History of Kuwait late 16th century, the Portuguese built a defensive settlement in Kuwait. In 1613, the town of Kuwait was founded in the present-day location of Kuwait City. Kuwait was initially under the control of the Bani Khalid clan, who built a fishing village in present-day Kuwait Bay. The beginning of the eighteenth century witnessed the contention of Kuwait by the Bani Utub confederation. They migrated to Kuwait in 1682. As a result of successive matrimonial alliances, they were able to wrest control of Kuwait sometime after the death of Barrak Bin Urair [Bani Khaled] and the fall of the Bani Khaled
Kuwait is widely considered to be the national icon of Kuwait, although football is more popular among the overall population. Ice hockey in Kuwait is governed by the Kuwait Ice Hockey Association. Kuwait first joined the International Ice Hockey Federation in 1985, but was expelled in 1992 due to a lack of ice hockey activity. Kuwait was re-admitted into the IIHF in May 2009. In 2015, Kuwait won the IIHF Challenge Cup of Asia. Kuwait's media is annually classified as "partly free" in the Freedom of Press survey by Freedom House. Since 2005, Kuwait has frequently earned the highest ranking of