By Brett Wilkins
Common Dreams
Following an Olympic Games that activists said was tainted by the participation of Israeli athletes including a flag-bearer who signed bombs bound for Gaza, a shot putter who was disabled by an Israeli sniper and who lost at least 17 relatives to Israel’s onslaught is set to be the sole Palestinian competitor at the upcoming Paralympics in Paris.
“I want to raise my country flag here in Paris and to show the people we are still here,” 39-year-old Fadi Deeb said during a Monday interview with Democracy Now! ahead of the Aug. 28 Paralympic Opening Ceremony. “We’re still alive — we have hopes, we have dreams, we have goals.”
Deeb, who is from Gaza City, was shot in the spine by an Israeli sniper in 2001 during the Second Intifada, or general Palestinian uprising.
“It’s a very hard situation to … balance between my sport as an international player and one who is going to compete in the Paralympic Games, and … my family, all of my sisters, my brothers still in Gaza Strip,” he explained.
From Olympic Paris! Meet Fadi Deeb: the only Palestinian in the Paralympics and the only member of the Palestinian delegation from Gaza. Written @thenation with @JulesBoykoff https://t.co/al7G6RvLj2
— Dave Zirin (@EdgeofSports) August 2, 2024
“There is no safe place in Gaza … everyone is like a target for the killing machine,” Deeb continued. “So, what is happening now… it’s a genocide. It’s not a war… I lost my brother on Dec. 7, 2023, and two of my nephews … And for whole of my family members, I lost like more than, like, 17 persons. So, the situation is very hard.”
The official Palestinian death toll from Israel’s 311-day bombardment, invasion, and siege of Gaza surged toward 40,000 this week, according to local and international officials, with at least an additional 103,000 people wounded or missing. Most of those killed have been women and children.
[Related: Israel’s Barbarism Is Grossly Under Reported]
Almost all of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been forcibly displaced, while Israel’s total blockade of the coastal enclave has forced the starvation of at least hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. Dozens of Gazans — almost all of them children — have died from malnutrition, dehydration and lack of medical care.
Asked by Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman about the “amputation crisis” in Gaza — the charity Save the Children says an average of 10 children a day have lost one or more limbs during the war — Deeb said that it’s “a very hard situation, because, as I told before, there’s no difference… if you are children or women… everyone is a target.”
According to the Palestine Olympic Committee and Palestine Football Association (PFA), at least 400 Palestinian athletes, including nearly 70 children, have been killed by Israeli forces since October as of July 26. Among the dead are Hany Al-Masry, a former player and general manager of the Palestinian Olympic soccer team.
Still, eight Palestinians managed to compete in the Paris Olympics.
The International Olympic Committee has been accused of double standards for banning Russian athletes over their country’s invasion of Ukraine but allowing Israeli athletes — including Israel Defense Forces veterans and an Olympic flag-bearer who recently signed bombs to be dropped on Gaza — to compete.
Last week, PFA president Jibril Rajub called Israel’s alleged deliberate targeting of Palestinian athletes a blatant violation of the Olympic Charter.
[On Tuesday, Middle East Eye reported Rajub was detained by Israeli authorities on his way home from the Olympics and is being summoned for questioning.]
? UPDATE #Israel #Palestine
Israeli forces detained Jibril Rajoub, President of the Palestinian Football Association upon his return from the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, and handed him a summons for questioning next Thursday
More here ??https://t.co/054TQpsDhy
— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) August 13, 2024
Brett Wilkins is a staff writer for Common Dreams.
This article is from Common Dreams.
Views expressed in this article and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
Thank You Brett
Paralympic contender Fadi Deeb is why the US, by its own hands, is becoming a pariah to this world of nations For their people’s well-being, the US must be avoided..
100% of the people in Gaza will have PTSD. You can NOT live through this horror and come out a normal person. I totally hate the Israelis…except for the 2% who wish it was otherwise.
It’s even worse than he describes. Children and women are ESPECIALLY targeted. There are to be no future Palestinians. Many israelis are leaving Israel for good. I HOPE that that is because they cannot stand being parties to this genocidal carnage; but I SUSPECT that most of them are just scared for their own lives.