Welcoming Israel to the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Jakarta betrays Indonesia’s stand for Palestine

Indonesia has long claimed moral high ground in the Palestinian struggle. At the recent United Nations General Assembly, President Prabowo Subianto reaffirmed Jakarta’s commitment to a two-state solution, condemned the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and framed Palestine’s freedom as inseparable from justice.

And yet, just weeks later, Indonesia is preparing to roll out the red carpet for Israel’s national gymnastics team. The Israeli Gymnastics Federation confirmed that its athletes have been officially registered to compete in the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Jakarta on 19 October. Indonesian officials, in a sharp departure from decades of precedent, have said the delegation will be welcomed without conditions.

The timing could not be more jarring. As images of destruction, mass displacement, and civilian death from Gaza continue to horrify the world, Indonesia is making a choice that undermines its own principles. Hosting Israel is not just a sporting matter; it is a political act, one that risks normalizing the very state responsible for what many human rights experts, including U.N. officials, have described as a campaign of ethnic cleansing—if not outright genocide.

For decades, Indonesia has drawn a clear line. Since the Asian Games of 1962, when Israel and Taiwan were excluded from Jakarta, successive governments have maintained a consistent refusal to host Israeli delegations. Even as globalization brought Israeli athletes into competitions across Asia, Indonesia held firm, forcing Israel to reorient its sporting ties toward Europe. That stance was never about pettiness or isolationism; it was a reflection of Indonesia’s conviction that no sporting event should legitimize an apartheid state.

In 2023, Indonesia was stripped of its hosting rights for the FIFA Under-20 World Cup after refusing to allow Israel to participate. Bali’s governor openly opposed Israel’s inclusion, prompting FIFA’s intervention. That same year, Indonesia also relinquished the World Beach Games rather than admit Israeli athletes. Though costly, those decisions signaled moral clarity: the defense of Palestinian rights outweighed the prestige of hosting international sports.

Why abandon that clarity now?

The government’s rationale has been muted, couched in vague assurances about “separating sports from politics.” Officials emphasise the unprecedented scale of the gymnastics championships—86 nations, the largest ever—and the importance of showcasing Indonesia’s capacity as a global host. But sports are never divorced from politics, least of all here. Allowing an Israeli team to march into Jakarta while Gaza’s rubble still smolders sends an unmistakable message: that Indonesia is willing to dilute its most cherished foreign policy principle for the sake of convenience and international approval.

Prabowo’s words at the UN now hang in the air with uncomfortable contradiction. He spoke forcefully about Palestinians’ right to self-determination, about the international community’s duty to confront occupation and atrocities. Yet at home, his government has greenlit an Israeli delegation. Indonesians are left to ask: Which is the real policy? The one voiced at the marble halls of New York, or the one enacted on the gym floors of Jakarta?

This inconsistency risks more than embarrassment. It threatens to erode Indonesia’s credibility as a leader in the Muslim world and the Global South. For decades, Jakarta has presented itself as a voice of conscience—rejecting relations with Israel, rallying international solidarity, and positioning itself as a bridge between nations. By allowing Israel to compete unchallenged, Indonesia weakens that moral stance at the very moment it is needed most.

There are, of course, costs to exclusion. Losing hosting rights stings. International federations punish defiance, and younger athletes often bear the brunt of canceled opportunities. But solidarity is not meant to be easy. South Africa’s apartheid regime was not brought to its knees by polite diplomacy alone; it was isolated across the sporting world, banned from the Olympics and beyond. That isolation carried symbolic weight, signaling that racial supremacy had no place in global society. Why should Israel—whose policies in Gaza and the West Bank mirror, and in some ways exceed, the brutality of apartheid South Africa—be exempt from the same treatment?

Indonesia faces a choice. It can cling to the expedient fiction that sports and politics occupy separate worlds, or it can reaffirm the integrity of its principles. To allow Israel to compete in Jakarta while Gaza bleeds is to betray the very values Indonesia claims to champion.

Prabowo said at the UN that Palestine’s freedom is inseparable from justice itself. If those words are to mean anything, Indonesia must reconsider its decision. The world will not measure Jakarta by the success of the championships it hosts, but by whether it chose to stand firm — or to falter — in the face of genocide.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.