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July 25, 2024 - 4:15pm
Like every Olympic Games, the run up to Paris 2024 has been beset by controversies. Critics have challenged its green credentials, pointed out the large-scale removal of homeless people from the city, and complained about the immense disruption to everyday life that the security regime has imposed. All of these, it seems, will be eclipsed by the issue of Israel’s participation in the Games.
For the moment, the precise legal status of Israel’s pulverisation of Gaza has yet to be settled, but supporters of the Palestinian cause argue that if Russia and Belarus can be excluded for breaking international law, then so should Israel. This week, the Palestinian Olympic Committee (POC) called for Israel’s exclusion on the grounds that it was breaking the Olympic Truce, and pro-Palestinian groups in France have been demonstrating and promising protests at events.
Not surprisingly the French security authorities deemed Israel’s game against Mali in the men’s football tournament to be “high risk” and deployed 1,000 troops around the Parc des Princes for the occasion. In truth they might have been more usefully employed at the Morocco vs. Argentina game in Saint-Etienne where Moroccan fans invaded the pitch and threw a fusillade of objects at the Argentinian players after they scored a disputed and ultimately cancelled last-minute equaliser. By contrast, the crowd at the Parc des Princes was less volatile, if more pointed.
The Israeli national anthem was drowned out by booing, Palestinian flags were unveiled across the stadium, and some protestors came equipped with large watermelons, which given their red/green/black colours, have served as cipher for the former. At the start of the match, 13 masked protestors lined up at the front of one of the stands in white t-shirts which read “FREE PALESTINE”.
There will, no doubt, be more of this to come, but the French organisers and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) will not be censuring Israel anytime soon. Indeed, IOC President Thomas Bach has gone so far as to suggest that Olympic participation is a kind of balm for the conflict. He said: “We have two national Olympic committees (NOCs). Both have been living in peaceful coexistence. The Olympic Games are a competition not between countries but between athletes.” Bach, however, is living in a reality of his own making. In the one that Palestinians occupy there is no peaceful co-existence in sport. In fact, sport is just another arena for conflict. And in football in particular, they argue that Israel has systematically broken international law since well before the current conflict.
Since 2013, the Palestine Football Association (PFA) has been calling for Fifa to exclude Israel from international competition, arguing that the the Israeli Football Association (IFA) has broken the organisation’s statutes; specifically, that the matches played regularly by Israeli teams in West Bank settlements, deemed illegal under international law and therefore actually within the jurisdiction of the PFA, are also illegal under Fifa’s own rules.
The PFA also says that Fifa is very clear that its member associations should be free from any kind of governmental interference. But there has been active collusion between the IFA and the Israeli government. In response to a recent PFA complaint at Fifa, the Israeli Foreign Minister threatened to imprison the head of the PFA, Jibril Rajoub. What’s more, a WhatsApp group called “Remaining in Fifa” reportedly brought together “legal advisors of the ministries of foreign affairs, culture and sports and the IFA Chairman Shino Zoertz.” Other nations have been suspended from Fifa for far less.
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SubscribeDoesn’t help when companies like Adidas somehow think it is a good idea to launch a product (SL72 trainers) celebrating the tragic 1972 Olympics where Israeli olympians were murdered, then choosing a hate-filled Palestinian model to promote them. One can only imagine what was said at their product and marketing meetings.
I must have missed the story when USA and Great Britain were excluded from Athens in 2004 for their illegal invasion of Iraq.
The writer gets all his links here wrong. Do we need a link to confirm the POC has called for Israel’s ban? Perhaps, though I don’t know who would disbelieve the key element of the story (editors). Do we need English language sources when justifying whether there was anything fishy going on with the Whatsapp group? Probably. Could a non-paywall hidden article have been found to support the ICJ’s decision on apartheid? Definitely. This is sloppy.
On the flip side it would have been nice to have a link to the stadium internment camp story, the other nations disciplined by FIFA for lesser violations (and what those violations were) or the travel difficulties of Palestinians playing in international competitions.
None of these countries should be banned from competing. You punish athletes simply for living in craphole countries. Like FIFA and almost every globalist organization, the IOC is corrupt to its core. It bans Russia and Belarus, yet green lights other authoritarian regimes committing human rights violations.
Awful arbitrary for sure.
And doped up Chinese athletes.
Is this the same David Goldblatt who was blowing smoke up the backsides of the Qataris a couple of years ago?
I think I’ll pass on his ‘take’.
Israeli sport is remarkably integrated.
Those who try to pin the ‘apartheid’ label on Israel invariably overlook the players of Muslim Arab background in the national football team for example.
And the current captain of the national team is of Ethiopian Jewish descent.
But that doesn’t fit the anti-Israel narrative.
What a load of ****. The Israelis were invaded by Gazans, not the other way round.
As for international law, this is the most level-headed explanation I’ve come across so far: https://youtu.be/6wrhzDBvhEc?si=Bh9YgmhziGBchfYT
The Gazan kids’ tv shows alone should be watched by everyone who still thinks Israel is the aggressor in this conflict.
If I’m not mistaken the Palestinian flag bearer was wearing a top with rockets on it. And where are the hostages?