Saleem Al-Ashqar, 32-year-old Palestinian goalkeeper, has been killed by Israel in Gaza during an attack earlier this week, as announced by the Palestinian Football Association (PFA) (via Middle East Monitor).
According to some reports, he was shot by a sniper when trying to get some water for his wife, who is pregnant.
Al-Ashqar played for Khadamat Khan Younis, and had been married five months ago, expecting his first child. The PFA confirmed he died by the Israeli army earlier this week, and joins a list of more than 1,000 Palestinian athletes killed by Israel since the genocidal war began in October 2023, with more than 73,000 killed since then.
Club Deportivo Palestino, a football club founded in 1920 by the Palestinian community in Chile (the country with the largest Palestinian population outside of the Arab world, estimated to have nearly half a million people in a country with 20.5 million people), sent a statement after his passing. The club plays in the Chilean first division, winning league titles in 1955 and 1978 and the Copa Chile in 2018.
