SIXTY-SEVEN IRISH politicians, from both the Dáil and the Seanad, have called on football governing bodies Uefa and Fifa to ban all Israeli teams from competition amid Israel’s ongoing attacks in Gaza. 

They call for Israel’s national team to be barred from international competition, along with the expulsion of Israeli clubs from continental competition. One of those clubs, Maccabi Tel Aviv, is coached by former Ireland international Robbie Keane. They face Olympiakos of Greece in the knockout rounds of the Uefa Conference League tomorrow evening. 

The letter cites the boycott of apartheid South Africa in calling for sporting measures against Israel, viewing it as a “as a measure of pressure.” 

The letter is addressed to Uefa and Fifa and has been signed by all TDs and senators from Sinn Féin, Labour, Social Democrats, and People Before Profit. Several independents have also signed the latter, along with TDs from the Green Party and Aontú. 

The call coincides with this week’s visit to Dublin by Jibril Rajoub, President of the Palestinian Football Association and Chair of the Palestinian Olympic Committee. 

For five months, the world has watched in horror as over 30,000 Palestinians have been brutally murdered by Israeli forces, with hundreds of thousands displaced from their homes, while more than half a million Palestinians now face famine and starvation.

“What we are witnessing is barbaric”, said Chris Andrews TD, Sinn Fen spokesperson on sport. “There is an onus on us as parliamentarians to use every avenue possible to bring pressure to bear on Israel to end the slaughter, and to agree to an immediate and permanent ceasefire.

“There is also an onus on the international community too, and that must include international sporting bodies.

“We saw, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a unanimous and correct approach taken by international sporting organisations to remove Russia, and Russian clubs, from international and European sporting competitions.

“Yet when it comes to the atrocities being carried out day in and day out by Israel against Palestinians, international sporting bodies have continued to look the other way.

“This hypocrisy is reprehensible and must be called out.” 

Twelve football associations in the middle east last month wrote to Fifa, Uefa, and all national associations – including the FAI – to call for Israel to be banned from competition. 

The Israeli FA responded by asking Fifa to “not involve politics with football.” 

Uefa general-secretary Theodore Theodoridis was asked last month whether his organisation plan to exclude Israel from competition, replying that they had no intention of doing so, saying the situation is different from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

“There was no such discussion or such intention from the Uefa administration,” he said. “They are two completely different situations between the two countries. Don’t forget the start of the war, you mentioned Ukraine, and the start of what is happening now, which is regrettable now, in the Middle East.”

The letter, and its full list of signatories, can be read here. 

Written by Gavin Cooney and posted on the42.ie

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