GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — The first baseball team in the Gaza Strip was established on Feb. 22, and for the first time a number of youths started playing baseball in Gaza City, despite the lack of funding and access to a proper baseball field.

Palestinian athlete Mahmoud Tafesh came up with the idea of establishing Gaza's first baseball team and baseball federation. In April 2016, Tafesh, 35, attended a baseball training course for coaches in Egypt and returned to Gaza where he organized the first baseball introduction course for Palestinian amateurs on Oct. 18. Tafesh is the first baseball coach in Gaza and the chairman of the Palestinian Federation of Baseball and Softball, whose board of directors had its first meeting Jan. 17, after it obtained a license from the Ministry of Youth and Sports.

Tafesh told Al-Monitor, “The federation seeks to make baseball well known to Palestinians, help male and female amateurs to become professional baseball players and train local coaches and referees.” He said that 20 male and 20 female amateurs joined the federation for training purposes, and that it will be the nucleus of the first women’s and men’s baseball teams in the Gaza Strip.

Iman Moghayyer, 23, has a bachelor's degree in physical education and sports from Al-Aqsa University in Gaza, and she is a member of Gaza's baseball team. She told Al-Monitor that she has loved baseball since she was a child and enjoys watching Major League Baseball on TV at home in Gaza City.