The International Chess Federation (FIDE) is facing pressure to relocate next month’s World Amateur Chess Championships in Malaysia since Israeli chess players have been banned from participating in the competition because of their nationality.

“Allowing Malaysia to exclude Israeli players makes a mockery of @FIDE_chess and its ‘We Are One Family’ motto,” read a statement posted Wednesday on Israel’s official X account, which is run by the Foreign Ministry. “This is pure discrimination. No equal access, no tournament. Strip Malaysia of hosting rights and relocate the event now!”

Malaysia has a longstanding policy of banning Israeli citizens from entering the Muslim-majority country and refuses to establish diplomatic relations with Israel, claiming solidarity with the Palestinian cause. Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said in July that he “will not allow Israelis to set foot in Malaysia” and warned that Israelis found inside the country will be deported.

The FIDE World Amateur Chess Championships is set to take place in the city of Klang from Nov. 4-13. Malaysia on Saturday released the official list of chess players who will participate and two Israelis who registered for the tournament were excluded from the list.

One of them, Lior Aizenberg, said he was denied participation for being an Israeli citizen even after he registered for the tournament using a non-Israeli passport. Aizenberg is the director of the Chess4Solidarity initiative, which aims to strengthen ties between nations and promote solidarity through chess, and also runs the Chess4All club in Israel. He accused Malaysia of antisemitism and discriminating against him based on his nationality. He is urging the FIDE to relocate the tournament and said Malaysia should be barred from organizing the event.

“The Malaysian authorities are simply unwilling to allow Israelis to represent Israel at a World Championship. As far as they are concerned, Israel does not exist,” he said in a statement. “After 78 years of statehood, and especially following [the Hamas massacre on] Oct. 7, we as Israelis cannot allow such a situation to stand.”

Aizenberg told the Israeli publication Walla that a tournament organizer initially responded to his inquiry about participation by saying that Israelis could not compete because of Malaysia’s immigration policy. The organizer deleted the message shortly afterward and instead said someone would get back to him with a response, according to the chess player.

“A place that does not admit Israelis — or players from any other country — should not be granted the right to host a world championship,” Aizenberg said.

The Israel Chess Federation claimed the FIDE promised to assist Israeli players in obtaining the necessary visas to participate. Susan Polgar, a Hungarian-born Jewish-American chess grandmaster, said excluding Israeli players from the competition is hypocritical of the FIDE’s motto “Gens una Sumus,” which is Latin for “We are one Family.”

Yosi Levi Sfari, who is Israel’s ambassador to the Republic of Bulgaria, added that the word “world” should be removed from the tournament’s title if organizers refuse to allow Israeli participation.

“A world championship that excludes Israelis is not a world championship,” he wrote in a post on X. “Malaysia is set to host the @FIDE_chess World Amateur Chess Championship, yet Israeli players have reportedly been excluded because of their nationality. In 2019, FIDE pledged not to hold events in countries that deny entry to eligible players based on nationality. So where is that commitment now? If Malaysia cannot guarantee equal access to all participants, the championship must be moved. No double standards. No political excuses. FIDE must act. Let them play!”

In 2019, Malaysia was stripped by the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) from hosting the World Para Swimming Championships after banning Israeli athletes from entering the country to participate in the competition.

The FIDE has not publicly commented on Israel’s exclusion from the World Amateur Chess Championship, which is open to male and female players with a FIDE rating below 2300. The event will feature separate men’s and women’s competitions across three FIDE rating categories and participants will compete under the Swiss tournament system. FIDE Member Federations may send an unlimited number of players.

During the 46th FIDE Chess Olympiad in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, last month, Pakistan’s national team refused to compete against Israel in the opening round, saying the decision was in solidarity with the Palestinian cause. Israel’s male and female chess teams then pulled out of their sixth-round matches against the Netherlands and Bulgaria after both countries rejected requests to change the date of the match because it fell on Yom Kippur, the holiest day on the Jewish calendar.

In September 2025, seven Israeli chess players withdrew from a chess competition in Spain after event organizers said they were not welcome to the event and could not compete under their national flag, expressing support for the Palestinians and accusing Israel of genocide.