{"id":44313,"date":"2025-08-04T23:47:12","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T23:47:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/44313\/"},"modified":"2025-08-04T23:47:12","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T23:47:12","slug":"the-gym-rat-in-gaza-mohamed-hatem-talks-fitness-in-palestine-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/44313\/","title":{"rendered":"The ‘Gym Rat in Gaza’, Mohamed Hatem, Talks Fitness in Palestine"},"content":{"rendered":"

MOHAMMED HATEM\u2019S POSTS have all the signifiers of self-produced fitness influencer content: front-facing camera confessionals, plenty of workout footage, and meals broken down by macros. He takes part in viral trends, like when he created his own version<\/a> of influencer Ashton Hall\u2019s now-infamous morning routine<\/a> video. He joked about how much cheap workout clothes would cost with unpredictable tariffs<\/a>. Hatem even has a catchphrase he uses to start every video: \u201cLet\u2019s get it.\u201d
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Plenty of aspirationally fit young men around the world have set out to make it big on the internet with a smartphone and basic video production software. The difference is that Hatem hasn\u2019t stepped foot in a gym in months. He struggles to eat enough to maintain his sinewy frame, let alone make gains. Sometimes, his videos are punctuated by the sound of gunfire and bombs. He\u2019s a 19-year-old Palestinian kid living in Gaza, posting on Instagram with the handle @gym_rat_in_gaza<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Hatem\u2019s workout origin story is a familiar one: He was a skinny kid looking for a way to build up his body and bolster self-confidence. \u201cMy first inspiration to fitness was a personal feeling of wanting to get better, you know, be better,\u201d he says, recalling that he weighed around 40 kilograms (roughly 100 pounds) as a young teen when he started working out in 2022. \u201cOne of the aspects of my life that I really wanted to improve was my physical health, my physical strength, and appearance.\u201d Researching how to accomplish this led him to the world of online bodybuilding. He cites figures like Jeff Nippard, Sam Sulek, and Chris Bumstead as sparking his interest at the time.
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He was just two weeks into his studies in business administration at the Khan Yunis campus of Al Aqsa University, in the south of Gaza, when Israel began its bombardment. He shifted to an online program through the University of Palestine, but as conditions around him worsened, he had to put his education on hold. <\/p>\n

Hatem needed a new focus while he wasn\u2019t in school. Before, he had been extremely disciplined in the gym\u2014\u201dI was locked in back then\u201d\u2014so he shifted his approach to workouts, just as he and his family adjusted to life without reliable access to basic essentials. <\/p>\n

\u201cJust a few days before I started documenting my journey, I got the news that my house was destroyed,\u201d he recalls. \u201cDespite all of this going on, I was still working out every day.\u201d So he began recording his daily sessions in earnest. He made a series for the first 100 days to share his progress\u2014culminating in an impressive muscle transformation<\/a> by October 2024, even as his access to the gym was increasingly inconsistent and food was becoming scarce. Then, he kept posting. <\/p>\n

\u201cI can figure out a way to work out, no matter where you put me, no matter where I go, no matter what place I’m staying in, I’m gonna find two or three exercises that I can do,\u201d he says. In Hatem\u2019s videos, viewers see how he\u2019s had to lean on ingenuity. One clip<\/a>, responding to a prompt asking \u201cWhat\u2019s the craziest place you\u2019ve worked out in?\u201d shows the different platforms he\u2019s used for pullups, with footage of him hanging from door frames and exposed rebar in the rubble of a bombed-out building. <\/p>\n

\u201cI would find a little edge somewhere, and that would be my pull up bar. I would find a water gallon, and that’s my dumbbells. It\u2019s just about looking around and seeing what stuff has a progressive overload<\/a> potential.\u201d<\/p>\n

In one Instagram Reel<\/a>, Hatem mentions bodybuilder Jeff Nippard as he performs deficit pushups<\/a> using a pair of water jugs as platforms, stretching his chest muscles with the extended range of motion, his nose nearly touching the concrete floor. Turn on the audio, and you can hear him straining to press himself up from the bottom position. You can also hear the loud buzz of what sounds like a drone. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere’s no place for excuses,\u201d he says, echoing a common refrain heard in the fitness world. \u201cWhatever you’re going through, there’s always room for improvement, and you\u2019ve got to take that.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a video<\/a> posted in May, he prepares a meal and shows a 25 kg sack of flour. He asks viewers to guess how expensive it was. After the reveal\u2014$180\u2014he jokes: \u201cThis should be put in a museum as the most expensive bag of flour in history.\u201d <\/p>\n

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Mohamed Hatem<\/p>\n

In a reel<\/a> from July, he\u2019s back at it on the water jugs. He stops, stands up, and the camera switches to first person. The screen darkens, simulating a blackout. The caption reads \u201cPOV: you decided to work out but forgot you\u2019re in GAZA (I had 200 calories so far)\u201d.
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Besides his family\u2019s home, Hatem says that his grandmother\u2019s house has been destroyed, too. They\u2019ve been displaced 13 times. He says he\u2019s currently living in a tent on the beach in Khan Yunis, with his parents and two younger brothers. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe situation with the food,\u201d he says, \u201cit\u2019s no secret that it\u2019s the toughest it\u2019s ever been<\/a>.\u201d Naturally, this has impacted his training. \u201cNormal people, they don’t look at the nutrition thing, as calories and protein and carbohydrates and stuff\u2014they just look at it as fuel for the day,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd I would say, everyone around me has taken the same hit that I have taken.\u201d He\u2019s especially concerned for those around him who aren\u2019t healthy would-be bodybuilders\u2014like his grandmother, a cancer survivor. On his Instagram<\/a>, he regularly posts links to fundraisers to help his family and other Gazans buy food. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you look at starvation physiology, the severe caloric restriction that usually happens with famine, there’s going to be a lot of muscle loss,\u201d says MH Advisor Dezi Abeyta, RDN<\/a>. \u201cThere’s going to be some weakness, suppressed immune function.\u201d <\/p>\n

Hatem has approached the challenges just as he has with those that came before: from a fitness mindset. \u201cA rule that I\u2019ve been following [for workouts] since all this started here in Gaza is: Sacrifice the volume, keep the intensity,\u201d he says in a post<\/a>. This is an approach taken by bodybuilders, who restrict calories to achieve extremely low body fat before a competition\u2014but it\u2019s not necessarily healthy, especially for extended periods. \u201cWhen we look at severe malnutrition and muscle wasting and the types of severe caloric restriction, generally speaking, these have to be short term.\u201d Abeyta says. \u201cWe could be looking at electrolyte imbalances, cardiac issues, and respiratory distress. These are all symptoms that we want to watch out for when someone is under a severe calorie restriction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hatem\u2019s profile has caught on; he currently has nearly 350,000 Instagram followers, and his story has been covered by Al Jazeera<\/a> and MSNBC\u2019s Chris Hayes<\/a>, among others. In a December interview<\/a> with WBUR Here & Now host Deepa Fernandes, he said:<\/p>\n

\u201cI get a lot of messages from people telling me that they started going to the gym because of watching me and they got motivated by my journey and my content to start their own fitness journey. It makes me feel really proud and honored to be the reason for all of this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even with the uncertainty, Hatem has high hopes for the future. \u201cWhenever things are pretty stable again, I’m gonna be back to it, Inshallah,\u201d he says of his university studies. He hopes to shift his focus to subjects that will help him in his fledgling online fitness coaching career\u2014like nutrition. This year, he started things up with five clients, most of them based in Europe. In May, he poked fun<\/a> at the fact that he\u2019s a coach who\u2019s not always able to practice what he preaches, given he\u2019s rarely able to meet his daily protein goal. Still, he remains excited by the thought of scaling up his business.
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When it comes to reflecting on his efforts, Mohammed Hatem zooms out. \u201cSo for my journey, it’s mostly to motivate people to be a better version of themselves\u2014and to also show that us Gazans would never give up on our dreams, no matter how tough the conditions are, no matter how tough the circumstances are.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you read about us in the news, they would be like, a Gazan was this, this and that,\u201d he says. \u201cBut when it comes to thinking about a Gazan that is going on a fitness journey and has goals just like everyone else\u2026 it gives a feeling of connection between us.\u201d<\/p>\n

And his posts, etched onto the internet for as long as Meta and Google allow? \u201cWhen I look back at it, that’s a recap of the entire year that I went through with all the conditions, all the displacement, the nutrition, the training\u2014everything is just there. And then you’re going to see the results of it later on.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"Headshot<\/p>\n

Brett Williams, NASM-CPT, PES, a senior editor at Men’s Health, is a certified trainer and former pro football player and tech reporter. You can find his work elsewhere at Mashable, Thrillist, and other outlets.<\/p>\n