On June 4, Palestinian national soccer team member Mahmoud Sarsak completed
81 days of a grueling hunger strike. He had sustained the strike despite the
fact that nearly 2,000 Palestinian inmates had called off their own 28-day
hunger strike weeks ago.
Although the story of Palestinian prisoners in Israel speaks to a common
reality of unlawful detentions and widespread mistreatment, Sarsak’s fate
can also be viewed within its own unique context. The soccer player, who
once sought to take the name and flag of his nation to international arenas,
was arrested by Israeli soldiers in July 2009 while en route to join the
national team in the West Bank.
Sarsak was branded an “illegal combatant” by Israel’s military judicial
system, and has since been imprisoned without any charges or trial.
Sarsak is not alone in the continued hunger strike. Akram al-Rekhawi, a
diabetic prisoner demanding proper medical care, has refused food for over
50 days.
At the time of writing of this article, both men were reportedly in dire
medical condition. Sarsak, once of unmatched athletic build, is now gaunt
beyond recognition. The already ill al-Rekhawi is dying.
According to rights groups, an Israeli court on May 30 granted prison
doctors 12 more days before allowing independent doctors to visit the
prisoners, further prolonging their suffering and isolation. Physicians for
Human Rights – Israel (PHRI), which has done a remarkable job battling the
draconian rules of Israeli military courts, continues to petition the court
to meet with both Sarsak and al-Rekhawi, according to Ma’an news agency.
Sadly, the story here becomes typical. PHRI, along with other prisoners’
rights groups, are doing all that civil society organizations can do within
such an oppressive legal and political situation. Families are praying.
Social media activists are sending constant updates and declaring
solidarity. Meanwhile, the rest of the world is merely looking on – not due
to any lack of concern for human rights, but due to the selective sympathy
of Western governments and media.
Think of the uproar made by US media over the fate of blind Chinese
political activist Chen Guangcheng. When he took shelter in the US embassy
in Beijing, a near-diplomatic crisis ensued. Guangcheng was finally flown to
the US on May 19, and he recently delivered a talk in New York before an
astounded audience.
“The 40-year-old, blind activist said that his lengthy detention [of seven
years] demonstrates that lawlessness is still the norm in China,” reported
the New York Post on May 31. “Is there any justice? Is there any rationale
in any of this?” Chen asked. Few in the US media would contend with the
statement. But somehow the logic becomes entirely irrelevant when the
perpetrator of injustice is Israel, and the victim is a Palestinian.
Al-Rekhawi is not blind, but he has many medical ailments. He has been in
Ramle prison clinic since his detention in 2004, receiving severely
inadequate medical care.
Sarsak, who has been a witness to many tragedies, is now becoming one. The
25-year old had once hoped to push the ranking of his national team back to
a reasonable standing. If Palestinians ever deserve to be called “fanatics”,
it would be in reference to soccer. As a child growing up in Gaza, I
remember playing soccer in increments of a few minutes, braving Israeli
military curfews, risking arrest, injury and even death. Somehow, in a very
crowded refugee camp, soccer becomes tantamount to freedom.
Palestine’s ranking at 164th in the world is testament not to any lack of
passion for the game, but to the constant Israeli attempts at destroying
even that national aspiration.
The examples of Israeli war on Palestinian soccer are too many to count,
although most of them receive little or no media coverage whatsoever. In
2004, Israel blocked several essential players from accompanying the
national team out of Gaza for a second match against Chinese Taipei.
(Palestine had won the first match 8-0.) The obstacles culminated in the
March 2006 bombing of the Palestinian Football Stadium in Gaza, which
reduced the grass field to a massive crater. Then, in the war on Gaza
(Operation Cast Lead 2008-09), things turned bloody as Israel killed three
national soccer players: Ayman Alkurd, Shadi Sbakhe and Wajeh Moshtahe. It
also bombed their stadium again.
Sarsak was a promising new face of Palestinian soccer. In times of
Palestinian disunity and factionalism, it was the national team that kept a
symbolic unity between Gaza and the West Bank – and indeed Palestinians
everywhere. These young men exemplify hope that better times are ahead. But
Sarsak’s star is now fading, as is his life. His mother, who hasn’t seen him
since his arrests, told Ma’an that she thinks of him every minute of each
day. “Why is there no one moving to save his life?” she asked.
Writing in the Nation on May 10, Dave Zirin wrote:
“Imagine if a member of Team USA Basketball – let’s say Kobe Bryant – had
been traveling to an international tournament only to be seized by a foreign
government and held in prison for three years without trial or even hearing
the charges for which he was imprisoned … Chances are all the powerful
international sports organizations – the IOC [International Olympic
Committee], [global football`s organizing body] FIFA – would treat the
jailing nation as a pariah until Kobe was free. And chances are that even
Laker-haters would wear buttons that read, ‘Free Kobe’.”
Sarsak is the Bryant of his people. But ask any political commentator and he
will tell you why Mohmoud Sarsak is not Kobe Bryant, and why al-Rekhawi is
not Chen. It is the same prevalent logic of a powerful Washington-based
pro-Israel lobby and all the rest.
Even if the logic was founded, why are international sports institutions not
standing in complete solidarity with the dying Sarsak? Why don’t soccer
matches include a moment of solidarity with killed Palestinian players, and
the dying young man aching to join his teammates on the field once more? Why
is Israel not fully and comprehensively boycotted by every international
sports organization?
“As long as Sarsak remains indefinitely detained and as long as Israel
targets sport and athletes as legitimate targets of war, they have no
business being rewarded by FIFA or the UEFA, let alone even being a part of
the community of international sports,” wrote Zirin (the second being the
European footballing organization).
That would be a belated step, but an unequivocally urgent one, for
Palestinian sportsmen are literally dying.
Ramzy Baroud is an internationally syndicated columnist and the editor of
PalestineChronicle.com. His latest book is My Father Was a Freedom Fighter:
Gaza’s Untold Story.
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