Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Responding to Mohamed Salah: Who Killed the ‘Palestinian Pelé’?
Palestine Chronicle Staff
20 Aug 2025
🖨️ Print Article
x
Liverpool star Mohamed Salah rebuked UEFA for not mentioning who killed Suleiman al-Obeid. (Image: Maktoob Media)

Al-Obeid, 41, was killed on Wednesday, August 6, 2025, in an Israeli attack on civilians waiting for humanitarian aid in the southern Gaza Strip.

Originally published in Palestine Chronicle.

When UEFA posted a tribute on Friday, August 8, 2025, to Suleiman al-Obeid — the Gaza football legend known as the “Palestinian Pelé” — they made no mention of who killed him or how he died.

Liverpool star Mohamed Salah, the most high-profile Arab player in the game, appeared to notice. The following day, Saturday, August 9, 2025, he replied to UEFA’s post with a pointed and deliberate question: “Can you tell us how he died, where, and why?”

The comment — a clear rebuke of UEFA’s omission — quickly went viral, drawing nearly one million views in less than 24 hours.

Here is the Palestine Chronicle’s answer to Salah’s question.

Who Killed Suleiman al-Obeid?

Al-Obeid, 41, was killed on Wednesday, August 6, 2025, in an Israeli attack on civilians waiting for humanitarian aid in the southern Gaza Strip, according to the Palestinian Football Association (PFA).

Born in Gaza on March 24, 1984, he began his career with Khadamat al-Shati before moving to Markaz Shabab al-Am’ari in the occupied West Bank, later returning to play for Gaza Sport.

He became a fixture in the Palestinian national team after his 2007 debut, earning 24 caps and scoring twice. His most memorable goal — a spectacular scissor-kick against Yemen — came during the 2010 West Asian Football Federation championship.

During his long career, al-Obeid scored more than 100 goals. His skill, creativity, and leadership earned him the nickname “the Palestinian Pelé,” a nod to the Brazilian great widely regarded as one of the best players in history.

The PFA said al-Obeid was trying to obtain humanitarian aid amid widespread starvation and severe shortages of food and water when he was killed. He is survived by his wife and five children.

The Cost to Palestinian Sports

Al-Obeid’s death came just days before the killing of another Gaza footballer, Mahmoud Rafeh Shaheen of Al-Tuffah Sports Club, who was also targeted by Israeli forces while waiting for aid. Shaheen was the second Al-Tuffah player killed in two weeks, following his teammate Ismail Abu Dan.

The PFA says Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza has devastated Palestinian sports. 

Since October 7, 2023, over 700 athletes and sports officials have been killed, including 322 affiliated with the PFA — among them players, coaches, administrators, referees, and club board members. 

At least 288 sports facilities have been damaged or destroyed, 268 of them in Gaza. The association’s headquarters in Gaza was among the sites hit in Israeli air raids.

As Palestinian journalist and Palestine Chronicle editor Ramzy Baroud wrote in a recent editorial, “In the Palestinian case, the hypocrisy is limitless, though it began long before the Israeli genocide in Gaza. Every Palestinian effort, often backed by Arab, Muslim, and Global South associations, to hold Israel accountable for its apartheid and military occupation has been met with consistent failure. Every time, the response is the same.”

According to Baroudm, FIFA’s “go-to excuse” — that sports and politics should not mix — is “the height of hypocrisy,” given that the organization “seamlessly mixed the two following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.”

Baroud stressed that the “complete moral breakdown on the part of institutions like FIFA” stands in stark contrast to the growing movement of sports fans worldwide, who “refuse to be part of this moral travesty” and are now “unequivocally challenging FIFA’s continued support for Israel.”

With American backing, Israel’s assault on Gaza has killed more than 61,000 Palestinians — most of them women, children, and the elderly — and injured over 152,000, according to Palestinian authorities. 

Thousands remain missing under the rubble. The blockade-induced famine has already claimed the lives of dozens of children and continues to push thousands to the brink of starvation.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

Palestine
sports
Genocide

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


Related Stories

​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
“Don’t Worry Be Happy”: The World Cup as an International Psy-Op
17 June 2026
FIFA uses the World Cup to present the United States as a legitimate nation, but the U.S.
Black Alliance For Peace
Black Alliance for Peace Calls On International Community to Boycott the 2026 World Cup Games Scheduled for the United States
03 June 2026
The World Cup is meant to be a celebration of global unity, not a propaganda shield for a superpower waging genocide abroad and running detenti
Ramzy Baroud
Why Didn’t Iran Put Gaza on the Table? A Difficult Answer
03 June 2026
From Gaza to Tehran, from the politics of resistance to the limits of regional diplomacy, a pressing question has resurfaced amid the 2026 war:
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
ESSAY: The Palestine Question: Background and Solution, Edward Atiyah, 1946
20 May 2026
“It is impossible to make a national home for one people in a country inhabited by another, except by dislodging the latter.”
Black Alliance For Peace
Move the Games: No World Cup for Genocide, Ecocide, or State Thuggery
29 April 2026
A celebration of the most popular sport in the world can't be held in a country that commits genocide, ecocide, and daily state violence.
Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
Regarding Nuclear War Between Israel and Iran
15 April 2026
The political fallout from Trump’s recklessness in West Asia continues around the globe, while some wonder how far the radioactive fa
​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist , Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
What is the 'Left' in the Era of Global Fascism
18 March 2026
There is no coherent and sustained leftist movement at the very moment that U.S. led global fascism is accelerating.
​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
The Light of Palestine Will Lead the Way to Global Liberation
18 March 2026
Black Agenda Report Editor and Columnist, Ajamu Baraka, recently gave a presentation at the 4th International Conference “Palestine: The Nation
Joseph Massad
Who threatens the Arab world: Iran or the US and Israel?
18 March 2026
It should be clear to Gulf Arab states hosting US bases that the American presence does not protect them but instead places them in danger.
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Everything they touch turns to rubble
11 March 2026
Saddest symphony on Earth. Trembling notes, harrowing screams, wails,moans. Same timbre, same tones. Same saline Palestine tears as Sudan.

More Stories


  • ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    Fascism Born in the Colonies, Not Europe
    05 Nov 2025
    Europe refined fascism in its colonies long before bringing the model home.
  • Adele Robichez , José Eduardo Bernardes , Larissa Bohrer
    Brazilian Lawmaker From the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement Demands Investigation of “Planned Massacre” That Left 121 Dead
    05 Nov 2025
    The lawmaker states that Governor Cláudio Castro’s operation was “a massacre carried out in secret” and calls for an independent forensic investigation.
  • Roger McKenzie
    The Devastation in Melissa’s Wake and the ‘new normal’
    05 Nov 2025
    Hurricanes might have natural causes, but the tragedy that follows is entirely human-made and a consequence of capitalist greed, asserts Roger McKenzie.
  • Michael F. Brown
    Trump Ambassador Pick Vows to Pressure South Africa Over Gaza Genocide Case
    05 Nov 2025
    The nomination of an ambassador to South Africa who vows to "pressure" the country over its Gaza case confirms that the U.S. considers the practice of following international law to be a punishable…
  • book
    Dylan Evans
    Book Review: The Sword and the Neck – Reading the al-Aqsa Flood by Yanis Iqbal
    05 Nov 2025
    Operation Al Aqsa Flood was immediately cast as unprovoked terrorism. This review examines a work that dares to reframe it as the inevitable act of a people pushed to the brink.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us