DÜSSELDORF, Germany — Latakia is Syria’s principal port, on the country’s western shoreline. Turkey is just to the north.
The war in Syria has been going on for nearly nine years already. Three years into the violence, in 2014, in Latakia, Tareq Jamal and his cousin, Najib, decided to risk it all. They made their way up the shoreline to Turkey, and from there into a wooden boat packed with people.
It took 13 days, across the Mediterranean Sea, to reach Italy. “BIg waves,” he recalled. “Women were crying.” He paused in telling the story. “We were almost to die.”
On Saturday, Tareq Jamal, representing what was called the International Refugee Team, not only competed at the Düsseldorf Grand Slam, he won a match. Ranked 429th in the world in the men’s 73-kilo category — to repeat, No. 429 — he defeated a competitor ranked No. 69 and made a solid case to go to the Olympic Games this summer in Tokyo.
Jamal, in blue, competing in Zagreb // photo courtesy IJF
More, he underscored the powerful symbolism of the refugee team — how hope and dreams never die, and how institutional support, in this case from the International Judo Federation, can empower and sustain those hopes and dreams, and in the case of Tareq Jamal, and others, make them very real indeed.
“It’s not easy to describe,” the 26-year-old Jamal said, reflecting on the journey that brought him to Saturday, the trials but also the belief that there is richness and beauty in this world, that life is more, so much more, than trial and travail. “I had a horrible trip. I try to forget these feelings by doing judo.”
This Grand Slam counts 664 athletes from 115 countries. That men’s 73-kiio class featured an incredible 78 competitors. Of those 664, meanwhile, 14 competed not for their nation but, instead, as members of the refugee team.
Eight of the 14 are Syrians now living and training in Germany — Jamal and seven others.
Five are now in Holland — three from Syria, two from Iran.
One, from Afghanistan, is based now in Pakistan (but, in a twist, studying in Russia).
For the record: those 14 do not include Saeid Mollaei, who while competing for Iran in 2018 became the men’s 81-kilo world champion. At last year’s world championships in Tokyo, Mollaei said the Iranian authorities ordered him to intentionally lose so as to avoid a potential match against Israeli Sagi Muki, the eventual 2019 81-kilo champion.
Mollaei now lives and trains in Germany. He competes for Mongolia. Seeded No. 1 in Düsseldorf (Muki, among others, is not here), Mollaei was ahead by a point in the quarterfinals against Russia’s Khasan Khalmurzaev, the Rio 2016 81-kilo gold medalist, when he was abruptly red-carded for a rules violation.
Khalmurzaev took silver Saturday, behind Georgia’s Tato Grigalashvili, winner of the 2019 Budapest Grand Prix.
At 73 kilos, the Japanese superstar Shohei Ono prevailed; it was his fifth Dusseldorf title and third in a row. Ono is the Rio 2016 gold medalist as well as three-time world champion, 2019, 2015, 2013, and absent something freaky he would appear supremely difficult to beat this summer in Tokyo. In winning Saturday, for instance, he dispatched the Rio 2016 66-kilo gold medalist Fabio Basile of Italy, now up a weight category; last month, at the Tel Aviv Grand Prix, Basile won at 73 kilos.
Even for those who might not know the first thing about judo, it would be manifestly obvious to observe the disparity in talent, experience, power and precision between, on the one hand, someone like Ono or Basile or, for that matter, Mollaei and, on the other, those in the IJF 14.
It’s why, for instance, in that men’s 73-kilo class, Miad Nosrati lasted a mere 15 seconds against Peru’s Alonso Wong. Same category: Ahmad Alikaj, to his credit, made it almost three minutes against Romania’s Alexandru Raicu.
At 81 kilos, Odai Al Mawarde survived but 55 seconds against Bulgaria’s Ivaylo Ivanov.
In the women’s 70-kilo category, Oula Dahouk hung on for just 38 seconds against Ellen Santana of Brazil. At 63 kilos, younger sister Muna Dahouk, 24 — the family is from Damascus and now lives in Holland — gutted it out for two minutes against Mongolia’s Gankhaich Bold; the Mongolian would go on later Saturday to win bronze.
That the IJF 14 were, for the most part, overmatched is not the point. The point is exactly the opposite. It’s that they were, in fact, in the match.
It’s a testament to the human spirit, to the power of faith in the human condition, and what is, or might be, possible instead of what is not, that they took to the spotlight: that each and all of them walked onto the tatami here at the ISS Dome with respect in the first instance and bowed, in accord with the sport’s values, with humility and grace.
“Such a big honor,” Alikaj said after his day was done. “Perfect.”
“I appreciate in every way this family,” Muna Dahouk said, and in this context she meant the judo world as family. “I become stronger every day I train in judo.”
Fadi Darwish, coach of the refugee team, said, in halting English, that he believed in progress “step by step.”
He said that for each of the 14, “It’s a restart for every one of them. For life. For sport.”
He added, “I see the future. Every one of them is a winner.”
And on this Saturday, Tareq Jamal was, literally, a winner.
Down 1-0 halfway through the four-minute match against No. 69-ranked Claudio Nunes dos Santos of Luxembourg, Jamal threw Santos with 34 seconds to go. The clock ticked down to 23. For sure Jamal had scored at least a point. The referees went to a video review.
Whoa. Not just a point. Ippon!
Jamal shook his right hand above his head in gentle triumph, bowed, shook his competitor’s hand, walked to the edge of the tatami and, as custom prescribes, bowed again. He would say later, smiling, “It was a good feeling for me. My first Grand Slam!” And, he said, “The first match I won on the IJF Tour!”
In his next match, against Slovenia’s Martin Hojak, it was Jamal who ended up on the losing end of the ippon. For the record, Hojak, a Tel Aviv 2020 bronze medalist, would go on to Saturday’s bronze-medal match before himself losing.
But no matter.
Jamal had won. A refugee. He belonged. Just like everyone else.
Looking ahead, Jamal said, “I will try my very best to win more than one next time.”
As for the matter of the Olympic Games, there is cousin Najib — who doesn’t do judo but, instead, is a bodybuilder — and who for all these years has remained steadfast.
All the time, Tareq Jamal said, this has been Najib’s refrain: “I hope I can see you at the Olympic Games.”
There are no guarantees. Not in this life. Thirteen days in a wooden boat on the unforgiving Mediterranean can make that crystal clear.
But, you know — maybe. Just maybe. Winning has a way of making hopes and dreams seem very, very real.