Day after Kazakhstan confirms it will join Abraham Accords

Israel’s Omri Haviv wins jiu-jitsu gold as Kazakh rival disqualified for illegal kick

Aldiyar Serik refuses to shake the Israeli fighter’s hand after the bout; Haviv advanced to World Championship final after Kuwaiti opponent backed out of fighting an Israeli

By ToI Staff 8 November 2025, 10:16 am
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Kazakh jiujitsu fighter Aldiyar Serik, left, illegally kicks his Israeli rival Omri Haviv during the finals of the Adult Men's Under 29kg No Gi category at the Jiujitsu World Championships in Bangkok, Thailand, November 7, 2025. (Screen capture: X, used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)
Kazakh jiujitsu fighter Aldiyar Serik, left, illegally kicks his Israeli rival Omri Haviv during the finals of the Adult Men's Under 29kg No Gi category at the Jiujitsu World Championships in Bangkok, Thailand, November 7, 2025. (Screen capture: X, used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)

Israel’s Omri Haviv won a gold medal at the Jiu-jitsu World Championships in Bangkok on Friday after his Kazakh rival was disqualified for an illegal kick and then refused to shake his hand.

The clash came a day after Kazakhstan confirmed it would join the Abraham Accords normalization agreement with Israel.

Haviv, 23, took first place in the category for adult men under 69 kilograms (152 pounds) competing without a Gi, the traditional jiu-jitsu uniform. He was leading over his opponent Aldiyar Serik during the final match when Serik lost his temper and kicked him.

Kicking and hitting are illegal in Jiujitsu, a martial art that relies on grappling an opponent into submission.

The judge immediately disqualified Serik, who stormed away. Footage from the scene showed Haviv getting up, shaking the judge’s hand, and then running after Serik to shake his hand as well, only to be turned away.

“He got really upset, but I kept my cool, both because I didn’t want to hurt my chances of winning and because I’m not that kind of person,” Haviv told Israeli sports outlet ONE after the match. “I tried to shake his hand and end it honorably. Of course, he was unwilling to shake my hand, didn’t even turn around and didn’t want to talk.”

Earlier in the tournament, Haviv told ONE, he bested rivals from Mexico and Russia, and acceded to the finals after the Kuwaiti rival he was set to face off against in the semifinals refused to fight an Israeli.

Amir Boaron, the Israeli team’s coach, told the Israel Hayom newspaper that Serik’s behavior was “a crazy moment.”

“Omri reached the finals, schooled his rival, and then the Kazakh decided to kick him,” said Boaron. “Just yesterday the state of Kazakhstan signed the Abraham Accords, and today a Kazakh fighter behaves like this. It’s completely unsportsmanlike.”

On Thursday, the Muslim-majority Central Asian nation became the first country to join the Abraham Accords since US President Donald Trump returned to office in January.

The accords, first brokered by Trump during his first term in 2020, had previously normalized relations between Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan.

Kazakhstan’s addition to the agreement was more limited in scope given that the landlocked nation established diplomatic ties with Israel in 1992, soon after Kazakhstan broke away from the Soviet Union.

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