Rare whale shark that drew crowds in Israel meets grisly end in Gaza

There had only been two previous sightings of the species in the region, including one in Turkey and one off the coast of Gibraltar.

By JNS

A rare whale shark which thrilled Israeli beachgoers for weeks after making an unusual entry into the Mediterranean was caught and killed on Friday in Gaza.

The whale shark—classified as an endangered species—was first spotted off the Israeli coast last month and made forays up and down the shoreline in Ashdod, Atlit, Bat Yam and Ashkelon before his fatal journey to Gaza last week.

“It was a big surprise when he arrived in Israel, and very exciting to see,” Aviad Scheinin, head of the Marine Apex Predator Lab at the University of Haifa, told JNS on Sunday.

Scheinin, who had tracked its movements as it swam north and south along the Israeli coast, noted that the young whale shark, which measured about five meters long and weighed several tons, likely entered the Mediterranean by accident from the Red Sea via the Suez Canal, swimming close to the Israeli shoreline.

There had only been two previous sightings of the species in the region, including one in Turkey and one off the coast of Gibraltar, on the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula, said Scheinin.

The animal was caught by Palestinian fishermen and butchered, with video circulating on social media showing crowds of Gazan men in Khan Yunis pulling the enormous fish ashore.

Animal rights groups, along with international marine biologists, were notably silent after the images emerged online.

“Regrettably, this doesn’t come as a surprise to me,” said Scheinlin. “They are so captive in their conception that ‘Israel is bad and the Palestinians are good’ that this won’t change anything.”

“It’s very sad,” said Adi Barash, CEO of Sharks in Israel, a nonprofit dedicated to shark conservation, noting that almost every animal that enters Gaza waters—including a rare giant sea turtle killed by Palestinian fishermen two decades ago—never returns.

“Whatever is migratory will not pass through Gaza waters,” she said. “But we can’t expect that in Gaza they will care about preserving nature.”