By Issam Khalidi

After FIFA President Gianni Infantino rejected calls for an immediate vote on Israel’s exclusion from world football’s governing body, it was predicted that nothing positive would come out of the FIFA Council meeting.

FIFA postponed the meeting until after the Paris Olympics. Then it was postponed again after setting a deadline of August 31 by which both sides – Israel and Palestine – had to submit additional documentation to FIFA.

This came after the Palestinian Football Association (PFA) presented a draft at the FIFA Congress in Bangkok on 17 May.

The draft called for Israel to be held accountable for violating Palestinian sports rights.

In early July, Jibril Rajoub, the president of the Palestinian Football Association, made the following statement on the Palestinian Football Association website:

“We have sent a draft resolution to the FIFA Congress on behalf of Palestinian sport to hold Israel accountable for its violations of Palestinian sport since October 7, 2023. For 15 years, we have repeatedly raised the same concerns with FIFA, only to see them repeatedly referred from one Congress to the next, from one Committee to the next. Now, as our football faces the same existential threat as our Palestinian people, FIFA must make a decision to either sit passively by or uphold its core values ​​and human rights commitments and stand firmly on the right side of history.”

Head of the PFA legal team Katarina Pijetlovic said: “FIFA can either choose to follow its statutes and its commitments in terms of human rights policy or sacrifice its legal provisions and objectives in order to continue to protect Israel from liability. Referring this process to committees and task forces would be a futile exercise aimed at once again delaying the resolution of the long-standing problem. Any decision other than an immediate suspension would set an extremely dangerous precedent.”

A report to FIFA by human rights organisation FairSquare said there were “several reasons to suspend or expel the IFA”, highlighting, among others, “the holding of matches in occupied Palestinian territory, severe and systematic racial discrimination, political interference and the killing of Palestinian players by Israel, as well as the systematic destruction of PFA facilities – most of which predates the Israeli attacks in Gaza, since the Hamas attacks of 7 October 2023”.

The fact is that FIFA is violating its own statutes.

Article 4.1 of the FIFA Statutes states that discrimination of any kind against a country, individual or group of individuals based on race, colour, ethnic, national or social origin, gender, disability, language, religion, political or other opinion, property, birth or other status, sexual orientation or any other reason is strictly prohibited and will be punishable by suspension or expulsion.

According to Articles 72.1 and 2 of the Statute:

1. Players and teams belonging to member associations or provisional members of the confederations may not, without FIFA’s authorisation, play matches or have sporting contacts with players or teams not belonging to member associations or provisional members of the confederations.
2. Member associations and their clubs may not play on the territory of another member association without the consent of that association.

Incidentally, Rajoub was arrested by Israeli forces at the Karama/King Hussein Bridge border crossing with Jordan after his return from the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris.

The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) said Rajoub’s arrest by Israeli security forces at the border was shocking and called for an “immediate solution”.

FIFA believes that its decision to exclude Israel represents a confrontation and challenge to the United States and the Israeli lobby.

FIFA is obviously not prepared for a confrontation like this.

There is no doubt that FIFA is embarking on an adventure that will cause headaches and perhaps even pull the rug out from under its feet if it takes this fundamental decision.

Instead of following principles, it is better to adapt to the hypocritical and duplicitous reality of the West, whose hallmarks are hypocrisy and double standards.

FIFA and Israel accuse the PFA of abusing sport for political purposes.

Firstly, sport and politics are inseparable. There has always been a close connection between sport and the political and social events that surround it. Sport also plays an important role in public discourse on politics.

Second, this claim is nothing but hypocrisy. They both use it when it serves their interests and criticise the PFA when it uses it in a way that harms their interests.

In fact, FIFA’s demand that Israel should not be excluded is in itself a political reason.

It was the Zionists who, since the 1920s, concentrated all efforts to use sport for political and national purposes.

In order to conceal its true nature, the paramilitary organization Betar (whose fans today call for the death of Arabs at football matches) posed as a sports organization in the 1920s, attempting to disguise its true motives.

During the Arab Revolt of 1936, Jewish sports teams maintained close ties with the British to help suppress the uprising.

In addition, several Jewish sports organizations maintain close ties with paramilitary Zionist terrorist organizations such as Hagana, Palmach, Irgun, Lehi and Stern, among others.

In the Gaza Strip, Israel has destroyed sports infrastructure, including sports fields and sports facilities. More than 300 athletes have been killed. Not to mention the destruction of the cultural heritage of the entire sector. This seems to be sufficient reason for sanctions.

Amazingly, FIFA took strict measures against Russia within a short period of time without hesitation or hesitation, while delaying the PFA’s request and inventing explanations for the delay. FIFA’s unconvincing excuses are disgusting, they undermine the principles enshrined in FIFA’s statutes and reflect the hypocrisy of its policies.

In 2014, Western media called for a boycott of the Winter Olympics in Sochi, claiming that Russia was persecuting homosexuals at the time.

Russia and Belarus were excluded from participating in the Olympic Games in Paris under the pretext of the war in Ukraine. Only a limited number of individual athletes from both countries are excluded, provided they prove to be neutral with regard to the war in Ukraine. They also participate under the Olympic flag.

Olympic officials have been asked to exclude Russian and Belarusian athletes from the 2024 Paris Olympic Games after they were accused of violating rules for “neutral” participants.

At the same time, Israel sent a delegation of around 85 athletes to the Olympic Games in Paris. The delegation reportedly included the Israeli flag bearer who signed the bombs before they were used in the military attack on the Gaza Strip.

According to an Associated Press report, IOC President Thomas Bach said on March 6 that Israeli teams and individuals would be allowed to participate in the Paris Games. “There is no question about that,” Bach said.

This is of course beyond question.

This is the logic of double standards that the West applies when dealing with various issues around the world. In recent months, we have seen a strong correlation between hypocrisy and double standards, especially with regard to the genocide in Gaza.

It is permissible to fly the Ukrainian flag in stadiums, but not the Palestinian one. The Russians could be punished, but not Israel.

The West’s love for Israel is like the love of a father for his spoiled child. With a kiss on the cheek, the West allows Israel to do whatever it wants without fear of punishment or risk of reprisal.

There is growing outrage throughout the Middle East and the world, not only over the genocide in Palestine, but also over the blatant hypocrisy and double standards of the West – not to mention the complicity of most Arab regimes.

Although the West boasted to the world that it was a beacon of democracy and human rights, it was unable to maintain this claim when it came to relations with Israel.

This also applies to FIFA. In response, doubts about the credibility of Western politics have been increasingly voiced.

The West buries its head in the sand when it comes to Israel, behaves like an ostrich and ignores international law as if it did not exist.

Even more frustrating is the constant repetition: “No one is above the law.” Except Israel, indeed, no one is above the law (Iran, Syria, Yemen, Russia and many others).

In response to the Palestinian Olympic Committee’s call at the time for the reconstruction of sports facilities destroyed by Israeli bombings in the Gaza Strip, the International Olympic Committee expressed its condolences to the many innocent victims of the ongoing conflict in the region and their families.

However, it did not respond to the request. Neither FIFA nor the International Olympic Committee see Palestine as an occupation, ethnic cleansing or genocide. Rather, they see it as a war between equals.

Those who support Israel, ignore its brutality and do not condemn it when it happens, will find that history will not be kind to them, for the simple reason that complicity and silence are evil. They should therefore stop posing as champions of democracy, human rights, equality and other values ​​of humanity.

Enough is enough.

As a result, we are left with disappointment, disrespect and disgust. Our anger was sparked when we saw how hypocritical the West is and how blindly it supports Israel in pursuing its goals.

– Issam Khalidi is an independent researcher and author of History of Sports in Palestine 1900-1948 (in Arabic), One Hundred Years of Football in Palestine (in Arabic and English), co-editor Football in the Middle East, as well as articles and essays on sports at