Balls of fury

IRELAND V ISRAEL

“The number 75 is significant,” replied a calmly indignant Brian Kerr, former manager of the Republic of Ireland, when asked for his reaction to the decision by the general assembly of the Football Association of Ireland (FAI) to go ahead with their Nations League matches against Israel. The vote at an EGM on July 8 was carried by 75 votes to 32, and as Kerr told Virgin Media Sport: “There’s been about 75,000 people been killed by the Israelis. It’s kind of a thousand [deaths] for each vote.”

The previous November, the FAI agreed to submit Bohemian FC’s motion to UEFA to ban Israel and its clubs from its competitions. It argued that the Israelis had “breached two separate provisions of UEFA’s statutes by organising clubs in occupied Palestinian territories without the consent of the Palestinian FA” and “allegedly failing to enforce an effective anti-racism policy”.

The proposal drew threats from US Republican senator Lindsey Graham: “If these attacks against Israel continue, I will do everything in my power to make those who participate in this effort to marginalise Israel in sports, and elsewhere, pay a heavy price when it comes to access to the American economy.” UEFA predictably sidestepped the motion.

Three months later, the FAI found itself with a bigger headache: the Nations League draw pitted Ireland against Israel. Immediately, a concerted campaign to get the FAI to boycott the games begun.

“I don’t see a difference between FIFA and UEFA banning Russia and not Israel,” said coach Heimir Hallgrimsson. Kerr suggested that the FAI should “show a real bit of balls” and refuse to play. Dublin-born Cape Verdean defender Pico Lopes added: “Some things are bigger than football and this is definitely one of them.” The fan organisation Irish Football Supporters Partnership’s own survey returned 75.6 per cent of respondents wanting the games cancelled.

After a game with Qatar in May was briefly stopped by tennis balls being thrown onto the pitch in protest at the matches, the FAI decided to play their home fixture outside Ireland without spectators, fearing another protest would entail a ground closure. They have moved the match to Backa Topola in a largely Hungarian enclave in Serbia where the local club is connected to former Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban. The Palestinian FA were hardly impressed – “Any interpretation suggesting the PFA has given its blessing to the fixture does not accurately reflect our position” – although they thanked the FAI for “the principled positions taken… in support of the rights of the Palestinian people and Palestinian athletes.”

Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 and was rightly evicted from footballing competition. Meanwhile, Israel invades Lebanon following a two-year genocidal campaign against Palestinians, and it’s business as usual. FIFA president Gianni Infantino dismissed the 21,000 children killed in both Gaza and the West Bank in the past three years alone by Israel in tones reminiscent of his predecessor Stanley Rous’s opposition to South Africa being banned in the 1960s, claiming: “FIFA cannot solve geopolitical problems.” Keeping politics out of football entails ignoring the 567 Palestinian footballers that have so far been killed by Israel since 2023, the latest being a 32-year-old goalkeeper, Saleem al-Ashqar of Khadamat Khan Younis.

As an Asian state, Israel was kicked out in 1974 of the AFC it co-founded. It then spent the next two decades playing World Cup qualifiers against Oceanic or South American opposition. FIFA’s solution to Israel’s then “geopolitical” problem was to move it to UEFA in 1991 which came to be seen as a pragmatic move.

The FAI want Israel suspended from international football but feel that they have done their bit. Simply refusing to play Israel would set a precedent for all its teams in future. Also complicating matters is the Irish co-hosting the next European Championship in 2028 , for which Israel could potentially qualify. Should Ireland withdraw from the fixtures, Israel would pick up six points and move closer to the Nations League top tier; nothing would change for the Palestinians.

Ireland’s other Nations League rivals, Austria and Kosovo, have declined to comment. Clearly a move to make Israel a footballing pariah will require more than one country’s refusal to engage them. Hallgrimsson concedes this, and now just wants to get on with the job: “I think the best answer for us is just to win this game, to win this war against them. That would be a perfect answer from my end. Other decisions are not made by us.” Patrick Redmond