Khan Younis, Gaza – Within the ruins of his residence in Khan Younis, 75-year-old Shaker Safi gently thumbs via fading images of his son Mohammed’s sporting profession.
Medals, trophies, staff huddles, and group photographs of younger athletes coached by Mohammed now function a haunting memorial to a dream destroyed by struggle.
On November 15, 2023, Mohammed Safi – a soccer coach and bodily schooling trainer – was killed in an Israeli air strike.
He had spent years constructing a legacy of hope via sport, coaching at faculties and group golf equipment, and reworking underdog groups into native champions.
A graduate in bodily schooling from Al-Aqsa College, Mohammed was the pinnacle coach of Al-Amal Soccer Membership in southern Gaza and was broadly admired for his work nurturing younger expertise aged between six and 16.
“My son dreamt of representing Palestine internationally,” Shaker says, surrounded by remnants of his son’s accolades. “He believed sport might elevate youth from despair. However struggle reached him earlier than he might attain the world.”
Mohammed Safi’s father, Shaker Safi, reveals a picture of his deceased son holding a soccer trophy. Mohammed, who was a junior soccer coach and umpire, was killed in an Israeli air strike in November 2023 (Mohamed-Solaimane/Al Jazeera)
Now displaced, Mohammed’s spouse Nermeen and their 4 kids – 16-year-old Shaker Jr, Amir, 14, Alma, 11, and Taif, 7 – reside with the painful void created by his dying.
The youngsters cling to their father’s final soccer and training notes as keepsakes.
Nermeen, an artwork trainer, gently wipes away Taif’s tears when she asks, “Why did they take Daddy from us?”
“He was a person of desires, not politics,” Nermeen says. “He needed to develop into a world referee. He needed his grasp’s diploma. As a substitute, he was killed for being a logo of life and youth.”
Mohammed Safi is one in all a whole lot of athletes and sports activities professionals who’ve been killed or displaced for the reason that struggle started.
In accordance with the Palestinian Olympic Committee, 582 athletes have been killed since October 7, 2023, lots of them nationwide staff gamers, coaches, and directors.
Mohammed Safi’s spouse and kids are usually not solely coping with his dying, but in addition displacement created by the struggle on Gaza (Mohamed-Solaimane/Al Jazeera)
Sports activities changed by survival
For individuals who stay alive in Gaza, survival has changed sporting ambition.
Yousef Abu Shawarib is a 20-year-old goalkeeper for Rafah’s premier league soccer membership.
In Could 2024, he and his household fled their residence and took shelter at Khan Younis Stadium – the identical area the place he as soon as performed official matches.
In the present day, the stadium is a shelter for displaced households, its artificial turf now lined with tents as an alternative of gamers.
“That is the place my coach used to transient me earlier than video games,” Yousef says, standing close to what was the bench space, now a water distribution level. “Now I wait right here for water, not for kickoff.”
His routine in the present day includes gentle, irregular coaching inside his tent, hoping to protect a fraction of his health. However his desires of learning sports activities sciences in Germany and enjoying professionally are gone.
“Now, I solely hope we now have one thing to eat tomorrow,” he tells Al Jazeera. “The struggle didn’t simply destroy fields – it destroyed our futures.”
When he appears to be like on the charred stadium, he doesn’t see a brief displacement.
“This was not collateral injury. It was systematic. It’s like they need to erase every part about us – even our video games.”
Taking part in organised soccer out within the open will not be a sensible possibility in Gaza anymore. As a substitute, Yousef Abu Shawarib does health coaching in a tent at Khan Younis Stadium (Mohamed-Solaimane/Al Jazeera)
Hope beneath the rubble
Nonetheless, just like the patches of grass that survived the blasts, some hope stays.
Shadi Abu Armanah, head coach of Palestine’s amputee soccer staff, had devised a six-month plan to renew coaching.
His 25 gamers and 5 teaching workers had been constructing momentum earlier than the struggle on Gaza. The staff had competed internationally, together with in a 2019 event in France. Earlier than hostilities started, they had been getting ready for one more occasion in November 2023 and an occasion in West Asia set for October 2025.
“Now, we are able to’t even collect,” Shadi says. “Each facility we used has been destroyed. The gamers have misplaced their properties. Most have misplaced family members. There’s nowhere protected to coach – no gear, no area, nothing.”
Supported by the Worldwide Committee of the Crimson Cross, the staff had as soon as symbolised resilience. Coaching periods had been greater than drills – they had been lifelines. “For amputees, sport was a second probability,” Shadi says. “Now they’re simply attempting to outlive.”
Shadi himself is displaced. His residence, too, was bombed. “The golf equipment I labored for are gone. The gamers are both useless or scattered. If the struggle ends in the present day, we’ll nonetheless want years to deliver again even a fraction of what was misplaced.”
He provides, “I coached throughout many golf equipment and divisions. Nearly all their amenities have been diminished to rubble. It’s not only a pause – it’s erasure.”
This multi-purpose sporting venue in Khan Younis used to host basketball and volleyball video games till the Israeli navy demolished it by aerial bombing. In more moderen occasions, it was repurposed as a refugee shelter, however has since been evacuated (Mohamed-Solaimane/Al Jazeera)
A scientific erasure
The scope of devastation extends past private loss.
In accordance with Asaad al-Majdalawi, vice chairman of the Palestinian Olympic Committee, Gaza’s total sporting infrastructure is getting ready to collapse. A minimum of 270 sports activities amenities have been broken or destroyed: 189 fully flattened and 81 partially broken, with preliminary estimates of fabric losses within the a whole lot of tens of millions of {dollars}.
“Each main part of Gaza’s sports activities system has been hit,” al-Majdalawi instructed Al Jazeera. “The Olympic Committee places of work, sports activities federations, golf equipment, faculty and college sports activities programmes – even non-public sports activities amenities have been focused. It’s a complete assault.”
Among the many fallen are high-profile athletes like Nagham Abu Samra, Palestine’s worldwide karate champion; Majed Abu Maraheel, the primary Palestinian to hold the Olympic flag on the 1996 Atlanta Video games; Olympic soccer coach Hani al-Masdar; and nationwide athletics coach Bilal Abu Sam’an. Lots of of others stay injured or lacking, complicating correct assessments.
“This isn’t simply loss – it’s extermination,” al-Majdalawi says. “Every athlete was a group pillar. They weren’t numbers. They had been symbols of hope, unity, and perseverance. Shedding them has deeply wounded the Palestinian society.”
He warns that past the instant human toll, the interruption of sports activities actions for a yr and a half will lead to bodily, psychological, {and professional} regression for remaining athletes. “You lose greater than muscle and ability – you lose goal.”
A lone grandstand stays partially intact in an in any other case fully destroyed Khan Younis soccer stadium. The venue, as soon as a preferred cultural and social hub of the Khan Younis sports activities group, has now develop into a shelter for 1000’s of internally displaced Gazans (Mohamed-Solaimane/Al Jazeera)
A worldwide silence
Al-Majdalawi believes the worldwide response has been alarmingly insufficient. When Gaza’s sports activities group reaches out to world federations, Olympic our bodies, and ministers of youth and sport, they’re met with silence.
“In non-public, many worldwide officers sympathise,” he says. “However on the decision-making stage, Israel appears to function above the regulation. There’s no accountability. It’s like sport doesn’t matter when it’s Palestinian. The worldwide and worldwide sports activities establishments seem complicit via their silence, ignoring all worldwide legal guidelines, human rights, and the governing guidelines of the worldwide sports activities system,” he says.
He believes that if the struggle ended in the present day, it will nonetheless take 5 to 10 years to rebuild what has been misplaced. Even that gloomy timeline is predicated on the idea that the blockade ends and worldwide funding turns into accessible.
“Now we have been constructing this sports activities sector since 1994,” al-Majdalawi says. “It took us many years to build up data, expertise, and professionalism. Now, it’s all been levelled in months.”
Because the struggle continues, the destiny of Gaza’s sports activities sector hangs by a thread. But amid the ruins, fathers like Shaker Safi, athletes like Yousef, and coaches like Shadi maintain on to at least one unyielding perception: that sport will as soon as once more be a supply of hope, id, and life for Palestinians.
Yousef Abu Shawarib, who has lived as a refugee at Khan Younis soccer stadium since Could 2024, hopes to outlive the struggle and as soon as once more play soccer on these grounds (Mohamed-Solaimane/Al Jazeera)
This piece was printed in collaboration with Egab.
