Kickboxing Champion Badr Hari Condemns Violence in Israel-Hamas Conflict

"It is particularly sad and outrageous to see all these images of violence involving innocent people," reacts Badr Hari, in an Instagram post, while offering his "condolences" to all those who have lost a loved one during this "bloody week". In the eyes of the Moroccan kickboxing champion, the Israeli invasion of Gaza is an "unconscious decision" that will lead to "unprecedented levels of misery and will further push the inhabitants of Gaza into the abyss from which nothing good will come."

"We cannot decently witness the confinement of two million Palestinians in Gaza without feeling sad and angry at this situation," he fumed angrily. According to the UN, 1.1 million people should leave northern Gaza as part of the expected Israeli ground invasion. Describing the Israeli occupation of Palestine as an "apartheid" system "denounced by NGOs for several years", the Moroccan athlete says that Israel has "put in place laws, policies and practices aimed at maintaining a cruel system of control over the Palestinians, and have left them geographically and politically fragmented."

Hari also draws a comparison between Palestine and Ukraine, and wonders why the international community "accepted for the Palestinians what was unacceptable for the Ukrainians: the bombing of civilians, the deprivation of basic needs such as water, electricity or food".

Since the surprise and spectacular attack by the Palestinian Islamic movement Hamas and Israel’s retaliation, at least 2,329 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza and 9,024 others have been injured, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health. As for the number of deaths in the Hamas-controlled enclave, it has risen to 2,215 dead, including 724 children, according to a latest report from the local authorities on Friday evening.