By Mark Baber
August 14 – Palestinian football was never going to escape unscathed from the latest war in Gaza, which has cost the lives of more than 1,900 Palestinians and 66 Israelis, destroying much of Gaza’s infrastructure. However, the killing of local football legend and coach Ahed Zaqqut, suggests the damage to the Palestinian football community may be more than just collateral.
With support from FIFA, Palestinian football had been making great strides forward in recent times, both at grassroots and national level. The national team is preparing to play the Philippines in the Peace Cup on 9th September in a rerun of the famous AFC Challenge Cup final win which saw Palestine qualify for the Asian Cup finals.
However, as Abdelmajid Hijjeh, the Palestinian football association’s secretary general, said, “The war Israel is waging against the Palestinian people spares no one. The sports family in the West Bank as well as in the Gaza Strip are among those living through a real humanitarian catastrophe.”
49 year old Ahed Zaqqut, was widely considered to have been one of Palestine’s best ever midfielders and played in a 1993 friendly in Jericho against a French side captained by Michel Platini, now president of UEFA. After retirement he set up the first football training ground in Gaza with his team winning the local championship in 2000 and was working as the host of a Palestine sports programme.
Ahed Zaqqut’s wife told AFP of the day his home was hit by an Israeli missile on July 30. “I heard an enormous explosion. I rushed out of the bathroom and saw a cloud of dust. Then I knew that the rocket had fallen on us. I saw Ahed, his head and chest were soaked in blood. I couldn’t stop crying. The neighbours came and took him to hospital but he was already dead.”
19 year old aspiring footballers Mohammed Qatari and Udai Jaber were shot dead last week during separate protests against the Gaza war on the West Bank. Mohammed had been selected to meet FIFA president Sepp Blatter when he recently visited the West Bank. These deaths may of course have been coincidental.
Ahed Zaqqut had no connections to the Hamas movement and media suggestions his death was the result of a targeted attack have been fuelled suspicions over previous Israeli behaviour, including the shootings in the feet of Jawhar Nasser Jawhar, 19, and Adam Abd Al Raouf Halabiya, 17, were trying to pass a checkpoint in the West Bank on their way home from a training session, and the 2009 arrest and imprisonment for three years of 14 year old Mahmoud Sarsak, the youngest player ever to play in the Palestine League.
Attempts to hinder the movements of Palestinian players are so widespread that FIFA has set up a committee to monitor Israeli actions against Palestinian football. However, the determination of Palestinians to continue to build a vibrant footballing community has received widespread admiration, with an editorial in Abu Dhabi’s influential ‘The National’ saying: “The game plan for Israel is not just to defeat Palestinians, but to crush their spirit. To their great credit, they have not succumbed.”
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