Israeli chess players forced to pull out of Spain tournament after flag ban

The Athletic, The New York Times’ sports journalism department, reported the development on Friday concerning the seven-strong team that had planned on competing in the Basque Country Chess Championship in the Spanish town of Sestao. 

The event, officially known as the Basque Country Open, is slated to go underway later this week. Upon launch, it would mark the 40th edition of the tournament that features hundreds of players from dozens of countries.

The report cited the organizers as saying, “We want to raise our voices to reject the crimes committed against the Palestinian civilian population in the Gaza strip and the indiscriminate attacks by the Israeli army.”

Upon facing the rejection, the Israeli competitors did not accept to play under the flag of the World Chess Federation (FIDE) either.

Commenting on the matter, Sestao’s chess club said the request from the organizers to ban the regime’s flag served as “a sign of rejection of Israel’s systematic violation of human rights.”

Through their rejection, the organizers sought to “express their strongest condemnation of the genocide being carried out by Israel in Gaza,” the club added.

The event, the report added, is now set to go underway, with only flags of Spain’s autonomous communities and the Palestinian flag being displayed on the tables.

It added that the organizers had originally planned to bar the Israeli team from the tournament altogether.

The Zionist regime’s October 2023-present war of genocide has so far claimed the lives of more than 64,750 Palestinians, mostly women and children.

Hundreds of the victims have perished due to the regime’s near-total siege of the territory that runs concomitantly with its incessant bombardments of the densely-populated coastal sliver.

Pro-Palestine groups and football fans launch a boycott campaign across Europe against Zionist  teams, demanding federations take action before the 2026 World Cup.

The war has escalated international resentment of the regime’s atrocities, triggering far-and-wide acts of protest, including thousands-strong demonstrations and requests for Israeli officials to be banned from national territories.