Football’s reaction to crisis in the Middle East – Football Weekly special

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Hi pod fans, it's Max here.

I'm really apprehensive about recording a pod or it going out, but this is the special that we did on football's reaction to what's happening in Israel and Gaza at the moment.

And it is simultaneously incredibly complicated in terms of history and geopolitics and startly straightforward in terms of some of the harrowing images and videos that you may have seen, or some of our listeners in the region you may be living through, both from October the 7th and the subsequent response from Israel.

Hamas's attacks left approximately 1,200 people dead.

The figures vary slightly, mostly civilians.

and abducted around 240 hostages.

About half of those remaining in Gaza, dozens are thought to have died there.

Since then,

at least 25,295 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been confirmed killed in the Israeli offensive, according to the Palestinian authorities.

And thousands more are thought to remain unidentified under the rubble of the bombardment.

We recorded this episode last week on the 17th of January.

It's now the 24th.

I'm incredibly grateful to all the panelists for coming on, especially Yuri, because as he says, he's living this conflict.

He's lost friends on both sides, and it was brave of him, especially to come on.

I don't tend to think about what makes this pod good that often.

I just hope people like it.

But I think we do try and have conversations that others don't want to have and this is one such occasion.

We don't think we're very important, but I'm just aware of the response we might get for even attempting this.

So if you find it useful or enlightening, please tell us on social media or email footballweekly at theguardian.com.

Of course, we are never beyond criticism.

We didn't set out to solve anything.

I was left with at least some faith that there are good people who care about football and who care about every life that has been lost.

And I'm glad I spent an hour in their company.

Thanks for listening.

Hello, and welcome to the Guardian Football Weekly.

Today, a special on football's reaction or lack of it to what's happening in Israel and Palestine.

Why has football been so silent on the issue?

And is that a problem?

Some people are calling for Israel to be banned from UEFA and FIFA competitions.

Is that right?

We'll examine the history of sporting bans, the precedents, and whether they make a difference.

Many players have been directly involved.

Israeli and Palestinian footballers have lost their lives in this conflict and across the world players on both sides have lost their careers by speaking up for what they believe in.

This podcast has spoken about human rights many times especially with regards to the Qatar World Cup and Saudi Arabia's takeover of Newcastle United.

We've been asked many times why we've only mentioned this story in passing, truthfully because it's complex, it's polarizing and it's difficult.

We've simultaneously been asked why we'd even consider weighing into this topic.

What does football have to do with it?

What good can come of this?

We believe that every human deserves to be free and every life is equally valuable we ask you to listen with an open mind and in good faith just because a conversation is difficult it doesn't mean we shouldn't have it this is the guardian football weekly

on the panel today philippe au claire joins us hey philippe hello max also on yuri levy an israeli football journalist and commentator based in jerusalem the founder of babagol which covers football in the middle east amongst others hey yuri thanks for coming on sure thanks for having me me, Max.

Karim Zidane who joined us for the pod we did a year on from Qatar who writes for The Guardian and the New York Times and is the founder of Sports Politica.

Hi Karim.

Hi Max, it's great to be back.

And Craig Foster, a former Australian international footballer, human rights activist, and unfortunately for him, a colleague of mine on Stan Sport in Australia.

Hey Foz.

Hi, Max.

Yeah, delighted to join you all.

Thank you.

Right, so as I said in the intro, right, we're really aware of how sensitive an issue this is.

And whatever we do, it will not satisfy everyone listening.

Just to explain the structure then, part one is going to focus on football's place in this conversation, if there even is one, and almost whether we should be doing this podcast at all.

Part two will talk about the history of sporting bans and possible sporting sanctions in this instant.

And part three, we'll talk about some of the players that have been caught up in this.

We had lots of questions on the merit of this discussion.

Sam says some people say football should stay out of politics.

Is this perhaps an example of where they might be correct just because it's a really complicated topic with high stakes involved?

Chris says, without sounding horrible, football is a game.

Does it really need to respond to everything?

Max says, perhaps a good time to think about how football's response to any conflict, including this one, simply doesn't matter.

Football is incredibly far up its own arse in terms of how much difference it can make in the world, at least in the context of military conflict.

I'd like everyone's thoughts on this, Philippe?

You will remember that the first time we

tried to talk or

tried not to talk, or I don't know how to phrase it it actually.

I spoke about the right to speechlessness.

This was in the immediate aftermath.

We have to remind ourselves of that.

Of the Hamas attack in which over a thousand Israelis lost their lives in obscurely horrifying circumstances and there had already been a response from the Israeli government,

quite a brutal one.

But At the time I was very much saying we do not have to be to polarize everything from the very start.

There's a right to be speechless in the front when faced with horror.

But that was a

few months ago now.

And I think that the situation has evolved in such a way that this conversation must be had.

And that

whether we like it or not, football has been politicized ever since football was

organized into a professional sport and an international sport.

There's always been a political dimension to it.

And there are moments where events

are such that you are obliged to have the conversation.

But the conversation here, I mean, I'm sure that's probably what you're the same.

The conversation for me is not about me as a person, and that's what I refer to when I talked about the right to speechlessness, as to what I feel, what I think, and God knows I feel and think many things, and put across this opinion as being

you know, God's own truth, and

castigate others for having a different opinion from mine.

So I think what I hope is that we can actually contextualize what is happening, understand what the place of football

is about, is in this conversation.

I do think there is a space for it myself.

If it's completely fine to have a right to speechlessness as an individual, I don't think that it's right as an organization.

when this organization, particularly organizations like UEFA and FIFA and the International Olympic Committee, have been silent,

completely silent on what is happening, which is in complete contrast

with what has happened, for example, with the situation in Ukraine.

Now, you might say and argue that the situation in Ukraine is completely different from what is happening in Israel, Palestine, the West Bank, Gaza Strip.

You might argue that, but that's a conversation to be had.

And the contrast between the two attitudes,

on one hand, the action, and on the other hand, the silence, is one which must be interrogated, must be questioned.

It's an interrogation we must have.

Why is it that FIFA, UEFA and the IOC are silent at the moment?

Why is it that only the International Ice Hockey Federation is the only organization which has taken some kind of stance, which we can talk about later?

So, yes, that's why I believe, Max, that the conversation must be had, despite maintaining that there is also such a thing as a right to speechlessness.

You do not have to have, you can have an opinion, you're not forced to put yourself across as this is my opinion, this is the truth, and so forth, and contribute to the polarization of the debate.

So, I'm sorry, that's a long-winded answer because there is no short, no simple answer to the question you asked.

That's okay.

Yuri?

First of all,

I agree with Philip.

You know, everyone has the right to remain speechless.

And I think that speaking for myself at the moment,

you know, for the listeners to give some context, I'm the only one in the conversation that really leaves this war.

I breathe this war.

I lost friends.

I lost friends from both sides, Kazans and relatives.

So for me, it's even more difficult to have this conversation, but I joined because I think it's important.

And

I'm privileged enough to remain and sit here with my voice, two hands, two legs and a and a head to speak and tell the the context that we live here and also the other context.

You know, in my career I've been covering Palestinian football in the past decade.

Every stadium in the West Bank I've been there, I've accompanied the Palestinian national team in their journeys to the Asian Cup in twenty nineteen, World Cup twenty eighteen, I've seen everything.

This round of you know, this

war, sorry, is probably the hardest moment in my career and my adult life.

I'm raising now a five-month-old baby that when the war started was two months old.

I'm managing my life between Jerusalem and Jaffa.

Jaffa, as we say in Arabic, and I leave both people, like majority of the people in this land.

Gaza, Israel, the West Bank.

It's very hard to explain to someone who is not here physically

the level of

combiningness and the level that we are mixed together in so many different levels that sometimes from the outside view is

all very dichotomic.

Like the conversations that are being held.

So it's very important for the context to understand where I come from and what I'm going to say.

Do football need to respond?

I think, yeah.

You know,

I joined Philip in this and I think that more than the fact that football has become a professional activity or something, it's a human ritual.

It's a human ritual that takes place for many years.

And if it's a human ritual, so basically

it contains everything that human rituals and human presence, human beings are doing, which is cultures,

society, politics,

everything, religion,

finance, economics.

This is why we're here.

This is why we are speaking in the Guardian Football Weekly eventually.

So

I think that football must have certain response, but it doesn't have to be a unified response.

For example, here in Israel, you know, football

Israeli football now speaking is a is a very different uh field or stage than the rest of the of the subjects and fields in Israel, because in Israeli football third of the clubs and third of the players are Arab where they define themselves as the Palestinian Israelis, Arab Israelis, Arab Palestinians, citizens of Israel.

This is a third of the of the population that plays and makes Israeli football.

So basically the response of Israeli football to the war was

very much I would say civilized and more focused on the civilian side of this war and not the military side of this war and definitely not pro-war.

It was about the hostages, it was about the survivors from the October seventh massacre

and

about holding signs before

matches, because Israeli football is a diverse

is a diverse small universe that you know include Arab, Muslims, Christian, Druze.

It combines a lot of foreign players.

We have six foreign players per team in the league, so you can imagine that nobody wanted to create a mass a message or a response that wouldn't be inclusive enough for people to identify with.

So I think Israeli football remain

a detached and rare island from the global discussion about Israel, Palestine and this war in Gaza.

Football does not have a chance and does not have an option not to respond.

to this, but we need to understand and be strong enough to enclave and understand that there will be a diversity and a variety of responses that many of them, especially for someone like me who's coming from this place, living,

born and raised in Jerusalem, second in Tifada, you know,

it wouldn't be nice for me to hear maybe, but it's there, you know.

So

I think

I'm mostly with Philippe, with also my personal context here for the conversation.

I'll bring in Karim and Foz.

Just on that, the importance of this conversation.

I'll start with Karim.

So, Max, I absolutely agree with what's been said so far, and I really don't want to repeat many of the same points.

So, to move on from there, I'd like to say that really, in my opinion, I don't think that football really has a choice to stay out of this conflict.

I don't think it's really realistic anymore.

At this point, the war has come to football.

And in the case of what we've seen happen in

Ghaza since the start of the the war, since October 7th, we've seen statements coming out from the Palestinian Football Federation saying that, and this is around December 13th, they said that about 55 football players have been killed in the bombardment in Gaza.

And when I looked at the list of the names, because they released

an entire list of names,

a significant chunk of them were under the age of 18.

And that's something that's really difficult to swallow when you think about that, just on a human level, since we're talking about humans humans here rather than just politics and numbers.

When you really think about that, and actually football is already involved in this, and that's just one of many examples.

And to list another one that I thought was particularly difficult, and I've done some writing about, was these incidents that have been taking place in Ghaza's historic Al-Yarmuk football stadium.

This is one of the oldest sports facilities in Palestine.

And it was turned into a makeshift internment camp by Israeli troops.

And this happened just after Christmas around Boxing Day when all these photos started coming out showing dozens of men, women, and children being rounded up, stripped down to underwear and blindfolded.

This is very humiliating and harrowing scenes.

And at the same time, there were videos showing bulldozers leveling the pitch, making it unusable.

That's difficult.

I understand they might be searching for whatever was under there.

There have been no reports that anything

has emerged that I'm aware of.

And seeing those scenes and understanding that this is one of the few places where residents that I have spoken to since this incident told me that they could actually go and enjoy themselves and go and actually play football and how much this place actually meant to them.

It's really one of those difficult things to swallow.

And it immediately tells you that football is absolutely intertwined with this war and there's no way around that.

Just looking at Aleir Mukits reminds you of previous times where football has been drawn into war and drawn into really, really deep political situations.

This really isn't the first time football stadiums have been used as mass detention centers.

In 1973, Chile's national stadium was also used as a prison camp and torture facility by the Pinochet dictatorship.

So there is precedent for this.

But what struck me the most was speaking to Palestinians who have experience with Aliar Mouk Stadium.

One Palestinian artist called Hazem Harab spoke to me, showed me pictures of his uncle when he was a coach at the stadium and told me about how he grew up, while his love was primarily for art, he grew up around a family that adored football, that lived and breathed football.

And in his words, what he saw that day was the transformation of his beautiful memories into a dystopian nightmare.

And that's what sits with me in situations like this.

So it's hard for me to ever look at this as a journalist who covers the intersection of sports and politics for a living.

And as an Arab, as an Arab who

has lived across the region, has now one foot in the Arab world and one foot in the Western world, this has been

a difficult time and one that I have never attempted to shy away from, at least voicing my opinion in this situation to the best of my capabilities and with the sincerest respect to the situation as well.

Farz?

Yeah, so

you know, the question was first raised, I think, by Philippe about the right to speechlessness.

And I think

alongside that, as a corollary, we might also talk about the duty and the responsibility of everyone on an individual level and at an institutional level and then multilateral and global sport to act or at least do something.

That doesn't have to be speaking, but the question is, do we all have a responsibility?

And there's been many periods in history where people have been questioned

post facto because they've been too silent and haven't been willing to speak up at the appropriate time.

And so I think my personal view is that we all have a responsibility to be as aware of the issues as we possibly can and to take some form of action.

So I think sport deals with these issues on a number of levels.

Firstly is stakeholder and athlete, for example.

And I know that we're going to discuss and throughout history we've seen athlete activism through many heroic figures of sport who have taken the opportunity to either boycott various competitions are their own sports

or raise the issue in in various ways within the competitive environment The broader aspect though is around institutional response and so the question you asked at the start Max is what should FIFA and IOC and others be doing about this current situation.

The term that Yuri used is one that I think sport should be wedded to and that is objective.

And here's where we come to international law, human rights instruments and humanitarian law.

And that's where sport, in my view, has to be firmly embedded.

And therefore, by ensuring that

it's welded to those instruments, to those principles of international law and engagement of nation states or engagement and interactions between human beings that are codified in all of these various declarations and conventions.

What sport is able to do then is actually be truly neutral.

What sport does is pretend that it's neutral by staying out of some issues and wanting to engage sometimes very firmly.

Russia-Ukraine is a really great example in the football and Olympic context.

Engaging very quickly and very firmly in other contexts and yet making arbitrary decisions about when to be involved in each of them.

Now conflict is of course part of human life and always has been.

I think in early 2024 there's around 100, if not 110

different forms of armed conflicts in the world today.

So the question around what is the threshold for sport to say this has now exceeded the level at which membership of the international sporting community can be maintained.

That is a particular focus of mine.

And I think the answer to it

is essentially crimes against humanity.

And the most egregious

transgressions against international law or against other humans by nation states

or potentially groups within, in my view, puts sport in a position where it needs to think very seriously about whether it maintains the membership of various members around the world.

FIFA have been criticised for being largely silent on the conflicts.

Gianni Infantino did write to the Israel and Palestine Football Federations in October to offer his condolences for the horrendous violence following the October 7th attacks.

In the letter, he called for the immediate end of hostilities and for the immediate relief of the suffering of the people of both Israel and Palestine.

I would like to stress that FIFA will do whatever we possibly can to assist you in your relief efforts and to restoring peace and hope to your people now and in the future.

The UEFA President Alexander Shefferin sent a similar letter to Shino Moshe Suarez, the president of Israeli FA, saying that the pain and sorrow are profound and resonate across the entire football community.

So they have said something, Philippe.

They have

in the immediate aftermath of the horrors which we've seen since 7th of October.

But they've yet to take a position when it comes to the questions which have been asked as to whether other decisions must be taken

about the participation of Israeli teams, both in club competitions, because Makabi Harifa and Makabi Tel Aviv will take part in European competition.

And when we enter the

title elimination phase, and there's obviously the Israeli national team,

the situation, and let's not forget the Palestine national team, which is taking part in the Asian Cup as we speak.

From this point of view, there's been complete silence from everybody.

So it is almost as if there is

a dividing line here

between

political speech and football action which has been drawn and which nobody seems to be willing to cross and which I don't think is necessarily right because again the question is going to be put and not just through petitions not just through

political activists or individual players or managers having an opinion as to what should be done what should be said the the silence has been almost complete we should say here that at least one footballing association has gone public with their views on the matter on New Year's Eve the Jordanian FA released a statement calling on the global sports community to take quote decisive action to stop the aggression against Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied territories but they're currently very much in the minority which I don't know how you feel Yuri.

Might be to do with the fact that whatever they could say about it might not be received positively.

First of all, yes.

And I have responses to everything that have been said so far.

So if I may, just relate a few of these things.

Yeah, of course.

First of all, you know,

Karim described beautifully the role of Eli Almuk Stadium in the Palestinian football heritage and history.

But you know,

unfortunately, this site has been used as a as a rocket site launch to to to shoot rockets towards israeli population and israeli towns we need to put things in context and again hamas also used football stadiums and hospitals and and and many public buildings within gaza to detain gazans and investigate gazans and torture them if if they don't collide with the the right line so it's important to put the the things in in the right context on what we are speaking about and what is taking place true it's heartbreaking to see

shots of civilians being held in a football stadium as a football person it breaks my heart but you know it's it's not out of context here and obviously you know it's a it's important to understand that it's the use of football and the use of football structures maybe in this war is going both ways.

Craig, you mentioned Russia and Ukraine and the response.

I don't think you know that one day on a holiday, on a national holiday, Russia woke up at 6 a.m.

to discover 3,000 Ukrainians, militants, broadcasting live on Facebook and Instagram, how they are executing women, children, and elders.

That's the way I discovered that one of my friends died.

You know, we can go on with comparisons and look on history and what's up and you know, talk about things, but these are real experiences, and it's different stories.

And I think that the problem with the most complicated

conflict of them all that everyone and every big institution wants to solve, and you know, from Stebb Later, who thought he will solve it, he didn't succeed.

Gian Infantino is still flirting with the idea.

It's impossible to solve it.

It's on us.

It's on the people who live here.

Israel is civilians were attacked and Israel has responded.

Of course, there is a gap in powers, but there is no clear breach of international law.

Yeah, human rights are being hurt.

Yeah, if bad things happen,

no argue about that.

But the fact is, there is a discussion about it, whether there is an international law breach right now taking place in the Netherlands.

But small correction, the AFC, the Asian Football Confederation, took a clear stand.

And the Asian Cup

were opened just last week with a ceremony commemorating the Palestinian

the Palestinian cause.

You know, the Palestinian captain Musab al-Battat, which is a good friend of mine, spoke in front of 80,000 people about the sufferings of the Gazans.

He was accompanied by Qatar.

captain Khassan El-Raidus, also

someone I had the chance to interview a few times in the past.

And you know, the Asian football community stood by Palestine firmly, always have been.

The fact is, things are very complex.

And when East and West collide, and unfortunately it's taking place on the land that I live in and I'm born and raised and you know the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is situated at,

it's very problematic because if you collide if you side with the Palestinians, are you against the US?

Are you against the West?

If you side with Israel, you are necessarily against the Palestinians.

So at the moment, we will be able to break this

axiom that is completely false.

And let me be clear, there are people who are making a great benefit from this axiom.

Maybe, maybe there will be a chance for my children, if not my children, my grandchildren,

to live in a better place.

That'll do for part one.

We'll be back in one second.

HiPod fans of America.

Max here.

Barry's here too.

Hello.

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Welcome to part two of the Guardian Football Weekly.

Jerome says, asked a question.

I'm not sure if it's a question.

I'm just wondering.

Israel are unlikely to be banned, which gives the hosts and any team they play a huge security headache.

Do you think UEFA and other nations

want them to get banned?

I mean, it's interesting,

isn't it?

You know, Karen,

do you think that FIFA and UEFA should be acting here?

That's a big question, Max.

And honestly,

I think there does need to be context added to even that when we're talking about bans and sanctions or whatever sort of demands are being put forth here for action that's going to be taken or that should be taken

against the Israeli Football Federation or other sports federations as well.

This is not new, right?

These calls for sanctions or calls for bans and pressure that's being put on right now

did not start after October 7th, right?

So there's a sort of a long history of activists sort of unsuccessfully advocating that Israel's Football Association, for instance, be expelled or suspended for hosting FIFA-sanctioned matches in Israeli settlements in the West Bank, a territory that's still under Israeli military occupation and has been since 1967 right there have been accusations of targeting Palestinian athletes as well as keeping competitors from Gaza from being able to go and join their teammates in the West Bank to play overseas there have been multiple reports over the of these things over the years and I'm sure there's something we can address going forth but there have been renewed calls and as I said something like the the incident and and and sort of the harrowing scenes that took place at Yarmouk Stadium has sort of prompted responses from at the very least the Palestinian Football Association, which claims it sent letters to the International Olympic Committee and FIFA demanding sort of an international probe into what they call occupation crimes.

Jordan's Football Association has since also added to that, saying that the international community has a duty to take action.

I know that since then, more than 300 Palestinian sports clubs and civil society organizations are launching a call to demanding that Israel be banned from the Olympics this summer.

This is something we're we're going to see more and more of, is really what I'm trying to say here.

And this is where we get to the sticky part of the conversation here.

FIFA,

as Philippe has absolutely well stated, sort of backed itself in a corner.

And so has the IOC in many ways.

And part of that, yes, is the precedent set with Russia.

I understand we're not talking about apples and apples here, but there does seem to be a disproportionality in the responses, to say the least, if not outright hypocrisy in the sort of the gleeful approach to banning Russia versus the complete timidity in approaching anything with the matter with regards to Israel.

Lest we forget Russia was immediately transformed into a pariah on the world in the world stage in sport.

It was instant.

Russia's national team, it's all sorts of football clubs were banned from everything, including the World Cup last year, right?

And the International Olympic Committee also took action.

And several international federations banned Russian and Belarusian athletes from taking part.

And here's the parts that really I find fascinating.

If we want to get into the weeds of how they've sort of dug themselves into a hole, I'll give a couple of examples or one quickly here.

On October 5th, and this is two days before the devastating attack from Hamas that killed approximately 1,200 people at Israel, the IOC suspended Russia's Olympic Committee for

basically breaching Olympic charters, saying that by annexing the territories in Ukraine and taking charge of their football facilities that they've broken into the Olympic charter.

It's kind of, at least to me here, and in my opinion, respectfully, it does seem like a double standard is quite glaring, really.

If taking over sports facilities really is the red line for the International Olympic Committee, then how do we explain Israeli troops converting Yarmouk Stadium into an internment camp?

This is a discussion that needs to be had.

I'm not immediately saying there is a direct answer, but avoiding the conversation and simply stating that outright that these are not equivalent matters or it's not something worth discussing, yeah, that does not feel

like an equal approach, to say the least.

So, yes, I do expect that there should be, at the very least, a discussion and pressure to be applied here.

I think

there is a big difference, though.

Besides,

I would say the natural question: who started, or if you look

on the point of who began this specific

war, this specific round of hostility, Israel hasn't annexed Gaza.

Israel hasn't annexed Ali Al Muk Stadium.

Russia did annex Crimea.

The Israel-Palestinian conflict going way back, it's not started on October 7 and it's not was paradise on October 6th.

But the fact is that on October 7th there was no war between Israel and Hamas,

not active war at least.

Actually it was a pretty much horrifying, disgusting, and shameful cooperation between the Israeli government and Hamas, in my opinion.

This is my personal opinion.

But

it's not like that tomorrow morning we are building a new stadium with a Jewish name over Eliyah Mook

leftovers.

No, not at all.

Probably Eliyamouk will be renovated, reconstructed, and hopefully Hach Jaiyah and Shababara Fah will play there in the next year Palestine Cup.

Okay?

But this is war.

In war, bad things happening, and

people will be held accountable.

But

on this fact, you know, again, I agree with you, Karim, that we need to discuss it.

But there is no way we can discuss

talking about annexation here, because annexation is not what's taking place here.

Philippe, you wanted to talk about...

Because we've talked a lot about Russia and Ukraine, and actually,

that's not part of a long list of countries that have been banned.

No, it's a complete outlier.

If you look at the history of sport and the history of football, and you look at the number of countries which have been expelled or banned from international competitions, it's such a short list.

You know, it's Nazi Germany was not banned from FIFA.

Fascist Italy was not banned from FIFA.

They both took part in the 1938 World Cup, despite the fact that The Anschluss, the invasion of Austria had happened, the invasion of Ethiopia had happened.

There were contemporary events.

There was nothing done.

Nazi Germany was never banned.

Imperial Japan was banned in 1951 after

World War II started.

And the Germans were actually reintroduced as West Germany and East Germany in 1950, 1951.

And they had never been banned themselves.

People often say, oh, they were banned from the 1950 World Cup.

No, the federations had just been formed.

They then integrated FIFA.

You know,

yes, former

Yugoslav

Yugoslavian Republic was excluded from the Euro 1992

and competition after a UN resolution following UN sanctions.

And that's probably the only example you can find.

If you think about, was USSR banned after invading Czechoslovakia in 1968 or Hungary in 1956 or Afghanistan?

where 150,000 people died in the conflict.

They were not.

Were the USA banned from international football after carpet bombing North Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos?

No, they were not.

You could carry on like this and like that for a very long time.

Sport has always held back from doing that.

The bans which have taken place there, I was talking about the apartheid ban, which was under the pressure of the African Football Confederation.

Perhaps, by the way, the most efficient ban that has ever been in boycott, that there's ever been in the history of sport in the long term.

But other than that,

was there a ban of Rwanda after the genocide?

No.

Was there a ban of the Kempuchea when the Khmer Rouge killed millions of people?

No, there were not.

Sport completely washed its hands of this for a very long time, which is why the ban of Russia, even though it was clear, one UEFA association country, member of UEFA invading another one, sovereign country, after annexing Crimea and eastern Ukraine, it was as clear-cut as

you will ever get.

But there were other instances in the past where it was just as clear-cut and nothing happened.

So it's just to insist that it is something which is very much of now, something that sport and football had taken their distances from in the past.

Fantastic.

And this is, I want to raise up a question, maybe also to the listeners.

Maybe football cannot

it

really in our minds, because we are football people, we are in love with these sports, we are in love with this human ritual, but maybe we give football too much credit.

And

eventually, football is a simple thing.

It's the beautiful game.

It's the game of the people.

So, maybe, maybe, Philip,

in a perfectly put

historical view of banning nations from playing officially international football,

maybe

something that we need to keep in our minds is how we use football better.

Not banning, but bringing together.

Think about it.

I'm really enlightened by what Philip has just said here.

But I think that for the listeners, maybe it's an idea.

Maybe we are looking at football as a political stage while we need to look at it as an opportunity not to do politics, but to bring people together.

Not as a cliché, really, to do it.

Let's remember, Yuri, that human rights aren't politics, but people often put the two together.

And the other thing about it is what we haven't discussed is that, you know, it's sports watching, because what's happening here as well is you know you've got a Qatar has made you know Qatar have been funding Hamas you know they own clubs you know own major clubs and you know this is one of the the constructs now that's having a huge influence on FIFA's willingness to do or say anything I'm sure probably they they are also you know they are also funding parts of FIFA activity what we are seeing now you know Saudi and then Qatar and the World Cup and the fact yeah so we are in a problem but maybe I don't don't know, you know, maybe Philip can give us another

in-depth historical view so we understand that maybe we need to found a new international governing body for the thing that is called football.

Given, Foz, what Yuri said about the make-up of football in Israel and it being actually one of the

being multicultural and having lots of Arab players in it and Muslim players in it.

In the crucial game, in the crucial game against Switzerland, we have three Arab Muslims in the lineup during the war, war you know and these players these players went to visit the survivors and stuff yeah so so like given that and maybe this is too utopian a you know a thought like isn't that visibility really powerful like within what is happening now and so the idea of them not of being banned would be counterproductive or not well the answer is yeah it is really powerful to see you know mixes of different cultures and particularly backgrounds ethnicities different religions who are

experiencing conflict between their various states or non-state organizations playing together.

And football plays a wonderful role in that around the world.

But I think we need to be careful in

kind of conflating some of these broader issues about what might happen after this particular conflict or whether players do or do not play together or what form of game they play together in.

And

from where I sit, from my perspective, I always come back to what are the objective international standards here, international humanitarian law and human rights principles.

And,

you know, they can't be discussed away, they can't be kind of

debated away.

They are objective.

And there are organizations, particularly around the UN special rapporteurs and others, whose only job is to independently verify human rights and humanitarian law breaches by all countries.

And all countries have breaches.

But I will say,

to Yuri's point before,

they're objectively and conclusively have been breaches of international law by both sides during this current conflict.

And that is a fact.

Now, we have a case in the ICJ

against the state of Israel for the possible

crime of genocide.

And that is yet to be proven.

However, in terms of the denial of humanitarian aid to civilians during a situation of conflict, and all of these are really,

very clear and they have been breached, as is the taking of hostages, the taking of innocent hostages that we saw on October 7, which is so heinous.

That is an international crime.

That is a war crime.

And they have been objectively

war crimes by both sides here.

So, no, we cannot

avoid, not only should we not avoid the conversation, but sport, particularly at a global level, these institutions have a fundamental responsibility to, in my view, uphold all of the laws that I've spoken about because sport is supposed to be about shared humanity.

It's supposed to be about equality.

This is what we say.

These are the slogans for the game, for the world.

Well, if FIFA and football is for the world, we must be for everyone equally.

And the only way that that can be brought to life is through international humanitarian and human rights law.

Of course,

in the general

saying, I agree with Craig here.

You know, obviously we need to find a solution or a resolution, but the big question is where you drew the line.

Where you drew the line.

Because basically, I think that if we go now country to country, especially in my region, I think no country can play football.

international football.

Yeah, and that's where we started.

That's where we started.

That's where I started the conversation.

Yeah.

Eventually the World Cup will be a final four between

four countries.

So so it's it's it's it's okay.

So we we need to discuss this too.

And and you wanna

the the comment you made about the the fact that there is a genocide uh going on in uh in Gaza.

You know I don't know if you are uh aware, I assume you are, but you know uh the Palestinian population it multiplied itself ten times since nineteen forty eight.

The Gazan population is growing two 2%.7% percent

each year,

regardless of the CS, regardless of

the war.

I don't think it's a genocide

if the population is growing.

I don't see it colliding on the same manner.

I think this is, you know, there are bad things and there are obviously human rights issues to solve and to held accountable for in this war.

But this is not a genocide.

Within Israel, you have two million Palestinian Israel full rights, member of parliaments, doctors, football stars, celebrities, engineers,

one of the pillars of this society.

So, yeah, obviously, nothing is perfect in Israel.

There is discrimination, there is a lot to talk about, a lot to fix, and there are people who are doing it day and night.

But I think genocide is a broad accusation that is used, for my opinion, in a little bit,

a populist manner in this discussion.

And I think it's missing the target of really fixing our our situation of living here, both Israelis and Palestinians.

On the accusations of genocide, South Africa has brought a case to the International Court of Justice accusing Israel of committing genocide in its military response to the 7th of October Hamas attack.

The case, which at the time of the recording, it's the 17th of January right now, is ongoing, states the acts are all attributable to Israel, which has failed to prevent genocide and is committing genocide in manifest violation of the Genocide Convention.

On Friday, Israel responded by accusing South Africa of presenting a profoundly distorted view of hostilities.

A day after South Africa had argued that it had committed genocidal acts in Gaza with intent from the highest levels of state, Israel said on Friday that that was a partial and deeply flawed picture.

Before we end part two, Karim, you wanted to come in?

Well, look,

I think this is something we can discuss day and night, and I don't necessarily think this is

the podcast to do it, especially under such time constraints.

But I do want

to make one point at least, which is while I understand everything that has been said so far, including what Yuri has been saying, I do want to stress one thing, at least from my perspective here, which is

the crimes committed on October 7th were horrific.

Yes, understandable.

However, I still do not believe that is justification for the collective punishment that we're seeing taking place in Geza.

This is not a proportionate response, and that's something we have to remember here.

We have seen entire neighborhoods flattened, the region, the enclave completely carpeted to the ground in ways that it would take an exceptional amount of time to recover.

This is not a normal response.

Countless civilians, women, and children have died.

This is what's happening right now.

They are also innocent civilians.

They are not responsible for the crimes of militants.

They are not responsible for the crimes of militants.

And therefore, this is why we're here, right?

We're trying to understand how we can go beyond the pure political discussion, what the politicos and the politicians are going to say and say how we as human beings can show humanity and respond and how football can play a role.

Because that's what football does, right?

We talk about football as a source of power, but what about a platform for humanity?

What about a platform for expression and for shared unity and for understanding and for appreciation?

Maybe one day for peace.

Who knows?

But that seems even right now very difficult thing to approach.

But

I struggle with the idea that

war is just war, but I speak as a person who does not believe in war as a solution generally.

So call me biased, call me what it may be.

I do not believe as war as a just

or realistic solution.

I believe a true solution comes from achieving justice and dignity for all and equality for all and a shared understanding for all.

That does not come come through war.

War creates more radicalization, more extremism and more entrenchment of ideologies and separation and leads us further and further away from peace.

That is not what we want to achieve here.

Just before we end part two, we should say that we reached out to FIFA, UEFA and the IOC to get their thoughts on some of the allegations levelled against them in this episode.

UEFA declined to comment.

FIFA pointed us again to the letters written by Gianni Infantino to the Israeli and Palestine FAs in the wake of October the 7th, as mentioned earlier in the show.

An IOC spokesperson told us that the IOC has not, in fact, been silent on the issues, but have publicly stated their position several times.

They said their thoughts and very strong feelings remain with the innocent victims of the violence and their families, something they say they expressed from the outset.

They told us that the IOC continues to monitor the situation and are working with both the Israelis and Palestinians in order to support their athletes in preparation for Paris 2024.

In response to the question of boycotts, they told us that as a global organization, the IOC has to, quote, manage a complex reality when trying to, quote, unite the entire world in peaceful competition.

They believe that if divisive political forces were to succeed in their efforts to decide which athletes can compete, then sports competitions would end up involving only athletes from like-minded political blocs.

In terms of their response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, a spokesperson told us that it was a unique situation and that cannot be compared to any other war or conflict.

They told us that the measures taken were a consequence of the invasion of Ukraine by the Russian army happening during the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games of 2022.

Something they told us is a breach of the Olympic Charter.

On the other hand, they told us that the suspension of the Russian Olympic Committee in 2023 was based on the unilateral decision of that body to include as its members the regional sports organizations which are under the authority of the National Olympic Committee of Ukraine.

Something they told us also constitutes a breach of the Olympic Charter.

We'll be back in a second.

HiPod fans of America.

Max here.

Barry's here too.

Hello.

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Welcome to part three of the Guardian Football Weekly.

I want to talk about some of the players involved.

And, like, sadly, some players have played the ultimate price and have lost their lives.

And it's worth,

and, you know, everyone who's lost their life in this conflict has a story and it deserves to be told.

And it seems kind of wrong to just pick out a couple, but we don't have time to pick out everybody.

And

actually the story about players on social media is a discussion that's almost easier to have.

But but Yuri, you mentioned a number of players in the WhatsApp group before this.

Leo Asulin, tell us about him.

Yeah, Leo Asulin is

really a heartbreaking and devastating story.

Leo Asulin is an ex-former Israeli footballer.

He's retired.

He played for Bneis Akhnin, which is the most, it's the biggest and most influential Arab club within Israeli football, the first Arab club to win a cup.

And really within Israeli football, it's a pillar of the common life and coexistence.

Arab and Jews playing together under Arab management.

There were bad years, better years, but in general a noasis of what the commoner life in this place could be.

And Leo was the face of their heroic run for an historical Israeli Cup triumph in 2002.

And later even played with Sakhnin at St.

James's Park against Newcastle United in its older version with Nikki Batt, Patrick Clivert, and

that Newcastle.

And Leo was a funny guy, a great goal scorer.

On October 7th, he was at the Nova Festival.

dancing, celebrating.

I think for my

familiarity with his story, also trying to forget the burdens of daily life.

And he was murdered by Hamas terrorists

in this festival,

something that was discovered only 48 hours after.

He's a cult figure in Israeli football because he played for Bnez Akhneen and took this club to its highest peak, but he also was

a fan favorite at Beitar Jerusalem.

He used to play for Apoor Tel Aviv, the most left-wing club

in the country traditionally, but also

as a kid he supported Maccabi Tel Aviv and

he really was, I would say, a micro cosmos of Israeli football, combining all together everyone moved from him.

Arab, Jews, left-wing, right-wing, Apollo, Maccabi, Beitar.

And, you know,

it was those days, those early days of the world, we all were grieving and still very much in shock, and you know, sirens going all the day.

That Leo Astoulin was for a moment

or for a day something that united the whole country.

I think he didn't enjoy

this

position and this level of impact while he was making history for Israeli football and for Arab football within Israel.

So

it was devastating.

You know, it was, I think, the first time that really

could shed a tear in, you know, after I realized this is happening and it's taking also our football too.

And you would

give us another player from the Palestinian side.

The Palestinian Football Authority have said that 55 have been killed.

Yeah, so one of the stories that raised up in the past weeks, and for me,

it was also something personal because I saw the person and I knew who he was, is Hanil Mazda, who was part of the coaching team in the under-23 Palestinian national team.

You know,

as we're saying always, you know, these are not numbers, these are not just names, these are people.

But for me, as someone who covers Palestinian football for so long, suddenly to connect it directly to someone I exchanged words with was very like it hit me hard.

It hit me hard.

And Hani was,

you know, there are not a lot of Gazans

involved in the national Palestinian, in the Palestinian national teams.

I mean, it's easier for West Bank and the Palestinian diaspora players or coaches to get involved.

And I think that Hani was a good spirit man and he knew how to work with the young Palestinian talents.

His intentions, from what I've knew and met, were good and

were hell-hearty.

And I think that, you know

I studied it a lot during the podcast that you know bad things happening in war but I think the loss of good souls of good football souls just like Leo Asulin just like Hanir Mazda are maybe the hardest price that we pay in the in this story and

you know both him both Leo both everyone who got you know not only killed imagine footballers that lost a leg a hand and they will keep being alive knowing that

and we have and I have plenty of examples, both Israeli and Palestinians in different levels of professionality that basically gonna live with their broken dream and experience it and seeing it in the mor in the mirror every morning.

So it's important, it's important to remember these are not names, these are not lists, these are people.

And it's important to understand that for people who live on this piece of land on October 7th,

our life has been shattered

in any means.

Everyone knows someone, everyone experienced something, everyone lost.

Everyone.

Yeah.

So for Hani al-Mazda and Dio Asulim, rest in peace.

According to the Palestinian Football Association, 85 Palestinian athletes, including 55 footballers, have been killed.

That figure includes 18 children and 37 teenagers.

Like I said, they all have a story.

It all deserves to be told.

It seems trite to move on to social media.

But it was quite interesting to see the stories.

Karim Ivano El Ghazi had his contract terminated by Mainz on the 2nd of November after a series of social media posts he made about the conflict.

Mainz said he took a position on the conflict in the Middle East in a manner that wasn't tolerable for the club.

Following the termination of his contract, he said, stand for what is right, even if it means standing alone.

The loss of my livelihood is nothing when compared to the hell being unleashed on the innocent and vulnerable in Gaza.

And you compare that to Sagiv Jehezkel,

who played for Antalya Spor in Turkey.

He was detained after wearing a bandage on his left wrist during a match with the words 100 days and the date

of October the 7th on it.

Following his release, Turkey's justice minister announced an investigation into Jezkel over the bandage incident for suspected incitement to hate.

He said, I did not act to incite or provoke anyone.

I'm not a pro-war person.

There are Israeli soldiers held hostage in Gaza.

I'm someone who believes that this 100-day period should end now.

I want the war to end.

That's why I showed the message here.

It's fascinating to see,

you know, it appears that there are some places where you can take one side and there are some where you can take the other, but you can't in the other, if that makes sense.

Unfortunately, this is just another example of sort of sort of the schism within football right now over the course of this war.

And it's part of the ongoing entrenchment and almost tribalism of science here.

Some things you can say in some places and some things you can't.

Let's start with the most recent one you're just talking about right here with Jefkel.

I think that whole situation was ridiculous.

Let's begin with that right now and say...

That is an infringement on your freedom of expression and says a lot about the Turkish government, which has long proclaimed itself as a democracy, but it's absolutely no such thing.

Lest we forget that Erdogan and his regime are, what, the fourth worst offenders of jailing journalists in the world.

That tells you what they view of speech.

At the end of the day, this is an attempt to intimidate people who have different opinions, dissenting opinions, and I will not stand with that, especially since the player did nothing other than

to speak out for the release of the hostages.

That should not be political.

The unfortunate reality we live in is that something like that is made political now.

That request should not be made political.

Similar, I believe, as the request for a humanitarian ceasefire, which should not be political either.

But alas, here we are right now in this situation.

So yes, that I think is ridiculous.

Likewise, though, I'd like to say, or not likewise in the sense that they're equal or similar situations.

But since we also mentioned Anwar Al-Ghazi, I'd like to say that from what it appears to me is that one of the social media posts included the slogan, from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.

Now, I'd like to reference again that that is one of those statements that has been has taken on such a political and incendiary tone even though at least in my personal experiences and i can only speak from my own everybody i have seen that has used it has had only used it with the intention of solidarity to palestine not a call for genocide against against the israeli people that is not the intention of the slogan there i cannot speak for anwhel ghazi but i'd like to i'd like to at least assume we can give somebody the benefit of the doubt that that was not their intention He has come out himself afterwards, apologizing for upsetting people.

And

I think in situations like that,

we're seeing how it divides across lines.

But unfortunately, this is also how social media plays out, isn't it?

Because you tend to end up seeing not only what the algorithm shows you in your own bubbles, but it also shows you things that are going to make you more mad.

And these were situations that were going to make more people mad, which you don't see as much.

Even though this went viral on arab social media and i'd like to point this this one story out a egyptian striker called ahmed hasan kuka he'd scored a hat trick uh in in turkey and he dedicated the win to a palestinian girl called rim she was a three-year-old who was killed in an israeli airstrike while sleeping in her bed all he did was he lifted his t-shirt and and revealed this picture of It was this famous picture that had been going around, this really harrowing picture of this deceased Reem, three years old, being hugged by her grieving grandfather.

His name is

Khaled Nabhan.

And the picture was accompanied with this Arab phrase, which is what Reem's grandfather had used when he was interviewed thereafter.

He was asked, what does this person mean to you?

What does she mean to you?

And he responded with, Heya Rocher Roch.

That roughly translates to the essence of the soul.

That's how he felt about his granddaughter.

And that's all that picture had there.

That picture of them and that quote.

Roher Roch.

That was one of the hardest ones for me to see.

We've seen all sorts of shows of solidarity.

We've seen the Palestinian flag.

That one, in many ways, was one of the most humane, one of the most powerful.

At least it resonated with me personally.

It shows how

in many ways it embodied the collective grief that many people

are feeling right now.

And it's yet another example of how football is a platform for you to speak out, to show humanity, and to voice your solidarity with causes.

That is something we should be in favor for, not something we should be shying away from.

We talk about whether football should have an opinion.

Look around you.

Football already does have an opinion.

And if you can't see that, well, I don't know what to say anymore.

Feels like a good place to end this.

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone for coming on.

Thank you, Philippe.

Thank you, Max.

Thanks, Karim.

Oh, it's a pleasure, Max, as always.

Cheers, Foz.

Okay, thanks, guys.

Really enjoyed it.

And Yuri, thank you so much for coming on.

Thank you, guys.

Thank you.

Formal Weekly is produced by Joel Grove.

Our executive producer is Max Salis.

This is The Guardian.