Irish middle-distance runner Ciara Mageean, the 2024 European champion in the women's 1,500 meters and Irish national record holder, died Sunday at the age of 34 after battling cancer, just weeks after marrying her longtime partner. Alongside her distinguished athletic career, Mageean had become a prominent voice in Irish sports calling for sanctions against Israel, accusing it of genocide and demanding that Israeli athletes be excluded from international competitions.
Mageean, who represented Ireland at two Olympic Games, Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020, which was held in 2021, was considered one of the country's greatest middle-distance runners. Her crowning achievement came at the 2024 European Athletics Championships in Rome, where she won gold in the women's 1,500 meters with a time of 4:04.66. She was diagnosed with stage 4 colorectal cancer in 2025 and married her longtime partner, Thomas Moran, in October. Her family announced that she died Sunday morning surrounded by loved ones.
Irish middle-distance runner Ciara Mageean
(Photo: Michael Steele/Getty Images)
In recent years, Mageean had also attracted attention for her outspoken criticism of Israel. In a June 2026 interview with the Irish Examiner, the European champion argued that Israel should be excluded from international athletics competitions, comparing its continued participation with the restrictions imposed on Russian and Belarusian athletes following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. She called the difference in treatment ridiculous and argued that governments should impose sanctions on countries she accused of committing genocide, questioning why Israel had not faced measures similar to those imposed on Russia.
In her autobiography, My Greatest Race, Mageean wrote that she firmly believed Israel should not have been allowed to compete at the previous European Championships because of what she described as genocide. She called for Israeli athletes to face the same restrictions as their Russian and Belarusian counterparts and expressed frustration that World Athletics president Sebastian Coe had refused to change the organization's policy toward Israel.
The Irish runner also said her public statements had exposed her to severe abuse on social media, including messages wishing that she would die of cancer. Speaking about the hostility she encountered, Mageean said she sometimes questioned whether she should stop expressing her views because she was already dealing with the difficulties of her illness. She rejected accusations of antisemitism, saying, "I'm not antisemitic," and maintained that her position was motivated by opposition to the killing of innocent civilians.
Mageean continued expressing those views during the final months of her life and was among the prominent Irish athletes who supported calls for the national soccer team to boycott its UEFA Nations League matches against Israel. In September, she joined more than 160 Irish sports figures who signed an open letter urging the national team not to take the field against Israel in the matches scheduled for September 27 and October 4. The letter was published as part of a campaign organized by Irish Sport for Palestine, which called on players to refuse to participate in protest against Israeli policies. "Not playing the game would be the most sporting thing you could do," the letter stated.