Crystal Lake native reflects on representing Palestine in Olympics

Olympian Valerie Tarazi is proud to swim for her country.

It was a dream of hers since she was a child watching the Olympics as a fan, said Tarazi, 24. However, the Crystal Lake native did not swim for the United States, where she was born and raised, but was one of eight athletes who competed for Palestine.

She placed 32nd when she competed at the Olympics in Paris this summer and set a new personal best in the 200-meter individual medley. Tarazi was one of the flag-bearers for the opening and closing ceremonies and continues to use her exposure at the Olympics to promote a message of peace.

“It was the biggest honor carrying the flag on my shoulder and representing the millions of Palestinians in the world,” she said.

Tarazi’s Palestinian heritage comes from her paternal grandfather, who was born in Gaza, she said. Her roots go even further back, though. The Tarazi family is one of the oldest Christian families in Palestine, she said, and she has traced her ties all the way to the year 400.

The International Olympic Committee was “very inclusive” and allowed Tarazi to swim for Palestine once she qualified, she said. Athletes from Gaza were absent from the Summer Games because of Israel’s ongoing bombardment in Gaza, which was triggered by Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7 attack in Israel and has caused massive death and destruction in the territory. But two of the eight Palestinian athletes were from the West Bank.

IOC members “know that situations are different all around the world, so when I got the opportunity to represent Palestine, I absolutely wanted to honor my family and that’s just kind of how it worked out,” Tarazi said.

Her father was baptized at the Greek Orthodox Church of St. Porphyrius in Gaza, which is one of the oldest churches in the world, Tarazi said. Some family members still in Gaza were sheltering in that church when it was bombed, and they died in the damage, she said. Communication with the relatives who are left in Palestine is “in and out,” Tarazi said, as they are mostly on the move and without cell service.

“We’re very close to Palestine,” Tarazi said. “Yes, I was born and raised in the United States, but when you’re Palestinian, you’re Palestinian. It doesn’t go away.”

For Tarazi, the war “hit very close to home very quickly.” 

“I had friends stuck there,” she said. “I had family stuck there. I had teammates stuck there. Within a month of the war, I lost people that were very close to me.”

Tarazi first competed for Palestine internationally in July 2023 at the Arab Games in Algeria, which take place every four years like the Olympics but are held for Arab countries. Tarazi won two gold medals, three silver medals and one bronze medal at the Arab Games.

“I took the opportunity every competition I went to and got to raise the flag for Palestine,” Tarazi said.

Tarazi then swam for Palestine at the Asian Games in China in September 2023 and wrapped up shortly before the Oct. 7 attack that plunged the region into war. She said she left the Asian Games at the beginning of October with some of her teammates, but half of the Palestinian delegation was still in China on Oct. 7, and many were stuck there.

Of the ones who made it back to Palestine just days before Oct. 7, some have died, others are injured and even more are looking to escape as death and destruction continue nearly one year later, she said. A friend of Tarazi’s who is a track and field athlete is in touch with her frequently, but he is stuck in Rafah, she said, still “trying to get out.”

Another friend who was a beach volleyball player died in a bombing in Gaza earlier on in the war, she said. Bilal Abu Samaan, a track and field coach from Gaza who Tarazi said was “one of the most loved coaches in all of Palestine,” died in an airstrike in December.

“You hear stories like this, and it’s just one after another,” Tarazi said. “Every Palestinian athlete has a story like that.”

Tarazi was able to visit Palestine before the Olympics began in July. She said she went to Ramallah for a few days, where the French consulate gave athletes a sendoff, and she got to speak at the event. She said she also filmed a swimming documentary while there and “got to just walk around and enjoy for a minute.”

“It was something that was so special,” she said. “It was very eye-opening, but it was very heartwarming to be back home and to just be with the people and feel the culture. I went into Paris feeling ready after that.”

Tarazi’s first time visiting her grandfather’s homeland was in August 2023 when she took a two-week trip with her family. They spent time in Jerusalem and Ramallah and traveled around the West Bank. While there, Tarazi met with Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian National Authority.

Tarazi’s father, Martin Tarazi, was born in Evanston to a Palestinian father and a Caucasian mother. Tarazi’s mother, Jana, is originally from Crystal Lake and also Caucasian.

Swimming has always been a “love and passion” for Valerie Tarazi, Jana Tarazi said, but her daughter also understood that not everyone had the privilege of being able to participate.

“She wanted to be a part of the Palestinian team,” Jana Tarazi said. “Her desire for sport and wanting to be a part of something bigger, and now that she is an Olympian, I think she’s showing the world what is possible.”

For Tarazi, using the platform she has been given to convey the message of peace will always be a top priority.

“People are listening because of the stage she’s on,” Jana Tarazi said. “Her goal is to help in crisis or humanitarian situations, getting supplies in and facilities rebuilt, and ultimately, she wants every child to have a place to play and take part in sports.”

Tarazi graduated from Prairie Ridge High School in Crystal Lake in 2018, moved to Alabama to attend Auburn University and has been there since. She got her bachelor’s degree in 2022 and a master’s degree in 2024, both in supply chain management. She plans to get her PhD next, she said.

She chose Auburn University, she said, because of its reputation as “one of the blue bloods of swimming.”

“I was one of the top recruits from my class, so for the most part I got to choose where I went,” Tarazi said.

Her parents still live in Crystal Lake, and she said she visits a few times a year but is studying and training in Auburn. She has an older brother in dental school at Southern Illinois University.

Tarazi has been competing at the junior national level since she was 14, but she started swimming long before that at Crystal Lake Country Club at the age of 3. She said by the time she was 12, she was swimming twice a day and competing regularly.

“I competed for my high school and was on a lot of different club teams,” Tarazi said. “I just found a love for swimming, and I stuck with it.”

Her stroke specialty depends on the season, she said. She competed in the 200-meter individual medley in Paris, which has athletes completing 50 meters in the pool in each of four strokes: butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke and freestyle.

“I’m a very well-versed swimmer,” Tarazi said. “I swim anything from sprint to mid-distance in all strokes, so it really just depends on the day,” she said with a laugh.

Her favorite stroke “by far” is breaststroke. Among her many accolades, she was an Illinois High School Association state champ for the 100-yard breaststroke in the 2015-16 school year and a U.S. national champion in the 50-meter breaststroke in 2017.

With Auburn, she placed first in the 100-yard and 200-yard breaststroke at the War Eagle Invitational during the 2022-23 school year.

After wrapping up in Paris, she headed back to the States feeling “so grateful” and ready to get back to school and training. She is now preparing for the World Championships in Budapest in December and starting research for her PhD program, which is about humanitarian supply chain management and delivering aid to areas like Palestine, Ukraine and Sudan.

“No one wants war, no one wants conflict,” Tarazi said. “We just want to live in peace in Palestine and in the rest of the world, but that hasn’t been a reality. I think that’s something hard to do.”