The Palestinian Football Association announced Monday that 14-year-old Al-Hilal player Mohammed Ramez Al-Sultan was killed along with 14 members of his family in an Israeli airstrike on their home in the north of Gaza City.
In a statement, the association said the player was killed Friday when Israeli forces struck his family’s house in the Al-Tuwam area.
Al-Hilal Club wrote on the US social media company Facebook’s platform that Al-Sultan was “one of the graduates of the club’s academy accredited by FIFA” and that he was killed alongside his father and relatives, joining teammate Malik Abu Al-Amaren.
On Sept. 6, Abu Al-Amaren, a youth player for Al-Hilal, was shot dead by Israeli forces while waiting for humanitarian aid in northern Gaza.
The killing of Al-Sultan and his family comes amid ongoing Israeli attacks that have wiped out entire Palestinian families in Gaza and claimed the lives of athletes, journalists, doctors and students as part of the broader war targeting all sectors of society.
On Aug. 26, Jibril Rajoub, president of the Palestinian Football Association, said Palestinian sports are experiencing an “unprecedented catastrophe” after losing 774 members of the sports community to Israel’s war according to Anadolu.
He noted that the death toll included 355 football players, 277 from other sports federations and 142 scouts, in addition to 119 missing. He added that 15 sports journalists were also killed, while 288 sports facilities in the West Bank and Gaza were either totally or partially destroyed.
Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza has killed nearly 65,000 Palestinians since October 2023 and devastated the enclave, which faces famine.
Israel is facing a genocide case at the International Court of Justice over its war in the territory.
Israel’s top army general has accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of withholding decisions on the war in Gaza, as new reports indicate thousands of Israeli soldiers have abandoned combat service since the genocidal assault on the enclave began, according to Israeli media.
According to the Anadolu news agency, the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth reported on Monday that Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir told the Knesset’s intelligence subcommittee last week that Netanyahu had not provided clear instructions on the army’s next steps in Gaza, the report said.
“The prime minister doesn’t tell us what comes next, so we don’t know what to prepare for,” the newspaper quoted Zamir as saying.
He added that if the government intends to impose a military administration in Gaza, “they should state it openly.”
GHF Criticized
Zamir also criticized the US-backed aid distribution scheme run by the so-called Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, calling it a “failure.”
Despite the expansion of distribution centers from four to 12, Zamir questioned why Israel was enlarging a program that “did not work in the first place.”
“I don’t understand why they are spending money on it and increasing the number of aid centers to 12, if it failed when there were four,” he is quoted by Haaretz as saying.
Gaza’s Health Ministry says Israeli attacks on aid seekers at distribution sites have killed more than 2,400 Palestinians and wounded over 18,000.
Morale Crisis
Meanwhile, Haaretz reported that the army is facing an unprecedented morale crisis, with thousands of conscripts leaving frontline units since October 2023. Many were reassigned to non-combat duties or discharged altogether, with officers admitting the scale of withdrawals is without precedent, Anadolu cited the paper as reporting.
Testimonies collected by Haaretz described deep psychological scars among troops, including post-traumatic stress and what military counselors call “moral injuries”- trauma from actions that conflict with personal values. Soldiers spoke of accidental killings of children, snipers ordered to fire on civilians near aid convoys, and repeated suicide attempts in combat brigades.
While the army’s spokesperson has withheld official figures, senior officers told Haaretz the problem is “out of control.”
The Jerusalem Post reported on Monday that the Hostages and Missing Families Forum have demanded a meeting with Zamir over “the threat” that the operation in Gaza City poses to the captives held in the enclave.
20,000 Wounded Soldiers
On Monday, Haaretz reported that around 20,000 soldiers injured in the Gaza onslaught “are being treated by the Defense Ministry Rehabilitation Division, with 55 percent – roughly 10,700 – struggling with mental health issues.”
Citing the Defense Ministry, the paper said” 20 percent of those with mental health issues were also physically wounded, while 45 percent of the veterans registered with the division are dealing with physical injuries only.”
By 2028, the division estimates it will treat “100,000 injured veterans, including 50,000 with mental health injuries.”
Ongoing Genocide
Starting on October 7, 2023, the Israeli military, with American support, launched a genocidal war against the people of Gaza. This campaign has so far resulted in the deaths of more than 64,900 Palestinians, with more than 164,000 wounded. The vast majority of the population has been displaced, and the destruction of infrastructure is unprecedented since World War II. Thousands of people are still missing.
In addition to the military assault, the Israeli blockade has caused a man-made famine, leading to the deaths of hundreds of Palestinians—mostly children—with hundreds of thousands more at risk.
Despite widespread international condemnation, little has been done to hold Israel accountable. The nation is currently under investigation for genocide by the International Court of Justice, while accused war criminals, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, are officially wanted by the International Criminal Court as reported in the Palestine Chronicle.
A few personal reflections which certainly don’t resolve the Middle East puzzle, and one hopes don’t add to the already existing puzzle.
In any case, the Arabs tend to be a vocal people of tradition, consequently, all that can be done, is limited to the terms of providing the best description to circumstances rather than providing practicable and working solutions.
One can’t say that at times there are in fact idealistic solutions which can work only in the imagination, and indeed there is plenty of that, but to face other nations’ aggression; specifically Israel’s self-proclaimed defense of its national security, Arabs tend to counter that with competition between themselves as who is the most eloquent electronically.
Essentially and apparently, the Rabs are currently in a weak state, and weakness does corrupt, and if the current circumstances persist, will lead to absolute impotence.
For generations the Arabs have followed the so-called western path to development, while some, in order to spite the West, followed the socialist path to development, the mirage was the same, and failure no different, and with international relations, the policy has been habitually leaning on the Americans to fend off Iranian threat, leaning on Russia to fend off American threat, and leaning on Israel to fend of the threat coming from each other, which prompts the logical question: Why don’t they lean on each other?
Well, part of the answer comes from an incident from my pre-retirement days, as one was looking out of the window of the airplane passing over an area in Turkey full of dams, the VIP I had the honor of accompanying said the prophetic words which stayed with me “good luck to them, all what we did, we conspired against each other.”
The fact remains, that a form of catharsis is needed in inter-Arab relations, which probably requires more of psychological analysis than political, because the phenomenon of seeking allies from the presumed enemy lines, as opposed to allies from the so called brethren camp, requires plenty of reflection. The ethos of common culture, religion, geography are nothing but folklore the doesn’t have the idea of common interest in its composition.
Alas, a folkloric nation that derives its strength from rhetoric can only remain a reactive nation, and in order to become an active nation, it has to clean up from its mind, the cobwebs of memory and start acting to the basis of common Arab interests.
Dr Janbek is a Jordanian writer based in Paris, France
As Israel intensifies its assault on Gaza City, residents describe relentless bombardment, mass forced displacement, in what they see as an Israeli attempt to wipe out and occupy the city.
Israeli forces have stepped up their assault on Gaza City with a sustained wave of heavy airstrikes, relying on extensive aerial bombardment that has reduced entire neighborhoods, residential buildings, and shelters to rubble.
Here’s what Gaza City residents are saying from the ground, their fears, resistance, and the reality they face as their city is being wipe out by Israel:
“This is the last call. Gaza City is being wiped out,” residents share in social media stories using a widely circulated template.
Mira Abu Amer: “We’re sitting here, hearing the Israeli bombs as they destroy the city, block by block.”
Shadi Jabr: “What’s happening is beyond what we can bear, they’ve destroyed Gaza.”
Eman: “People flee from death to death. We are dying in every possible way. May God’s curse be upon this unjust world. For two years of Israeli genocide, we have raised our voices, but no one listens.”
Mona Hasan: “What’s happening in Gaza right now is horrible, relentless shelling and continuous fire belts with no end in sight!
Aya abo Taqiya: “The situation is tragic. We are literally in the middle of the fire, and even now we’re still asking ourselves: ‘But where can we go?’ Staying where we are now is suicide, a death trap. Displacement to the south means exhaustion, a slow drain, a solitary cell.”
Ahmed Hindi:“I swear to you, we are living through the horrors of the Day of Judgment. What we’re enduring is beyond imagination, no human on this earth could bear it. Save whoever’s left of us… we are dying.”
Journalist Hind Khoudary: “I swear to God, people are lying in the streets with nowhere to go… Some don’t have anything with them at all, completely helpless.”
Karam Naji:“Mass displacement and overwhelming crowds, long hours of walking under relentless bombardment, with exhaustion wearing people down in their desperate search for safety.”
Photographer Mahmoud Hamda: “It is a state of profound despair that people have never experienced before,” according to the Quds News Network.
Sixteen ships set sail from Tunisian ports as part of the Global Sumud Fleet for Gaza, a large-scale international flotilla of civilian boats aiming to break Israel’s blockade on the territory and deliver humanitarian aid.
Khaled Boujemaa, a member of the Maghreb contingent of the Global Sumud Flotilla, told Anadolu that 11 of the ships departed from Bizerte Port in northern Tunisia from Saturday evening until late Sunday.
Three ships set sail from Gammarth Port in the capital, as two others left Sidi Bou Said Port near Tunis, Boujemaa said.
On Sunday, spokesperson Ghassan al-Hanshiri also told Anadolu that two ships left from Gammarth Port toward Gaza and “a third Tunisian ship was preparing to depart shortly,” noting that “a total of eight Tunisian ships are currently docked at Gammarth.”
He pointed out that other ships remain in Sidi Bou Said Port, while vessels from Italy and Spain have already departed, and all will meet in the Mediterranean on their way to Gaza.
On Saturday, the very first vessel of the Global Sumud Flotilla departed Tunisia’s Bizerte Port, in addition to 18 boats from Sicily’s Augusta Port, toward Gaza.
According to an Anadolu correspondent and flotilla spokesperson, the flotilla includes dozens of ships and hundreds of participants from 47 Arab and Western countries, among them prominent politicians, artists, and parliamentarians.
The initiative began last month, with ships departing from Barcelona, Spain, and Genoa, Italy. Over the past week, European boats arrived in Tunisian waters to join their Maghreb counterparts before continuing toward Gaza. Organizers described the mission as unprecedented, contrasting it with previous attempts involving single boats that were intercepted by Israel and their passengers deported.
This convoy is the largest of its kind, aiming to challenge the blockade and deliver humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, where famine conditions have taken hold under Israel’s months-long closure of all crossings.
The Israeli army has killed nearly 65,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, in Gaza since October 2023. The relentless bombardment has rendered the enclave uninhabitable and led to starvation and the spread of diseases.
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