By Dave Zirin - When Israeli sports teams travel to Europe, they are often met with protest. Palestinian solidarity and human rights organizations, such as Red Card Israeli Apartheid, have argued that such spectacles “normalize” the military occupation suffered by Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. They also argue that it is fantasy to pretend that these games do not carry a strong political as well as symbolic weight. Now the specter of a pro-Palestinian protest at an Israeli sporting event is coming to the United States. This will happen next month when the most celebrated basketball team in Israel’s history, Maccabi Tel-Aviv, will return to the United States and play two NBA preseason games against the Brooklyn Nets and Cleveland Cavaliers. As Euroleague Champions, this will be the fifth time in nine years that Maccabi has played in the United States. But coming on the heels of the summer bombardment of Gaza, there are many activists in New York City arguing that it can no lo
Until now, the besieged Gaza Strip has stayed free of the novel coronavirus spreading across the world. As the Gaza Strip has been under a stringent Israeli-led blockade for nearly 13 years, the spread of the coronavirus - officially known as COVID-19 - has become the topic of discussion for many Palestinians, with some joking that the blockade was preventing them from being exposed.But as authorities in the coastal Palestinian enclave gear up to contain any potential outbreak, serious questions have arisen about the risks and implications of such a scenario. But given its already difficult humanitarian situation and high population density, an outbreak in the Gaza Strip could prove to be catastrophic, health officials have warned. "If the virus enters Gaza and spreads, it will get out of hand," Gaza Ministry of Health spokesperson Majdi Thuhair told Middle East Eye, as he explained that a severe shortage of resources and personnel would make it near impossible