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Bach: Palestinian Athletes to be Invited to Paris Olympics

The Olympic flag flies during the Olympic flame handover ceremony, Friday, April 26, 2024, in Athens, at Panathenaic stadium, where the first modern games were held in 1896. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)
The Olympic flag flies during the Olympic flame handover ceremony, Friday, April 26, 2024, in Athens, at Panathenaic stadium, where the first modern games were held in 1896. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)
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Bach: Palestinian Athletes to be Invited to Paris Olympics

The Olympic flag flies during the Olympic flame handover ceremony, Friday, April 26, 2024, in Athens, at Panathenaic stadium, where the first modern games were held in 1896. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)
The Olympic flag flies during the Olympic flame handover ceremony, Friday, April 26, 2024, in Athens, at Panathenaic stadium, where the first modern games were held in 1896. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)

Between six and eight Palestinian athletes are expected to compete at the Paris Olympics, with some set to be invited by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) even if they fail to qualify, its head Thomas Bach said.

Bach told AFP on Friday that qualification events for the Paris Games, which start on July 26, were ongoing for a number of sports.

"But we have made the clear commitment that even if no (Palestinian) athlete would qualify on the field of play ... then the NOC (National Olympic Committee) of Palestine would benefit from invitations, like other national Olympic Committees who do not have a qualified athlete," he said in an interview at IOC headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland.

He said he expected the Palestinian delegation to number "six to eight.”

Bach said that the International Olympic Committee "from day one of the conflict" in Gaza had "supported in many different ways the athletes to allow them to take part in qualifications and to continue their training."

Bach dismissed suggestions the IOC has treated Russia differently over its invasion of Ukraine compared with Israel and its war in Gaza.

Russia was suspended from many international sports after its invasion and its athletes have been banned from competing under the national flag at Paris 2024.

In order to take part in the Paris Games, they are also required to have never publicly supported the war against Ukraine and not be employed by the military or security services.

The sanctions against Russia were a result of Moscow violating the "Olympic truce" in its invasion of Ukraine soon after the Winter Olympics in Beijing in 2022 and for annexing Ukrainian sports organizations.

"The situation between Israel and Palestine is completely different," Bach said.

He said he had been even-handed in his public statements on Ukraine, the Hamas attack on Israel and the "horrifying consequences" of the war in Gaza.

"From day one, we expressed how horrified we were, first on the seventh of October and then about the war and its horrifying consequences," Bach said.

"We have always been very clear as we have been with the Russian invasion in Ukraine."

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Keys Upsets Swiatek, to Face Sabalenka in Saturday’s Final

Tennis - Australian Open - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia - January 23, 2025 Madison Keys of the US celebrates winning her semi final match against Poland's Iga Swiatek REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon
Tennis - Australian Open - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia - January 23, 2025 Madison Keys of the US celebrates winning her semi final match against Poland's Iga Swiatek REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon
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Keys Upsets Swiatek, to Face Sabalenka in Saturday’s Final

Tennis - Australian Open - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia - January 23, 2025 Madison Keys of the US celebrates winning her semi final match against Poland's Iga Swiatek REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon
Tennis - Australian Open - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia - January 23, 2025 Madison Keys of the US celebrates winning her semi final match against Poland's Iga Swiatek REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon

When Madison Keys finally finished off her 5-7, 6-1, 7-6 (10-8) upset of No. 2 Iga Swiatek in a high-intensity, high-quality Australian Open semifinal on Thursday night, saving a match point along the way, the 29-year-old American crouched on the court and placed a hand on her white hat.

She had a hard time believing it all. The comeback. What Keys called an “extra dramatic finish.” The victory over five-time Grand Slam champion Swiatek, who'd been on the most dominant run at Melbourne Park in a dozen years. And now the chance to play in her second Grand Slam final, a long wait after being the 2017 US Open runner-up.

“I’m still trying to catch up to everything that’s happening,” said the 19th-seeded Keys, who will face No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka, the two-time defending champion, for the trophy Saturday. “I felt like I was just fighting to stay in it. ... It was so up and down and so many big points."

Just to be sure, Keys asked whether Swiatek was, indeed, one point from victory. Yes, Madison, she was, while serving at 6-5, 40-30, but missed a backhand into the net, then eventually getting broken by double-faulting, sending the contest to a first-to-10, win-by-two tiebreaker.

“I felt like I blacked out there at some point,” Keys said, “and was out there running around.”

Whatever she was doing, it worked. Keys claimed more games in the semifinal than the 14 total that Swiatek dropped in her five previous matches over the past two weeks.

Sabalenka beat good friend Paula Badosa 6-4, 6-2 earlier Thursday. Sabalenka, a 26-year-old from Belarus, can become the first woman since 1999 to complete a threepeat.

"If she plays like this,” the 11th-seeded Badosa said, “I mean, we can already give her the trophy.”

Keys might have something to say about that.

Still, Sabalenka won her first major trophy at Melbourne Park in 2023, and she since has added two more — in Australia a year ago and at the US Open last September.
The last woman to reach three finals in a row at the year’s first Grand Slam tournament was Serena Williams, who won two from 2015-17. Martina Hingis was the most recent woman with a threepeat, doing it from 1997-1999.
“I have goosebumps. I’m so proud of myself,” Sabalenka said.
Swiatek had not lost a single service game since the first round, but was broken three times by Keys in the first set alone and eight times in all.
That included each of Swiatek’s first two times serving, making clear right from the get-go this would not be her usual sort of day. And while Swiatek did eke out the opening set, she was overwhelmed in the second, trailing 5-0 before getting a game.
This was the big-hitting Keys at her very best. She turns 30 next month and, at the suggestion of her coach, former player Bjorn Fratangelo — who also happens to be her husband — decided to try a new racket this season, an effort both to help her with generating easy power but also to relieve some strain on her right shoulder.
It’s certainly paid immediate dividends. Keys is now on an 11-match winning streak, including taking the title at a tuneup event in Adelaide.
She was good enough to get through this one, which was as tight as can be down the stretch.
“At the end, I feel like we were both kind of battling some nerves. ... It just became who can get that final point and who can be a little bit better than the other one,” Keys said. “And I’m happy it was me.”