The bullet that tore into Alaa al-Dali felt more like a grenade than a tiny bit of metal, smashing apart 22cm of his right leg bone. For years, the pro-cyclist biked up and down the Gaza Strip, hoping one day to enter the Olympic Games waving the Palestinian flag. In 2018, this dream seemed closer than ever before.
Alaa, then 21, qualified for the Asian Games – but Palestinians cannot leave the coastal enclave without a special permit granted by Israel . With his career up in the air, Alaa knew he had to take part in the Great Return March – a string of protests along the border between Gaza and Israel – on March 30, 2018. ‘I decided to participate in the protests on my bicycle and in full cycling gear to call for my right of return as an athlete unable to leave Gaza,’ Alaa, now 27, told Metro.
co.uk. ‘The Israeli occupation responded to my demands with brutality and by shooting at me with an explosive bullet, leading to the amputation of my leg.
’ According to a UN report , Israeli forces shot Alaa as he stood beside his bike about 300m away from the barbed-wire fence in Rafah. He was just ‘watching the demonstration’, the report says. ‘I felt defeated because not only did I lose my leg – such a big part of my body – but I also effectively lost my ability to play my sport and fulfil my dream of raising the Palestinian flag on the world stage,’ Alaa added.
‘I lost my job and my means of earning a living wage. It destroyed me; I felt as though I had l.
