Gender-Row Boxer Imane Khelif Blasts 'Enemies,' Makes Bold Declaration After Winning Gold At Paris Olympics 2024

Imane Khelif, the Algerian boxer at the center of the gender controversy at the Paris Olympics 2024, has a message for her "enemies" after winning gold.

After suffering criticism and bullying regarding her gender, Khelif emerged victorious in the women's welterweight boxing Friday when she defeated China's Yang Liu by unanimous decision at Roland-Garros Stadium.

Following her victory, Khelif, 25, called out her detractors, calling them "enemies of success."

"These are enemies of success of course. That gives my success a special taste because of these attacks," the Algerian boxer told reporters, according to a translation by the Daily Mail.

Khelif also declared, "I am fully qualified. I am a woman like any other woman. I was born a woman, I lived as a woman, I competed as woman -- there is no doubt."

According to USA Today, thousands of Algerians came to support Khelif in person during all four of her bouts at the Olympics, including Friday's match.

Khelif expressed gratitude to her countrymen who were in the arena to witness her Olympic gold win.

"The audience and the fans played an important role as they supported me," she said. "That support gave me strength."

Khelif received plenty of congratulatory messages on social media as well, including from Algeria FC, which posted: "IMANE KHELIF GOLD MEDAL! Algerian women continue to make us proud."

However, some groups and social media users continued to push the false claims that Khelif was not a woman and therefore not qualified to participate in women's boxing.

"The IOC has failed women. A male boxer is now the female Olympic champion. Imane Khelif beats Yang Liu. Male power smashes female talent," Fair Play for Women wrote in a post that has received nearly 9,000 likes.

Khelif faced questions and vitriol over her gender after her first fight in Paris against Italy's Angela Carini.

After getting struck by Khelif, the Italian boxer withdrew just 46 seconds into their match, claiming. "This is unjust."

Carini's coach Emanuel Renzini then claimed that she was warned not to fight Khelif because the Algerian was allegedly "a man."

The worldwide scrutiny against Khelif intensified when the International Boxing Association alleged that she and Taiwan's Lin Yu-ting were disqualified from the women's world championships last year after "a sex chromosome test ruled them ineligible," Reuters reported.

The International Boxing Association was permanently banned from the Olympics last year.

Amid the controversy, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) spoke out in support of Khelif and Lin, with the Olympics organizers' president, Thomas Bach, slamming the "hate speech" against the boxers as "totally unacceptable."

"We will not take part in a politically motivated ... cultural war," Bach said during a news conference last week, according to the Associated Press.

"We have two boxers who are born as women, who have been raised as women, who have a passport as a woman and have competed for many years as women," he added. "Some want to own a definition of who is a women."

IOC spokesman Mark Adams said the testing process that resulted in Khelif and Lin's disqualification last year was "not legitimate" and "so flawed that it's impossible to engage with it."

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Olympics