El desafío a los juegos olímpicos de Berlín 1936: Los atletas Judíos de Palestina en la frustrada Olimpiada Popular de Barcelona

On 19th July 1936, a few hours before the scheduled opening ceremony of the Peoples' Olympiad, the military uprising against the elected government of the Second Republic broke out. Most of the athletes who had come to Barcelona departed quickly. However, some of them remained in Spain and became the first international volunteers to help in the defense of the Republic. The Barcelona games had been planned as a response to the Olympics, about to open in Berlin, which had been hijacked to serve the Nazi propaganda. Since the Peoples' Olympiad did not take place, historiography has dedicated only little attention to this anti-fascist effort of counter-Olympics. This paper focuses on the delegation of athletes from Jewish Palestine, which consisted mainly of members of the Hapoel Sport's Federation. This was the first expression of the Yishuv's solidarity with the Spanish Republic and the anti-fascist struggle.