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Episode transcript
PROTESTORS
[Chanting]
Eight hundred athletes dead!
Eight hundred athletes dead!
Free! Free! Palestine!
HOST (SHARON NADEEM)
That’s the sound of more than 400 protestors rallying outside the Davis Cup match between Canada and Israel in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
It’s pretty loud outside the arena. Inside a different story.
NEWS READER
The Canada and Israel Davis Cup match will be played in a closed venue in Halifax with no fans. The move comes after more than 400 Canadian athletes and academics urged Tennis Canada in a letter to cancel the event over Israel’s actions in Gaza and the West Bank.
SHARON
This week, the United Nations Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory declared that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. Momentum has been building as fans around the world protest against Israel’s participation in major sporting events.
In this bonus episode of State of Play, we’re gonna look at this global movement, what it says about the growing opposition to genocide in Gaza and how sports have become an arena for this battle. We’ll hear how Halifax became part of this moment. And we ask Tennis Canada why it decided to shut out fans and the media.
[MUSIC]
I’m Sharon Nadeem. Normally, I work as a producer on the podcast, but for this bonus episode, I’m in the host chair. For the last two weeks, I’ve been closely following the story of the Davis Cup, known as the World Cup of Tennis. In response to calls to cancel the tournament, Tennis Canada refused, stating it is committed to upholding the principles of sport as a unifying force separate from political conflicts.
Instead, Tennis Canada decided to close the doors to the venue. They cited escalating safety concerns based on intelligence from local and national security agencies.
So I reached out to the Halifax Regional Police and the Nova Scotia, RCMP. They told me that they did not provide a risk assessment for the event. Canada’s National Intelligence Service, CSIS, told CBC News, it also gave no such warning.
To better understand the events that led to the matches being played behind closed doors, I reached out to EL Jones.
EL JONES
I’m a professor of political and cultural studies at Mount St. Vincent University. I was also one of many organizers of the protest against the Davis Cup here in Halifax.
What ended up happening in the face of our mobilization was they said that they were closing the event not only to fans, but to reporters under these allegations of safety threats.
But what’s interesting about that is that while we’re very happy to take credit for the fact that, you know, the strength of our mobilizing forced this event behind closed doors in an embarrassing climb down. So the event was literally played without commentary. It was just literally in silence, no audience. They’d only sold 1500 tickets, so there wasn’t an appetite in Halifax’s event to start with. So we’re gonna claim credit through our mobilizing, but I do want to like put the caveat that Tennis Canada manufactured a narrative around extremist threats to the venue. I think what really happened is obviously in the face of public moral outrage, in the face of tickets collapsing, major stars pulling out like that didn’t wanna come and play. And realizing that the event was in no way going to be a success. And that of course people were gonna show up and Boo Israel, in order to protect the Israeli players and delegation and Tennis Canada from having to hear the public opinion on Israel. The move to close the venue was literally to prevent that from being heard on the broadcast. They didn’t want. People listening to hear people saying, Free Palestine, or you’re committing genocide, or, uh, booing Israel. And so in order to protect the opponent nation, Tennis Canada not only shut down the venue, but essentially smeared us, the protesters, as these violent extremists, creating these threats in order to cover the fact that it was their own embarrassment, their own debacle, and their own shame that made this event a total failure.
SHARON
All three local and national security agencies denied having anything to do with the event or providing any risk assessments.
So, where do you think this narrative came from for Tennis Canada?
EL JONES
We saw this language echoed from the beginning. From the moment our letter came out, and of course, none of which was supported by the police. So it began as this smear that we were extreme, that opposing genocide is extreme. And then was gradually shifted step by step until it becomes the idea that we’re extremists, we must have threatened this violence.
You get all of this, extremely racist mobilization of Islamophobic language around terrorism, around like. Canadian values, extremely racist language. And of course, this is all classic anti-Palestinian racism.
So then you get the National Post, for example, then running these front page headlines around, extremists are running the country by shutting down the Davis Cup. Can you imagine if, during Four Nations hockey, when Canadians were booing the US National Anthem, if our national newspapers had said, extremist Canadians, boo innocent us, right? Like it’s the same scenario. And this very Islamophobic, very racist, very anti-Palestinian narrative is deliberately and consciously mobilized, based on no evidence and in fact flying in the face of evidence.
So I think it’s fairly obvious that Tennis Canada picked up that language. And it shows you really, I think what’s important isn’t that, you know, I’m personally like offended by this or anything, it’s that it shows you exactly how this has always worked and how these media smears are manufactured.
SHARON
How do you think the campaign went overall?
EL JONES
People looked back and they said, Why did you choose sports like, Sports is so insignificant. Why not arms trade? Why not political relations? The answer is because those are more important as such, but we don’t have the power of those in the same ways we are able to mobilize our power for the symbolic value of sports.
Like ideally we would’ve liked our city to cancel Davis Cup and not play the match. That didn’t happen. Right? Like they did go ahead. Canada did play. So in that sense, we didn’t win, but we did force it behind closed doors and that forced a lot of news and commentary. A lot of awareness. It gave people in the local community a chance to have our voices raised and to speak to our city council. Um, there was like 47,000 letters sent to City Council, a huge amount.
So even people that didn’t come out to protest took time to send emails and letters. So I think that’s really important.
SHARON
There seems to be this big movement in this shift in sports. The Spanish Prime Minister was the first European leader ever to call for Israel to be completely banned from international sports.
How do you think about this and how Davis Cup situated in this
EL JONES
Sports is one of the few places that the working classes can express themselves. We’ve seen so many demonstrations, particularly in the football stands for Palestine. The big displays, the big cards, the big performances, people holding up massive flags, massive signs, um. Not on the field, like an official level, has been incredibly repressive around Palestine.
They’ve banned flags and jerseys and stuff in the stadium, but the people have consistently snuck them in, handed them out and done Palestine demonstrations. So that’s also been building, I think, in football in particular. We ended up, by happenstance, really at the center of what has become an extremely global conversation that sports has become, this flashpoint. For Israel, particularly now, and Halifax, which I think they didn’t bank on. I think they thought precisely because we’re a small city, you know, it’s hard to mobilize a lot of people.
Like, you get a couple of hundred people out in Halifax, it’s a lot, right? We’re not Toronto, where we just can’t like pull thousands and thousands and thousands of people. The support was much stronger than they thought.
I’m proud of us that this match was played in the exact shameful silence it deserved., And I think that silence perfectly encapsulated this moment, right? The elites forcing silence on everybody and forging ahead, despite the voices outside increasingly yelling loud – No. And so I think it was just the perfect encapsulation of this moment.
People see we can’t get our politicians to listen in arms. We can’t change how they’re voting at the UN. They’re passing all kinds of laws to repress us, like bubble zone laws, protest laws, free speech laws, all this stuff. But they cannot stop us from raising our voices. And I think sports is one place. That has made that very possible, and that’s why it’s become such a flash point.
SHARON
El Jones is a professor of political and cultural studies at Mount St. Vincent University. At the rally, she read out a message she received from Palestine.
EL JONES
I want to read these words to you, sent to us from Omar. From Palestine, we send you love, gratitude, and unwavering solidarity — your courage to stand firm against Israel’s sportswashing is part of our common struggle for justice. When Tennis Canada tries to smear you with lies, it only proves the power of your witness.
They fear the truth we all carry. You already achieved a victory, forcing the match behind closed doors. And that is no small thing.
Every step, every action, chips away at the iron walls of impunity. We are not extremists. You are the voice of conscience. The voice of life against the machinery of death. And to those who are playing tennis today and tomorrow. Please know this is not about opposing your sport. We do not enjoy disrupting games.
We do it because we must disrupt genocide and starvation engineered against our people.
SHARON
The Davis Cup is just one part of the larger story. 📍
NEWSREADER:
Throughout the three-week race, hundreds of protesters have objected to the participation of Israel’s Premier Tech team.
The Italian Coaches Association has sent a letter to the president of the Italian Football Federation, asking for action for Gaza and for the request to be submitted to U FFA and FIFA for Israel’s suspension.
SHARON
I wanted to know about the history and significance of boycotts in sports. I called up Nathan Kelman Lamb, who is an assistant professor of sociology at the University of New Brunswick, and the author of Game Misconduct: Injury Fandom and the Business of Sport.
NATHAN
My research focuses on issues around exploitation and harm in the context of high-performance sport.
SHARON
Why do you think it’s important for Israel to be boycotted or suspended from sporting competitions?
This is a really important question, and honestly, it’s taken me close to two years to come around on this, because I work on sport and questions of harm and exploitation. So this is literally my wheelhouse
But for a long time, it was hard for me because I was, I even, I, even I, who I’m always advocating for the importance of sport. But in the face of genocide. Why would I think about sport? It was hard for me to come around to sport mattering in the context of the stakes being so extreme.
But I’m there finally. Because sport is such a central part of culture and of identity. That it is a way at which you can reach people. That’s the key here. There’s two aspects to this that are really important. One of them is that Israel, as part of its own genocidal project in Gaza, is trying to obliterate sporting culture for Palestinians. And there is a forthcoming paper, which is so close to emerging now, in the leading journal in our field.
Calling this athleticide and saying that athleticide is a form of cultural genocide. The obliteration of cultural identity to erase a people from existence, right?
People can express their identity through sport, and Palestine does. They have a national team that competes and almost made the World Cup, amazingly, against all odds. Sport is a way to express that identity and avoid that obliteration, and create these counterclaims that are very dangerous and threatening to the settler colonial project. And so Israel has been systematically obliterating athletic life in Gaza, life, infrastructure, facilities.
Their most famous athlete, Suleiman Al Obeid, the Palestinian Pele was murdered while seeking aid. Well over 800 athletes have been killed. More than half of them children. The numbers are horrific. Knee-capping is a practice because they’re actually trying to maim people in a way that makes it impossible for them to play sport.
That’s part of this story. And the other side of the story is that Israel also has an incentive to perform itself through sport because if it can portray its own national identity on the international stage, it appears to be a normal, legitimate nation to be treated commensurate with all other nations.
If UEFA welcomes them to their stage, if FIFA and the IOC welcome them, then they must not be a genocidal state in direct contravention of international law. They may be just another country.
We must understand Israel to be an apartheid state. So even separate from the genocide, we could actually be calling for all of these measures against Israel, just because it’s in violation of international law as an apartheid state.
SHARON
What are some of the other historical examples where countries have been sanctioned, suspended, or boycotted?
NATHAN
The biggest most notable examples we have in front of us here are South Africa and Russia. I think those are the ones that we should be considering because one of them is the best analog in a sense, in terms of the type of state that
would potentially be boycotted, the type of project that state has. And hopefully, what the results of that boycott would be. And that’s South Africa. Right? And the South African Apartheid Project was really significantly undermined by the ostracization of South African Sport. So I think it’s something that we should be taking immensely seriously for that reason, because it is such a similar case. Russia, I think, is a different case.
It’s a useful model in that Russia was just banned from all the exact organizations that we’re talking about. They have made a decision in recent memory to ban a country from sport.
And the stakes of that are raised even higher because of Russia’s prohibition. The very fact that Russia has been prohibited from an international sport tells us that these organizations have the authority to do so, that they will do so under particular circumstances. So this actually benefits Israel even more because it’s actually sending the message that Russia equals bad, Israel equals not at least that bad.
So it’s immediately creating a hierarchy. So every second that Israel is not censured by international sport is a second where sportwashing or the laundering of their reputation is occurring. And that is why the campaign to prohibit or show Israel the red card right, is so important
It suddenly puts them under scrutiny like South Africa was placed under scrutiny, and the difference between Israel and Russia is that Russia on a geopolitical level. It doesn’t actually need the international community’s ascent in any way, shape, or form to enact its policy agenda. They’re powerful.
They have weapons. They have population. They have wealth. They’re capable of doing what they want. I’m not making a judgment, I’m just saying that’s just a fact of understanding what these material relations are. But Israel is a client state. Israel relies on the Global North, especially the United States.
And a lot of European powers, like the UK and Germany. They rely on those states in order to be able to enact their policy agenda and their settler colonial project. And if that support were ultimately withdrawn, and if they were strangled through a kind of ostracism of the international community.
It actually would literally be impossible for them to enact their policy agenda. And so I’m going so far as to say that actually there’s a pathway through which banning Israel from international sport is perhaps the most important channel we have because if they are banned in that context, it’s a very easy step for banning them in other contexts, let’s say, with respect to embargoes and trade and so forth.
SHARON
Given your experience as a sports scholar, this moment that we are seeing in sports with, not just Tennis Canada, but what’s happening in soccer
How do you see this moment in sporting history?
NATHAN
Yeah, in a way that remains to be determined. It’s a potentially incredibly important moment. What I’m noticing is that forces are coalescing in sport. There’s like a bit of a tipping point that’s happening. I found it stunning to see the Italian Football Coaches Association speak out against Italy’s participation because they have the exact same situation we were confronting here with the Davis Cup, right?
Italy is in UEFA qualifying for the World Cup of soccer against Israel, and so they have exactly the same issue in front of them. And Italy, this is like one of the, precious places in the world for the sport of soccer, and so for the coaches association to come down so strongly as to say that they also feel that this match should not go ahead because of the stakes of genocide.
To me, that’s a really powerful message. At bare minimum there’s a lot of tension in the sports world and things that have been latent up to this point, and maybe people have been quiet about how they feel like it’s bubbling. I don’t know if we’re gonna break through, right?
That’s the question.
NATHAN
Tennis Canada said that it’s moving the match to a closed venue format, citing security concerns. There seems to be a little bit of a disconnect with the rhetoric I’m seeing online and from Tennis Canada versus the photos I’m seeing from on the ground. What do you think about this?
Look, I think that this is a typical tactic that we have seen from Israel and Israeli-affiliated individuals since the beginning of this genocide. We could honestly compare it to. The way in which the term antisemitism has been completely debased by the Israeli project, in that it’s slung around in all kinds of different contexts where it doesn’t actually apply, right?
Because criticism of the state of Israel is not antisemitism, and I say this as the descendant of Holocaust survivors. I take the term antisemitism very seriously. But we have seen that term used in all kinds of contexts, including many people who would say, right now, everything I’ve said in this conversation with you is antisemitic, right?
And I reject that, but the very fact that would happen is the point I’m making. It’s a smear, and it’s a smear for a particular purpose, right? To undermine the credibility of a very principled argument. That’s a way of deflecting in order to allow an unjustifiable project to continue. Now, let’s come around to this idea of security concerns.
Protestors are protesting violence. They’re protesting genocide. That is all they’re trying to accomplish. But as soon as you introduce this term, security. Now we’re transforming the conversation, and it starts to seem like there’s danger. Maybe there’s danger for the players.
But the real security concern like this, is why it’s deflection. There are security concerns. The security concerns are for the people right now who are starving to death in Gaza, who are being murdered at aid sites.
They have the maximal security concerns of anyone in the world. There are security concerns at stake today. They are not in the stadium in Halifax. They have nothing to do with tennis players. And they have nothing to do with the people who want the starving children in Gaza to be able to live.
Those people are not creating a security concern. They’re doing everything in their power to provide security for people who deserve to be able to live.
SHARON
Why is this important to you?
To be honest, what I’m about to say. Part of me is, I almost don’t feel like I should or want to say it because it’s not necessary to say. I actually think that anyone who is principled in the world, who cares about ethics, who cares about basic human rights for real, cares about this, and we see that.
The vast majority of just regular human beings can see with their own eyes that genocide is occurring, and they hate it. They abhor it. They have not lost their humanity. That’s why I care like everyone else cares.
But yes, I also feel like a kind of an additional piece to this because this is my own family’s history, right? To be victimized by the Holocaust. My own parent provided testimony at a Nazi war crime trial. She gave a victim intact statement at a Nazi war crime trial because her half-sibling had been murdered by the Nazis, I mean, that’s, that’s the family history. So when you band around the expression ‘never again,’ right?
Anyone who was confronted with that message, whether they’re Jewish or not. The correct way to read that message is that no one should ever be subjected to genocide.
Again, like this is a very clear lesson. We’re all human beings here, and although we may have different identities for various reasons, no one should be subjected to genocide, and it’s a complete distortion and corruption, a horrific one. To think that means only that Jewish people should be protected from genocide in the future, and actually that Jewish people should be entitled to commit genocide.
That to me is. Deeply, deeply corrupt
SHARON
Nathan Coleman Lamb is a professor of sociology at the University of New Brunswick.
I started thinking more about how this moment compares to the struggle against apartheid in South Africa.
Racial segregation was established there in 1948. But it wasn’t until the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo that South Africa faced its first sports boycott. Here’s a BBC report from Johannesburg.
NEWSREADER
Let’s be absolutely clear about why South Africa is banned from international sport. It’s not banned because of its record on human rights; we play sport with countries that have a far worse record. Countries like Chile, Argentina, and the Soviet Union. No, they are banned simply because sport is based on the ethos of play and competition being fair and equal for all, and that is not deemed possible in this country, which practices apartheid.
SHARON
It took another 27 years until Nelson Mandela was finally freed from prison in 1990, marking the beginning of the end of apartheid.
NEWSREADER
Within seconds, Nelson Mandela will appear, and that’ll be the moment the world has been waiting for.
SHARON
Two years later, the country was allowed back in the Olympics.
[MUSIC]
NEWSREADER
On the 25th of July, 1992, the 25th Summer Olympics opened in Barcelona, Spain. This is also South Africa’s first time taking part after being banned from participating in international sports because of its apartheid policies.
Democracy Now has looked back at the movement to win freedom and bring an end to apartheid. Today, we bring you the story of how the worldwide campaign helped bring about the fall of the apartheid regime. Even as powerful countries like the United States continue to support it.
SHARON
While we witness the current push to end the genocide in Gaza, one could argue that what we see now is a continuation of a movement which began with Israel being established as a state in 1948.
As journalists? We like to think of ourselves as documentarians of moments in history. It made me think about where we sit on this timeline. Are we at a tipping point? Is a sporting boycott more than symbolic?
Like Nathan said, it remains to be seen, but what is undeniable is the calls are getting louder. This week, a million-dollar PR campaign launched called “Game Over Israel”
The campaign is supported by former soccer stars Gary Linekar and Eric Cantona. It targets soccer federations to boycott Israel’s national and club soccer teams.
We’ve been talking a lot about sports and athletes, so I wanted to hear an athlete’s perspective.
CHARLOTTE
My name is Charlotte Phillips. I am a varsity soccer player at York University. I also play for the Palestinian Women’s National Team. I’m a goalkeeper, and I study human rights and equity at York. I was one of the people to sign two of the letters that we wrote to Tennis Canada, asking to boycott the matches against Israel. I think it’s an incredibly important way to put pressure on governments to stop supporting and funding genocide. Because sports has the power to influence decisions like this. And, and sports is inherently political. So I think we have the responsibility to stick up for it, especially as athletes.
SHARON
Why do you think it’s important for athletes to take such a stand like this?
CHARLOTTE
Well, sports is one of the most watched, most enjoyed things on the planet. Most people love sports. Which sport? It doesn’t matter. People love sports. They love to bond over sports. Play, watch. So sports influences governments. It can influence people. The most followed person in the world is Christiana Ronaldo. He’s a football player. Athletes have power, and they have a voice. I think it’s incredibly important, not just on the field, but off the field, to reflect your values. If we’re playing against a country that is committing a genocide and killing children and innocent people, we cannot in good conscience play against them. And as a Canadian Palestinian, I feel very strongly about that position. And I feel that Canada should not be hosting the Israeli team at this time.
SHARON
Why do you think that Israel should be boycotted and banned from these competitions?
CHARLOTTE
Every time you walk onto the field, I know this, as a national team athlete, you are representing the country and their government and their policies and what they do to other people, regardless of if you as an individual athlete, believe in it and support what they’re doing. It doesn’t matter because you are representing the institution that is committing these atrocities and representing Israel at a time like this. You cannot in good conscience do it. Like, Tennis Canada is familiar with boycotts. In 1978, the South African apartheid was going on, and Tennis Canada boycotted the match against them. So I don’t know why there is a difference here between Israel and when South Africa was committing apartheid. I believe that when countries are doing heinous things, they should be reprimanded, and there should be international action
SHARON
As a Palestinian athlete wearing the Palestinian jersey, over the last two years, what has that been like for you?
CHARLOTTE
It’s definitely a responsibility. It’s emotional. I’m incredibly grateful to be able to represent Palestine when I know that there are so many others, in the diaspora in the West Bank, who want to play for Palestine but are unable because of occupation. Imagine how many talents were undiscovered or have been killed now in Gaza. There were over 800 athletes that we know of at least, whether it’s referees, coaches, players that have been murdered and systematically targeted by Israel. Stepping onto the field, representing all of those people who are unable to be there, or, um, have ever gotten their chance. It’s an an enormous pressure, but it fills me with a massive sense of pride. Sports is a great way to show people that we are just like everybody else.
We have passions, we have success, we have failures, and we have a passion for sports. Our people are just like any other people.
SHARON
What are you hearing from your teammates, especially those that are still in Palestine, and how do you guys handle this as a team?
CHARLOTTE
Um, that’s a great question. My friends, I talk to them pretty much every day. We’re always talking, laughing, despite everything that they’re going through; they’re the most kindhearted people. But I feel for them because their leagues have been suspended in Palestine since October 2023. They’ve tried to start them up a couple of times but Israel will put up checkpoints and blockade them from the field. In one instance, my teammates, the Palestinian Women’s National team and the youth team was training with them, and the field actually got tear gassed, which has happened before to many of my teammates. But this time it was with the national team, was deliberately targeting our national team, uh, and they were forced off the field. One of my friends had asthma and she she couldn’t breathe.
It could have been very, very dangerous for her. Um, and for everyone else, you know,
SHARON
When you were mentioning your teammates in the West Bank, I was just thinking, how do you guys practice as a team?
CHARLOTTE
Yeah. Well, a lot of times the short answer is we’re not able to, we have players who come from all over. We have myself, my sister, and one other person sometimes who comes from Canada. We have a couple from the States, from Germany, from Sweden, and from Chile. So we have people from all over who, who come. Because Palestinians have been displaced for so long that the diaspora is so large that people you grew up in other countries but you’re wanting that connection, and you are connected to Palestine. But we can never train together before big tournaments. Because we’re not able to train in Palestine, Israel has destroyed our airports and Tel Aviv because we have Palestinian passports. They don’t let us fly out of there.
There’s been petitions to get UEFA to cancel Israel from any sporting tournaments. There’s been fans going to a lot of these games with these huge plaque cards. So, as a Palestinian athlete, when you see all of this movement in sports, how does that make you feel?
CHARLOTTE
It makes me feel like, there is some humanity left in the world. We see day in and day out people being murdered and Israel committing these brazen, horrific acts, nothing is being done about it. But when fans and the world come together and stick up for what is right. It gives us hope and it gives us a feeling that this will come to an end. Especially as an athlete, you see people from your own community sticking up for you and wanting to support you.
And yeah, it gives me faith in humanity and shows that it’s not all lost. We have the power as fans, as players, as coaches to make a difference.
Sports are inherently political. It’s always gonna be political when you’re competing with different countries with different conflicts playing against each other. We cannot hide behind that excuse anymore.
That sports should be just sports. We have to do something now. We have the power to Free Palestine and to stop genocide.
Thank you so much, Charlotte.
CHARLOTTE
I appreciate it. Thanks, bye.
SHARON
Thank you so much. Bye-bye.
I mentioned at the beginning of this episode that we asked Tennis Canada about the decision to hold the Davis Cup matches in a closed arena. They sent us the following response:
As the event organizers, this decision was made by Tennis Canada after we received credible information from multiple sources, which proved to be accurate, and after reviewing recent disruptions at other sporting and cultural events, both in Canada and internationally.
We sent them follow-up questions about who the multiple sources are and how they prove to be accurate. As of airing this episode, we have not heard back.
We also reached out to the Israel Tennis Association and the Israel Football Association, but haven’t received a response yet.
[MUSIC]
That’s it for this bonus episode of State of Play.
State of Play is produced by Andie Crossan, Calyn Shaw, and by me, Sharon Nadeem
With reporting by Lauren Phillips in Halifax.
It is produced by the Global Reporting Centre at the University of British Columbia.
Before we go, we wanna leave you with more from Halifax.
While Canada and Israel played tennis in an empty arena, people gathered outside to remember the hundreds of Palestinian athletes killed by Israel in Gaza over the past 23 months.
READER
Reem Hamed. She was a member of the girls’ football team.
Sophian Fuad Amil Hamdan Abu Zain. He won first place in the Palestinian Youth Marathon. His success earned him a place on the Palestinian National Athletics Team.
Nagham Abu Samra. Nagham fell in love with karate as a child. She finished runner-up twice in the past in the Palestine Championship before finally winning the title in 2019.
According to her brother, her passion to the sport was unmatched.
Malak Tare Ziyat. She participated in the first Women’s Annual boxing championship, where she won first place. Malak went on to join the Palestinian National Boxing Team.
–END–