing in the medal table). As Guardian/Observer scribe Eddie Butler puts it, sometimes it feels like he's the only one there.

Of course there is a difference between the Olympics and the Paralympics. Perhaps it is at its most stark in the International Broadcast Centre, a vast convention centre next to the national stadium, converted for the duration of the two games into a giant television production house. In August, NBC, the American rights' holder, had 2,700 employees on site. For September's Paralympics there are just five NBC staff here. The IBC is a mausoleum.

If you're not plugged in to the British media and you want to get a good grasp of what's going on in Beijing, make sure you watch this excellent recap of events on YouTube (which is called Sixty Seconds but is actually six minutes long). The complete medal table after seven full days follows. China has stretched its overall medal lead by nine to 49, and picked up 12 gold medals to extend its dominance in the gold column over second-place Great Britain. Germany picked up seven medals to move from 10th to eighth on the Paralympic charts.

(Photo credit: Xinhua)