RIDE BEYOND LIMITS SUNBIRD ASCENDING

After losing a leg, Mohammed Abu Asfour sought solace in cycling - and now represents Palestine on the world stage

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That Gaza has the world’s largest population of amputees has become a grimly renowned statistic. But nobody is just a statistic — every life, and every limb, has a story. One such story is that of Mohammed Abu Asfour, a Palestinian paracyclist from Gaza, who lost a limb in a tragically familiar way. Taking part in a protest at the border fence between Gaza and Gaza and Israel on 18 January 2019, Asfour was shot in the right leg by an Israeli sniper. “I spent 18 days in Gaza hospitals,” he tells me via a video call from Belgium, where he now lives. “Without a transfer abroad, the wound got infected, and the leg had to be amputated.”

Like most amputees, Asfour faced depression and mental health difficulties as he adapted to his changed body, but he also found hitherto unknown reserves of strength. The Gaza Sunbirds para-cycling team had not yet been formed, but later in 2019 Asfour met Alaa al-Dali, who would go on to become the Sunbirds team captain. Al-Dali had been shot in a similar fashion in 2018, and observed other riders refusing to let amputation stop them from cycling. Asfour credits this meeting with a rekindled hope. “That moment made me realise I could ride again and start dreaming big.”

Palestine to Ostend

Now 25, Asfour is currently living in Liège, Belgium, having been evacuated last year with a handful of other Sunbirds team-mates as Israeli strikes on Gaza escalated. Asfour is originally from Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, and began cycling as a child. “I had a normal childhood,” he says, “I first rode a bike aged six — just for normal things, to get to school or the grocery shop. Racing professionally never crossed my mind back then.”