I completely agree. Athletics should be decoupled from public schools - K-12 and public universities. As someone who attended public school in the US, and who's wife currently teaches at a public school, I can say with certainty that these places are just training camps for the best athletes. In the place I currently live, the adults speak of their children always in the context of how good they are at a particular sport - never about academics or other achievements. For the parents, a child who's a good athlete is the same as winning the lottery.
And junior sports activites are completely extra-curricular. A local team might have its activities at a single school, so as a student you might have your after-school basketball at your school, or another school, it all depends. You still have a lot of people watching professional sports, and working their way up through junior sports, but the "high-school jock" cliché simply does not exist.
And, consequently, athletic proficiency isn't mixed with academic proficiency, the school doesn't care about how good a student is at basketball or football or whatever, that's completely outside its interests. And academic scholarships based on athletic skill is unheard of. (Then again, scholarships are pretty unheard of, university education is free... :) )
But if you do decide to visit, let me know and I'll show you around :-p
On other other hand - I guess sports is a distraction from politics and disagreement - a proxy war if you will. But watching others play is entirely different than getting out on the field.
If all you know about this place is gleaned from the news it sounds like a warzone but it really isn't, and there's usually quite a bit of warning before anything security-compromising happens -- With the exception of the 2006 war with Israel, that was quite sudden. But relatively few areas were affected.
As long as you stay away from Hezbollah-controlled territory(The deep south, the bekaa valley and the souther suburbs/ghetto of Beirut) you won't get kidnapped or anything like that :P
If you do take a leap, shoot me an email(in profile) and I'd be more than happy to assist :-)
Soccer is a religion in Europe (and most of the rest of the world) but no one gets into a university in Europe only thanks to their soccer skills.
I live in a country where sports aren't as watched or cared about as in the US. And if they are it's other countries playing it(like the world cup/champions league/eurocup in soccer). But the whole not being able to read/write well and not liking mathematics thing holds just the same here as it does in the states. However, people don't turn to sports to derive social status(we do have your equivalent of "the popular kids" but they aren't "jocks"). Furthermore, I know of no school that puts almost any kind of real emphasis on sports.
I think by far the biggest reason so much emphasis is put on sports in US high schools is precisely because of the importance sports holds in overall American culture due to the entire entertainment industry built around it. Not the other way around.