RAMALLAH: Eight Palestinian athletes taking part in the Paris Olympics will be symbols of “resistance” during the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, a Palestinian minister said on Sunday as the official delegation left the occupied West Bank.

This will be the eighth time Palestinian athletes have taken part in the Olympics since 1996, but Olympic committee head Jibril Rajoub said the athletes had never felt so much attention.

The athletes are preparing for the start of the Paris Games on July 26 in a “very dark moment in our history”, said Palestinian authority minister of state for foreign affairs Varsen Aghabekian Shahin.

“You are not just athletes, you are also ... symbols of Palestinian resistance,” Aghabekian added.

French organisers have stepped up security in Paris because of the conflict. But Rajoub said: “We want this participation to be a message from the Palestinians to the world that it is time for them to be free in their homeland. Through this participation, we want to present the suffering of the Palestinian people and the unprecedented killing taking place in Gaza,” he added.

Rajoub said 400 athletes, coaches and sporting officials in Gaza have been killed or wounded since the start of the war on October 7 when Hamas attacked Israel.

The attacks in southern Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.

Israel’s military offensive has killed at least 38,584 people in Gaza, also mostly civilians, according to a toll issued by the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.

Majed Abu Marahil, a long distance runner who was the first Palestinian to compete in an Olympics in Atlanta in 1996, died in June. According to officials, he suffered kidney failure and could not get treatment as Gaza’s hospitals have been devastated by the conflict.

Rajoub said getting athletes to Paris “is already a victory”.

The eight will compete in athletics, swimming, archery, taekwondo, judo and boxing. One secured a place through regular qualifying and seven were given special invitations.

Swimmer Valerie Tarazi, 24, has US and Palestinian nationality and won titles at the Arab Games last year in Algeria.

“My heart aches for them,” she said of the Gaza people. Tarazi said she has relatives in Gaza and speaks with them nearly every day.

“Being in Paris on behalf of Palestine is a very important thing, and taking part in a global swimming competition at a time when there are no places to train is surreal,” she said.

Published in Dawn, July 16th, 2024