FIFA President's Controversial Proposal

With the globe transfixed by the World Cup, FIFA president Gianni Infantino has an extraordinary

proposal that an upcoming youth tournament kick off with a match between Israeli and

Palestinian under-15 teams.

Let's work together to give hope to the children.

It follows his ham-fisted attempt at the FIFA conference in May

to get the Palestinian and Israeli delegates to shake hands.

The Palestinian delegate refused,

later saying, I cannot shake the hand of someone the Israelis have brought

to whitewash their fascism and genocide.

To understand just how crass and fatuous Infantino's suggestion is,

let's take a look at what the Israelis have done to Palestinian footballers in recent years.

Israel has destroyed around 285 sports facilities in Gaza.

Yarmouk Stadium, older than the Israeli state is.

itself, was levelled and converted into a detention and torture site, now serving as

a camp for thousands of displaced Palestinians.

Israel has slaughtered more than 1,000 members of Gaza's sports community, including 565

footballers, coaches and referees.

Nearly 6,000 survivors, including hundreds of athletes, have lost limbs due to an apparent

shoot to maim policy that long predates October 7th.

The Palestinian Amputee Football Association was founded in 2018, after Israel disabled

thousands of young people in the Great March of Return protests.

And they have just established the first all-girls amputee team in Gaza.

Israeli settlers work in tandem with the military to disrupt grassroots sports.

Footage emerged earlier this year of a set

a gang storming a children's football match in the occupied West Bank.

Promising athletes not killed or maimed are thrown in Israeli jails without due process,

including Mahmoud Sarsak, who was held and tortured for two years without trial, before

undertaking a 92-day hunger strike.

More recently, Israel detained Rand Halawani and Natalie Abudieh, who both played for the

national women's team, accusing them, without evidence, of terrorist-related activity.

The head of the Palestine Football Association's medical department and renowned orthopaedic

surgeon Dr. Adnan al-Bush was killed in an Israeli prison in 2023, having apparently

been sexually tortured.

The Palestinians have appealed to FIFA to suspend Israel,

just as the Russians were suspended following the invasion of Ukraine.

FIFA's own disciplinary committee states that Israel has brought football into disrepute

by practicing a de facto system of segregation.

But FIFA has refused to suspend Israel.

Instead, it announced a $50 million partnership with Trump's Board of Peace

to build football infrastructure atop the rubble of decimated Gaza.

In a world where conflict has silenced playgrounds and broken routines,

there is one language that still unites hearts.

Football.

If Infantino really wants Palestinians to play football with Israelis,

perhaps he could persuade the Israelis to stop mutilating, torturing and killing them first.

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