Tunisian Student Dies While Raising Palestinian Flag in Solidarity with Gaza
21-year-old Fares Khaled tragically falls from school rooftop while attempting to hoist Palestine’s flag amid growing outrage over Israeli war crimes in Gaza.
Watan-A tragic incident occurred at the Higher School of Design Sciences and Technologies in Denden, located in Manouba Governorate, Tunisia, where a 21-year-old student died after falling from the top of a building while attempting to raise the Palestinian flag.
The spokesperson for the Manouba Court of First Instance confirmed that Tunisian civil protection and local security forces arrived at the scene after a school guard discovered the student’s body around 7 a.m. and reported the incident.
Authorities, including a representative of the public prosecutor’s office and specialized security units, inspected the body and launched an investigation into the circumstances of the accident. According to preliminary findings, the student fell from the building, which led to his death.
Tunisian Student Dies While Raising Palestinian Flag in Solidarity with Gaza
A security source told the Tunisian News Agency (TAP) that surveillance footage showed the accident occurred on Sunday evening after 8 p.m., as the student was on top of a tall building—approximately three stories high—within the school garden. He slipped and fell while attempting to hoist the Palestinian flag.
Tunisian media identified the student as Fares Khaled.
The student’s act of raising the Palestinian flag comes amid growing outrage across the Arab world and globally over the ongoing Israeli war on Gaza, which has been widely condemned as a genocidal campaign.
Since October 7, 2023, Israel has conducted relentless bombardments on the Gaza Strip, resulting in over 165,000 Palestinians killed or wounded, the vast majority being women and children. Entire neighborhoods have been leveled, hospitals targeted, and basic infrastructure like water, electricity, and sanitation destroyed. Over 10,000 people remain missing, many presumed buried under the rubble.
Students, activists, and ordinary citizens in Tunisia and other countries have been holding demonstrations and symbolic gestures—such as raising the Palestinian flag—to express solidarity with Gaza and to condemn Israel’s crimes, including the targeting of journalists, medical personnel, and UN facilities.
Fares Khaled’s death tragically underscores how deeply personal and emotional the Palestinian cause is for many youth across the region, who see Gaza not just as a political issue, but as a humanitarian and moral struggle demanding solidarity.
