Champions killed, stadiums razed to the ground: this is how sport also died in Gaza

According to the Palestinian Football Federation, more than 243 athletes have died between the Strip and the West Bank. 161 footballers. 43 were little more than children.

ROME – Nagham Abu-Samra was 27 years old. In July she would go to Paris for the Olympics. He dreamed of a medal in karate. She was injured in a missile attack on December 17, and her leg was amputated. She died from her wounds in Al-Areesh hospital in Egypt. Instead Mohammed Barakat was a legend of Palestinian football. He scored 114 goals in his career, played in Jordan and Saudi Arabia. He was killed in March, under Israeli bombs. According to the Palestinian Football Federation, more than 243 athletes have died in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank since Israel’s military retaliation began. 161 footballers. 43 practically children.

The Guardian has collected some of these storiess of annihilation. In Gaza, sport was life, far beyond results and competitive spirit. For over 16 years it was the only entertainment possible. Now the gyms and facilities where judo, karate, swimming, volleyball, wrestling and gymnastics could be practiced are closed. Some have become shelters. Other tombs.

There were 10 stadiums in Gaza. They hosted games between the league’s 44 teams, four divisions. “They were once full of laughter and revelry but now, in their place, children cry from hunger and mothers’ faces turn pale and gray from the wood fire,” writes the Guardian. What happened to them? Here it is: thirteen months ago Khan Younis’ Al-Ataa Football Club won the third-tier championship against Al-Mosadar Club and earned promotion to the Khan Younis Stadium. After Israeli ground operations the site of the event was reduced to a pile of rubble. Eleven months ago the Khadamat Rafah Club celebrated the title of the Premier League of Gaza, in the municipality of Rafah, right where the Israeli advance now insists, and has extended his record to seven titles. Intense airstrikes on the stadium district devastated everything. Five days before October 7, Ittihad Al-Shujayya concluded their sixth matchweek with a 3-1 win against Hilal Gaza at Al-Yarmouk Stadium. The stadium no longer exists. It’s ash, dust. Right there the Israeli forces humiliated and tortured boys, men and elderly people. There are videos, verified. For those videos, the Palestinian Football Federation had asked FIFA to sanction the Israeli teams, and on February 12th the football associations of the Middle East had asked that Israel be banned from global sports competitions. None of this happened.

Only five camps escaped the bombing, distributed across the southern territories: Al-Salah, Khadamat Deir al-Balah and Ittihad Deir al-Balah in Deir al-Balah; two others, those of Rafah Youth and Khadamat Rafah, in Rafah. They have been transformed into shelters for thousands of displaced people from northern Gaza since the first weeks of the war. The Al-Dorra stadium now hosts more of 10,000 people and is the only intact stadium in Gaza.