2024-03-03 03:17:58
Australian cricketer Usman Khawaja wanted to spread the message of peace against Israel’s attack on Palestine. He used his own bat, pad and shoes. Khawaja, who faced repeated setbacks, once again faced a bitter experience. He was forced to remove the dove sticker from the bat.
The dove has been seen as a symbol of peace since ancient times. Over time, it started to be used as a symbol of human rights. In this case, the strict rules of the ICC, without permission, players and match officials cannot use any clothing and equipment with messages.
The incident happened on the morning of the third day of the New Zealand-Australia Test in Wellington. Midway through their second innings, when Khawaja’s bat had a problem, he sent for a new bat. A teammate brought several new bats and Khawaja selected one of them. As there was a dove sticker on it, he was forced to remove the sticker in the face of the umpires’ obstruction.
Earlier, Khawaja wanted to play in shoes with slogans in the first Test of the series in Perth to protest the brutality of the Israeli forces on Palestinians during the Test series against Pakistan in December last year. The shoes read ‘Freedom is a human right’ and ‘All lives matter’.
But the ICC did not allow him to play with this slogan. Then Khawaja took another route. Later, wearing black armbands, he came down to play. ICC also objected to this. Auji opener did not give up. This time, he wanted to play the Boxing Day Test by putting a peace symbol sticker on his bat and shoes. But ICC did not give that permission to Khawaja.