Modern-day Biblical Samson emerges in Gaza

Mohammad Baraka, a 20-year-old, referred to with the Biblical nickname, Samson, has used a rope around his chest to pull a 15-tonne petrol tanker.
“Go Samson go!’’ yelled by the crowd in the Palestinian enclave cheering on him after displaying his potential.
Baraka, who prefers to be known as “The Incredible’’, perhaps because he lacks the original Samson’s long hair, has been putting on displays in his hometown.
In the past two years, he has being earning a reputation as the strongest man of Deir al-Balah in the Gaza Strip.
“I was confident and there was power inside me which I started to develop,’’ said the body-builder and hotel management student.
Traffic came to a halt in Deir al-Balah during the weekend performance as motorists and children on their way to school stopped to watch Baraka perform.
He towed the yellow fuel truck. As an encore, by dragging a water tanker by his teeth for about 50 meters (yards).
Baraka also wowed his audience by lying on his back and having knives dropped on his bare stomach from a height of one meter (three feet).
Some friends used hammers to shatter bricks placed on his chest.
Kamal, Baraka’s father and a philosophy teacher said “his power is hidden inside him, it has nothing to do with muscles and training.’’
He added that some people believed in him in the beginning, others had their doubts – but everyone was amazed.
Mohammad’s power can be related to the Biblical Samson who was an Israelite warrior, as in the Old Testament.
Samson toppled a Philistine temple in Gaza, killing himself and a crowd that had demanded their captured and blinded enemy be brought from prison to entertain them.