MARDAN: Legendary cricketers Hashim Amla and Babar Azam were among top players from South Africa, Pakistan, India, England and the West Indies to express solidarity with Palestinians after more than a hundred civilians were killed in Israeli strikes since Monday.
It began with Israeli forces storming the Al-Aqsa Mosque – Islam's third holiest site – on Friday last week, attacking Palestinian worshippers using rubber-coated steel bullets, stun grenades and tear gas.
“Prayers for the people of Palestine. We just have to be human to stand up for humanity,” Pakistani captain Babar Azam, who recently became the top-ranked one-day batsman in international cricket and was declared ICC’s player for April, tweeted on Tuesday.
A day later, on Wednesday, test cricketer and former skipper Azhar Ali also denounced “the unjust acts of terrorism and cruelty happening in Palestine", tweeting that they were "totally unacceptable.”
“Our hearts bleed for our Muslim brothers & sisters. In the final days of this Holy Month of Ramadan, I request everyone to pray for the situation in Palestine #WeStandWithPalestine,” he said.
Tensions escalated in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood of East Jerusalem last week after Israeli forces tried to evict an entire Palestinian community and hand over their properties to ultra-extreme Jewish settlers.
According to the health ministry in Gaza, 103 Palestinians, including 27 children and 11 women, were killed, and 580 were wounded in the Israeli attacks in the days that followed.
Drawing attention to the atrocities committed against children, Afghanistan’s bowler Rashid Khan said: "No crime is more heinous than the killing of a child. I want these children to wake up to the sound of birds & not bombs."
"As an athlete who plays cricket around the world, I want to see this world out of war. I can’t watch people being killed in #Afghanistan & #Palestine," he added.
Meanwhile, former West Indian captain Darren Sammy, who won the T-20 World Cup for his nation in 2016, questioned: “why it is so difficult to treat others as you would want to be treated, or even better yet, treat each others as human beings. #PrayForPalestine”.
English bowler Saqib Mahmood also tweeted in support of Palestine, using a photo of Al-Aqsa mosque in his post.
“Breaks my heart seeing what has happened here if you don’t know it’s because mainstream media won’t report the suffering of Muslims in that part of the world," he said.
South African cricketer George Linde highlighted the "absloutely horrible and terrible scenes" emerging from Palestine.
“It is very sad to see what is happening in Palestine. Which direction this world going to. No tolerance with humans .#PrayForPalestine," he tweeted.
His teammate, Tabraiz Shamsi, used hashtags #PrayForPalestine #StopApartheidIsrael
#SavePalestine #SaveSheikhJarrah in his Twitter post, saying: “You cannot pick and chose whose human rights matters more.”
Pakistani batsman Fakhar Zaman highlighted the "selective justice" being meted out, highlighting "how unfair the world had become".
“ISRAELI forces continue to attack innocent worshipers at #AlAqsa with illegal confiscation of lands evicting #Palestinians from their homes with all illegal measures to undermine prospects for global peace,” Zaman tweeted on Tuesday.
Other Pakistani cricketers Shan Masood and Shadab Khan and Indian all-rounder Irfan Pathan also voiced opposition against Israel in various tweets.
Meanwhile, in a lengthy Instagram post, South African cricketing giant, Hashim Amla, drew comparisons to former South African leader Nelson Mandela's struggle against apartheid, reminding people of Mandela's unstinting support for the people of Palestine throughout his life.
Mandela had once said South Africa's struggle was "incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians".