Last Friday, Egypt’s national football team made history. The Pharaohs narrowly dispatched Australia to become the second Arab nation to reach the 2026 World Cup round of 16.
Draped in the Palestinian flag, Egyptian coach Hossam Hassan dedicated his squad’s victory to the people of Gaza, many of whom watched live amid the rubble.
Football, for the Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano, was a “mirror of everything”. The beautiful game, he argued, has always reflected the character of the world in which it is played - in both sun and shadow.
This year’s World Cup has been no different, legitimising the emergence of renewed imperial barbarism, while simultaneously reaffirming our common humanity with collective joy.
Just days before the Palestinian people celebrated Egyptian captain Mohamed Salah’s Panenka in Dallas Stadium, Israeli forces fatally shot Saleem al-Ashqar, a 32-year-old Palestinian goalkeeper who was searching for cooking fuel for his pregnant wife.
