Israel Adesanya apologizes to boxer Imane Khelif for tweeting "misinformation" amid Olympic controversy
Israel Adesanya recently apologized to Algerian Olympic boxer Imane Khelif for some social media comments he made earlier this month. Over the past couple of weeks, Khelif has been under intense public scrutiny over the controversy surrounding her eligibility to compete at the 2024 Olympic Games as a woman.
Khelif was cleared to compete in the women's category by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) after reportedly failing a gender test issued by the International Boxing Association (IBA), which led to her disqualification from last year's Women's World Boxing Championships in New Delhi. However, the IOC later stripped the IBA of official recognition and didn't consider their tests valid.
Ahead of her Olympic outing, Khelif took a lot of heat from sports fans and athletes who were misled by arbitrary reports and disingenuous social media narratives regarding her gender. In an X post uploaded last week, Adesanya shared a clip of one of her previous fights and wrote:
"Men should not be boxing women. Lol, he couldn’t even finish her. Anyway, People > politics."
While the former UFC middleweight champion may have been misled to believe false news about Khelif, he didn't shy away from owning up to his mistake and apologizing to the 25-year-old boxer.
During a recent interview on The Rock, 'The Last Stylebender' expressed regret for his previous comments on her gender and said:
"From now on, I'm going to leave women's fights to women... Apparently, I got it wrong or a lot of people got it wrong in this misinformation... I don't like to get triggered and when something triggers me, I'm a fighter, I saw the news or articles and I was like, 'Why they letting a trans person [fight women]' and then I find out later she wasn't actually a trans [person]. So to the lady, my bad. I got that wrong."
Adesanya continued:
"To the lady, the boxer, I'm sorry. I didn't understand what was going on."
Watch the full episode below:
Algeria defends Imane Khelif in wake of gender eligibility controversy at Paris Olympics
Algeria recently issued a statement addressing the controversy surrounding Imane Khelif and her eligibility to compete in the women's category at the Paris Olympics. The statement claimed that Khelif had been made the target of an unjust attack fueled by "baseless propaganda" by the media. It read:
"COA strongly condemns the unethical targeting and maligning of our esteemed athlete, Imane Khelif, with baseless propaganda from certain foreign media outlets. Such attacks on her personality and dignity are deeply unfair, especially as she prepares for the pinnacle of her career at the Olympics. The COA has taken all necessary measures to protect our champion." [H/t: Reuters]
It's worth noting that Khelif will fight for Olympic gold on Friday after beating Janjaem Suwannapheng of Thailand in the semi-final bout. She will face Liu Yang of China in the final bout in her bid to become Algeria's first female boxing gold medalist.