Israel hails Morocco for joining karate contest

Israel yesterday celebrated the first Moroccan participation in a karate tournament, in which Israel is also participating.

“For the first time, the Moroccan karate team is participating in the tournament with the Israeli national team,” official Israel Arabic said on Twitter, adding that Rabat’s participation was “consolidating peace in the hearts of young Moroccan people through sports.”

لأول مرة..

يشارك منتخب الكاراتيه المغربي🇲🇦 في دورة مع فريق الكاراتيه الإسرائيلي🇮🇱 لزرع السلام في نفوس الشباب عبر الرياضة وكان المدير العام للجامعة الملكية المغربية لرياضة الكاراتيه، سعيد الشراط، قد كما وقع على هامش اللقاء اتفاقية تعاون رياضي مع الاتحاد الإسرائيلي للكاراتيه pic.twitter.com/V8u7e2MT0j

— إسرائيل بالعربية (@IsraelArabic) March 6, 2022

The Moroccan participation comes nearly a year and a half after its normalisation agreement with Israel.

The Israeli foreign ministry-run account pointed out that teams from the United Arab Emirates, Ukraine and Italy were also taking part in the contest.

On 19 December 2020, Morocco and Israel signed the so-called Abraham Peace agreement, normalising relations between the two countries. In return the US recognised Morocco’s sovereignty over the Western Sahara.

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