It took the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) only a few days to ban Russia from competing in their leagues after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It was a swift step to hold an oppressor state accountable.
The ban immediately stopped Russia exerting cultural influence through the medium of the world’s most beloved sport.
UEFA and FIFA’s treatment of Israeli football stands in stark contrast. Two years into Israel’s genocidal war on Palestine, the Israeli national team and its domestic teams continue to play on the international stage.
The hypocrisy reeks and its consequences are immense.
Craig Mokhiber, former director for the New York office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, said allowing a country that commits genocide to participate in sports allows for its “normalisation”.
By continuing to play the world game on the world stage, Israel is using a powerful cultural front to seek to normalise and justify its genocidal actions.
Mokhiber said UEFA and FIFA allowing this “is an act of complicity”.
Amnesty International joined the calls to suspend Israel, signing a letter last week addressed to the maligned presidents of UEFA and FIFA, Aleksander Ceferin and Gianni Infantino.
It reads: “As I write, Israel continues to perpetrate genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, with over 800 athletes, players and sports officials among over 65,000 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in a deliberate campaign of wholesale devastation, forced displacement and starvation of civilians intended to destroy Palestinians in Gaza.
“The recent UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory is just the latest body to conclude that Israel is committing genocide, just as Amnesty concluded in December 2024.”
Every match Israel plays on the world stage is a propaganda victory for a genocidal regime. While Maccabi Tel Aviv players are allowed to kick and chase a football around UEFA’s Europa League — and travel across Europe — Palestinian footballers and future players are being massacred.
The double standards are cruel and glaring — and are adding to the clarion calls for Israel to be banned.
Israeli fans have been known to dress up football hooliganism in their own brand of violent Zionism. They have been regularly documented yelling racist chants, unfurling banners of soldiers on destroyed Palestinian land and glorifying genocide; all working to erode the line between supporter pride and state violence.
During a Europa League match between Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv in Amsterdam last year, hundreds of Israeli fans harassed Arab residents, ripped down Palestinian flags, and chanted “No children left in Gaza” in the city squares.
In light of this, Maccabi fans have been banned from travelling to Birmingham for its match against Aston Villa on November 7. The ban was made by Birmingham’s Safety Advisory Group and decided after an intelligence assessment was conducted by West Midlands Police.
Dutch police passed on information that Maccabi fans shouted racist taunts and randomly attacked Muslim residents while in Amsterdam.
Emblazoned on football billboards across the world are words of solidarity for the victims of racism — so why the exception for Israel?
Football — the great uniter — has become, for Israel, something darker: a platform for racism, militarism and propaganda.
The Amnesty letter continues: “Football cannot be separated from Israel’s unlawful occupation. There are at least six teams based in settlements in the OPT playing in Israeli leagues. The Israeli Football Association (IFA) is thus contributing to these violations of international law in the OPT, and their associated human rights abuses, by providing business opportunities and sports and cultural activities contributing to the sustainability of the settlements in the unlawfully occupied territory.
“The participation of teams from illegal settlements in Israeli leagues is not only in violation of international law, but also of FIFA’s own statues. Article 64.2 of FIFA’s statutes says that ‘Member associations and their clubs may not play on the territory of another member association without the latter’s approval.’”
Football — with its ability to stir passion and rouse crowds — is a vehicle for cultural power. Giving the Israeli national and domestic teams — including those on occupied territory — a platform on the global stage is sports washing of the greatest magnitude.
Israel, a genocidal regime with its Zionist, colonial philosophy, cannot be allowed to continue to participate in international football, nor its fans permitted to celebrate genocide.