The young chess player refused to play against his Israeli counterpart because “israel is the enemy.”
Mark Abou Deeb, an eight-year-old Lebanese chess player, has drawn a line in the sand, balking at playing against Israeli opponents at a tournament in Spain, a decision that earned him broad support in Lebanon, the Times of israel reports.
During an interview on Lebanese TV channel OTV after the tournament, the hosts asked the boy why he refused to play, to which Abou Deeb answered, “Because Israel is an enemy.” After the hosts asked the boy to repeat his answer louder, they replied with “Bravo.”
Abou Deeb competed in November in the World Cadet Chess Championships in Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, Spain. Two Israeli boys, Guy Sivan and Tomer Sternfeld, competed in the same age category as Abou Deeb but were never paired against the Lebanese competitor during the tournament.
However, Abou Deeb reportedly said ahead of the event that he wouldn't play against the Israelis, because that would mean acknowledging “normalization” with the Jewish state.
His decision has been praised in particular by Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the Hezbollah movement.
“We have many venerable examples of confronting normalization,” Nasrallah said in November. “Mark Abou Deeb, a Christian Lebanese youngster, participated in an international chess competition in Spain. He set a condition that he will not play with an Israeli because he…
