Iran Calls for Ban on Israeli Athletes at Paris Olympics

SAEDNEWS: In a post on its official account on X, the Iranian Foreign Ministry lashed out at the “reception and protection” of Israeli Olympians in the quadrennial games starting in the French capital this week over the occupying regime’s brutal war on the blockaded Palestinian strip.

“Announcing the reception & protection of the Apartheid & terrorist Zionist regime's convoy only means giving legitimacy to the child killers. They do not deserve to be present at the Paris Olympics because of the war against the innocent people of #Gaza,” the ministry said on X.

The Israeli delegation to the Olympic Games Paris 2024 arrived in the French capital on Monday before Friday’s opening ceremony and was immediately placed under 24-hour tight protection by France’s police force.

Israeli Olympians arrived in Paris amid mounting international outrage over the high Palestinian civilian casualty toll and unfolding appalling humanitarian crisis in the besieged and bombarded Palestinian territory.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry also called on organizers to ban Israel.

The Olympic Games Paris 2024, scheduled in France from July 26 to August 11, kicks off with an opening ceremony along the Seine River in Paris with athletes paraded in barges sailing down the stream.

It is unclear whether the Israeli team will take part in this event. However, the Israeli regime’s football team is slated for a match against the Malians in Paris’s Parc des Princes stadium on Wednesday, two days before the Friday opening parade.

Israel launched the war on Gaza on October 7 after the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas waged the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the occupying entity in response to the Israeli regime's decades-long campaign of bloodletting and devastation against Palestinians.

Since the start of the offensive, the Tel Aviv regime has killed at least 39,090 Palestinians and injured over 90,147. Thousands more are also missing and presumed dead under rubble.