Israel will resume its qualification campaign for the FIFA World Cup 2026 this coming weekend amid widespread public protests and growing demands for football’s governing body to sanction the country over its genocide in Gaza, reports Al Jazeera.
Despite the widespread opposition, Israel’s upcoming World Cup qualifiers – against Norway on Saturday and Italy on Tuesday – will go ahead as scheduled after FIFA sidestepped the issue by saying it cannot “solve geopolitical problems”.
Football fans and several experts have accused FIFA and UEFA of double standards over their failure to act against Israel in the two years of its war on Gaza, while swiftly sanctioning Russia following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
More than 30 legal experts have called on UEFA to bar Israel and its clubs from competitions over the atrocities in Gaza.
The letter said banning Israel was “imperative”, citing a report by a United Nations commission of inquiry that concluded that Israel was carrying out a genocide against Palestinians. The letter highlighted the damage that Israel has inflicted on the sport in Gaza – at least 421 Palestinian footballers have been killed since Israel began its military offensive in October 2023 – and said Israel’s bombing campaign was “systematically destroying Gaza’s football infrastructure”.
While a ceasefire deal was agreed between Israel and Hamas in the early hours of Thursday, the war on Gaza has killed at least 67,183 people and wounded 169,841 in more than two years. Almost a third of those killed were children. Thousands more are believed to be buried under the rubble of destroyed buildings.
Last month, Spanish Sports Minister Pilar Alegria said Israeli teams should be banned from sport in the same way that Russian ones were in 2022.
“[Israeli forces] have killed more than 60,000 people; children, babies [are] starving to death, hospitals destroyed,” Alegria told Spanish radio station Cadena SER.
“It is difficult to explain and understand that there is a double standard. It is important that sport, given this situation, takes a position at least similar to what it did against Russia.”
Former France and Manchester United captain Eric Cantona questioned the inaction from football officials while speaking at a fundraising event for Palestine in London on September 17.
“FIFA and UEFA must suspend Israel,” he said. “Clubs everywhere must refuse to play Israeli teams.”
Additionally, hundreds of thousands of football fans and pro-Palestine protesters have called for similar measures against Israel over the past two years.
Fans have used banners, tifos, pitch invasions, stadium walkouts and other means to register their protests inside and outside sport venues.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino has brushed aside the calls by indirectly addressing it as a “geopolitical issue” at the FIFA Council on October 2.
“We are committed to using the power of football to bring people together in a divided world,” Infantino said.
Bd-pratidin English/TR
