Athletes
Bassil Hafez's Bigger Mission
Welterweight Honors His Late Mother By Raising Money For Families Struggling With Cancer
Baraa Hafez never got to see her son, Bassil, fight. But he saw her fight every day as she battled breast cancer. And he never forgot how she got up every day, went to chemotherapy, then worked a 12-hour shift in the family’s pizza shop, all without complaint.
“That was her,” Bassil Hafez said. “Never thinking about herself, always thinking outward, trying to do what's best for her kids and her family. And not even telling me really how bad her cancer was because she didn't want to mess up my mentality or where I was. Obviously, I wanted to know. But she wouldn't think like that. She would think very selflessly in everything she did, always.”
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Every cancer is bad, but Baraa’s was really bad, and after a courageous fight, she passed away when her son was just 18. At the time, the only fighting Bassil Hafez was doing was in the streets, and as his mom and dad (who was battling lung cancer) tried to keep everything together, the teenager was going off the rails. Yet if the passing of both of his parents had any silver lining, it’s that he straightened out, determined to make them proud.
They would be. On Saturday night, Hafez steps into the Octagon for the third time, looking to earn his second UFC win against Oban Elliott. And he’s doing it in Madison Square Garden, no less. But perhaps more importantly, Hafez doesn’t fight solely for himself. Instead, he is doing his part to keep his mother’s memory alive through the Baraa Hafez Breast Cancer Foundation, which he created “to help families going through financial hardships due to breast cancer.”
“It's something that I never thought I would be able to create, and even when I started doing this stuff, I never thought I would do it in the name of the foundation,” said Hafez, who initially raised money by selling t-shirts while fighting as an amateur for the XFE promotion in his native Pennsylvania. Promoter David Feldman matched what Hafez raised, and they were able to donate the proceeds to a family of six fighting breast cancer.
It snowballed from there, and while there weren’t huge amounts of money being raised, it was making a difference to families who needed the help.
“Most donations after that were maybe $300 to a couple families or $400 to this family, $500 to each one of these families,” he said. “So it was always a small amount here and there, whatever I could raise. And then each time, I either knew somebody through family, a friend or a friend of a friend that had breast cancer that's fighting it and is having financial hardships. I remember one time I got connected to a friend who worked in oncology at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, and they connected me to three families, and we were able to help.”
Some local media attention helped bring light to Hafez’ efforts, but as he tried to build his pro fighting career on the regional scene, money got tight and didn’t afford him the time or resources for the foundation.
“It was a huge hiatus, probably about a five-year hiatus, because I was really so broke at points that I couldn't even afford to do it,” he admits. “I went through a phase where I didn't get signed to the UFC when I thought I would and I wasn't making as much in fights, so I'm scrounging to have money to pay rent, and even to be able to buy food at one point.”
Hafez persevered, though, and after a move from Philadelphia to Colorado, things began to click, and then he got a short notice call to fight Jack Della Maddalena.in July of last year. He lost the fight, but won the crowd, and a Fight of the Night bonus. First order of business? Fire up his mom’s foundation again.
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A fundraiser followed, raising nearly $5,000, and it was matched by Sense of Security, an organization that provides financial assistance for breast cancer patients. The money went to Oksana Gamayunova and her husband and three kids, to aid them as Oksana fought breast cancer. It was exactly what Hafez wanted the foundation to do; not throw money into administrative costs or into a black hole of bureaucracy, but to actually help and see where the money was going.
And he’s just getting started.
“I don't want to just have my name on a paper saying I did something,” he said. “I want to actually feel the difference that I made. The reason I got involved in this is because what it really comes down to is that it’s something that I feel would make my mother proud. I know that she was big into charity and big into being a good person and giving back. And she did that in her own way in different ways. And so, for me, it's something that’s a double-edged sword where we went through financial hardship because of breast cancer, and I know that maybe it led to stress in the household. So if that donation makes that one weekend or one month they don't fight and they're showing love to each other, it's maybe something that would've made a difference in our household before they eventually passed. And once someone passes away, they're gone. You only get one opportunity to spend time with that person. So hopefully we can help a family going through financial hardships with a little bit, something that can help take the stress off them and live their life with the last bit of time they have.”
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Hafez pauses, thinking about his mom and her struggles. And how hard she fought to beat this disease.
“She worked every single day,” he said. “She didn't want to work every single day while she's having stage four breast cancer for four years, going to chemo radiation every morning. She didn't want to work. Who wants to work going through that? I know people that have had breast cancer, and luckily, they didn't have to work. Maybe their situation was different. They got to get the treatment and go home and rest and it's like, man, people don't understand. Too many people don't understand. Yeah, life is hard, but it doesn't need to be harder. We don't need to make it harder on each other. And the fact that you could be sick, and you don't get treated any differently, and you still have to wake up and go to work - even if you can't eat that day, if you don't even have the energy to get up, you're nauseated, you're throwing up. You still have to get up and do everything, and no one expects you to tell your story and no, you just got to get up and work.”
He pauses again, the years of his mother’s illness seemingly flooding back. He continues.
“Some people share their story, but a lot of people just get up silently, do what they have to do, and they bite the bullet. And those people shouldn't have to always struggle. Maybe someone should help them. And so, it's like, why not? If I can help families going through what I went through, why shouldn't I help them? And I know that it would make my mother proud and make her happy, make her smile. Maybe I didn't have a great childhood. I was always getting in trouble, and she was always yelling at me, and I feel like I have a lot to make up, too, so that could be a part of it.”
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Maybe it’s the biggest part. And there’s nothing wrong with that, because it’s a son’s way of showing his mother that he was listening all along and that she raised a good man, even there were some bumps in the road to get there. And yes, Baraa would have been proud of Bassil. But would she be surprised?
“Maybe,” Hafez laughs. “I actually really believe that if she was alive today and saw everything I'm doing, she’d be like, ‘I can't believe this is my son.’ But in a good way.”
For more information on the Baraa Hafez Breast Cancer Foundation, visit https://habibihafez.com/
UFC 309: Jones vs Miocic took place live from Madison Square Garden in New York City, New York on November 16, 2024. See the final Prelim & Main Card Results, Official Scorecards and Who Won Bonuses - and relive the action on UFC FIGHT PASS!