A Ghanaian soccer player celebrated his team’s upset 2-0 victory over the Czech Republic Saturday by waving a small Israeli flag (he plays professionally for an Israeli soccer team).
Israel’s supposedly friendly neighbors in Egypt, who had previously been rooting for their fellow Africans, responded with anger. The Al-Masry al-Yom newspaper carried the following bold red headline on its frontpage Monday:
“Egyptians supported the Ghanaian team all the way until the 82nd minute, and regretted it after the Israeli flag (waving)”
The accompanying article started thus:
“As soon as the referee blew his whistle to start the match, Egyptians were out enthusiastically, almost hysterically supporting Ghana, until defender John Paintsil took out the Israeli flag.”
Some papers predictably accused Paintsil of being a Mossad agent, while popular sports commentator Alaa Sadek wrote in the Al-Akhbar that Paintsil was simply “ignorant and stupid.”
Some friends.
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5 comments so far ↓
1 frank // Jun 20, 2006 at 2:35 pm
destroy saudi arabia and iran; crush the intifada scumbags and wipe iran off the map
2 david cordell // Jun 20, 2006 at 8:11 pm
it is amazing how often someone will be for you until they find out you are 1. a christian 2. jewish 3.or both
then their try colors come out and you see them for who they are and the hatred that they have in them . such a shame that this athlete is cheered then booed for one little flag that they hate so much
3 tom jones // Jun 22, 2006 at 4:44 am
Don’t worry about it people. Its not like they are being persecuted for the name of Christ. So what if someone boos the flag, any flag? It happens to the USA all the time. Get over it.
4 peter // Jun 25, 2006 at 3:57 am
so pathetic that the arabs have to moan and complain every time anything good happens for israel. scumbags
5 amnaye // Jun 28, 2006 at 4:27 pm
We, Moroccans, saw it from a different angle. We thought the player was ignorant and stupid because he waved a flag other than his country’s. We simply can’t imagine ElGuerouge beating a world record and waving a French (or whatever) flag. Everybody knows that 33%of our culture is Jewish. Our parents still remenmber their jewish neighbours and friends who had chosen to leave Morocco for Israel.
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