October 08, 2021
The Supreme Leader has gone out of his way to emphasize that Iranian athletes must never play against Israeli citizens, thereby courting the anger of international sports organizations.
The Iranian ban has stood for four decades since soon after the evolution. But in recent years, there has been growing resistance to it from athletes, politicians and sports fans. One major objection stems from the fact that when an Iranian withdraws from facing an Israeli, the Iranian forfeits the match and the Israeli is declared the winner so the rule actually benefits Israel.
But Ali Khamenehi remains firm in his position. And, when he gave an audience September 18 to the Iranian medalists at the recent Olympics, he restated the rule and insisted on adherence to it.
“The ruthless, genocidal, illegitimate Zionist regime is trying to gain legitimacy by participating in international sports arenas,” he asserted, although legitimacy was given more than 70 years ago when the UN voted to establish Israel and granted it membership in the UN.
Khamenehi did not mention that the Islamic Republic is the sole country in the world to have a national policy of refusing to compete against Israelis.
He continued his explanation, saying, “Many organizations are busy planning in order to deprive society and especially youth of hope and exuberance.” He did not name any such organizations. Nor did he explain how forbidding Iranian athletes from facing Israelis added to their “hope and exuberance.”
The International Judo Federation (IJF) has already suspended Iran from competitionsalthough this did not impact the Iranian team that went to the Olympics because the IJF does not run that competition.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) also pressed Iran last year and IOC President Thomas Bach announced that Iran had dropped its ban which violates the Olympic charter. He said he had received a pledge signed by both Sports Minister Masud Soltanifar and Reza Salehi-Amiri, president of Iran’s National Olympic Committee.
Khamenehi’s remarks shredded that letter.
During the summer Olympics, no Iranian drew an Israeli opponent so the letter’s pledge was not tested. But now Khamenehi’s public statement raises the issue anew and the International Olympic Committee may face demands to take action against Iran.
But those demands are not likely to come from Israel. While Israeli officials regularly point to the Iranian policy as evidence of the nature of the Islamic Republic, they have not pursued the issue since the Iranian policy benefits Israeli athletes.
In his remarks to the Olympic medalists, Khamenehi went on to say: “Naming our sports teams after martyrs, especially Martyr [Qasem] Soleymani, giving medals to special martyrs, using a Basiji scarf as a symbol of self-sacrifice and resistance and prostrating on it, wearing hejab, especially the raising of the national flag by women wearing the chador, expressing love and affection for the flag, scenes of praying, embracing the defeated opponent and the scene of the Paralympic volleyball team honoring the mother of Martyr [Abbas] Babai [an air force general killed by friendly fire during the Iran-Iraq War] are all manifestations of Islamic values, and symbols of Iranian identity.”
Khamenehi went on to say, “Some ways of becoming a champion are not healthy or valuable. There are many examples in the world unfair refereeing; political scheming; bribery; and doping. Another example is when athletes win a medal by betraying their country or themselves. These are in conflict with values.”
In Tokyo, Iran won seven Olympic medals, three of them gold, as well as 24 Paralympic medals.
Khamenehi instructed “the Sports and Foreign Ministries, as well as the Judiciary, to deploy their legal resources to support athletes from this and other Muslim countries, like the Algerian who was recently disciplined.”
He was referring to Algerian judoka Fethi Nourine, who withdrew from the Tokyo Games after the draw set him on course for a possible match-up against an Israeli, prompting his suspension from international competition.
Two years ago, an Iranian judoka, Saeid Mollaei, defected after being ordered to deliberately lose at a World Cup event to avoid fighting Israeli Sagi Muki in the final.
He competed in Tokyo under the Mongolian flag, winning a silver medal for his adopted country.
Another incident involved current Iranian judo federation President Arash Mir-Esmaili, a two-time judo world champion who showed up intentionally overweight for his bout against an Israeli at the 2004 Olympics in Athens and was disqualified.