Second judoka withdraws from Tokyo Olympics, rejecting matchup with Israeli player

Tokyo (QNN)- A second judoka has withdrawn from the Olympics before facing an Israeli player in the 73kg division.

Olympic officials said Sudan’s Mohamed Abdalrasool didn’t show up to face the Israeli settler Tohar Butbul in their round of 32 bout on Monday despite weighing in for the bout earlier, as a form of rejecting normalization with the occupation state.

The International Judo Foundation didn’t immediately announce a reason why Abdalrasool didn’t compete, and the governing body didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Sudanese Olympic officials also didn’t immediately comment.

Abdalrasool was supposed to face Algerian Fethi Nourine in an earlier round, but Nourine also withdrew due to the winner of that fight having to take on the Israeli Butbul in the round of 16.

Nourine said he didn’t want to compete against Butbul due to Nourine’s political support of Palestine.

Nourine had withdrawn from the World Championship in 2019 after he was unlucky in the lottery, being matched with an Israeli settler.

This is not the first time athletes reject to play against athletes from the occupation state of ‘Israel’.

At the 2016 Rio Olympics, the International Olympic Committee sent Egyptian Islam El Shehaby home before the end of the Games for refusing to shake the hand of an Israeli athlete.