PARIS.- The International Olympic Committee (COI) no “sanctions” are proposed against Israel facing the Paris Olympic Games, a senior official from the Olympic body said this Friday.
Deputies from the French left had asked that Israeli athletes participate in Paris 2024 under a neutral flag.
In an email dated February 20 addressed to the president of the IOC, Thomas Bach, some thirty deputies had demanded “to apply to Israel, during the next Olympic Games, the same sanctions as to Russia and Belarus, leaving open the possibility of a lifting of such sanctions in the event of a lasting ceasefire.
“Today, no sanctions are contemplated” against Israel, Pierre-Olivier Beckers, president of the Coordination Commission for the 2024 Olympic Games, said on Friday, asked about it during a press conference in the French capital.
“The elements that led the IOC to sanction Russia first and the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) later are specific elements, by which Russia, and more recently the ROC in October 2023, have clearly flouted essential elements of the Charter Olympic,” Beckers explained.
“This is not the case with either the Palestinian Olympic Committee or the Israeli Olympic Committee (…), which coexist peacefully with each other. It is totally clear that they are two different situations,” he added.
In February 2022, the IOC had recommended that international federations ban Russians and Belarusians from world sport, a few days after the invasion of Ukraine.
A year later, in March 2023, the IOC had announced permission for the return of these athletes to international competitions under a neutral flag, provided that a series of conditions were met. On December 8, 2023, it gave the green light for its presence at the Paris Olympic Games, also under a neutral flag.
IOC measures:
Among the measures, the IOC suspended the ROC on October 12, 2023 for having placed four Ukrainian regional organizations under its authority.
The war between Israel and Hamas was triggered on October 7, 2023 by an attack by Hamas commandos that caused the death of at least 1,160 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli data. .
In retaliation, Israel vowed to erase Hamas, in power in Gaza since 2007 and which it considers a terrorist organization.
The Israeli army launched an offensive that has so far caused 30,534 deaths, mostly civilians, according to the Islamist movement’s Ministry of Health.
Source: AFP
