How FIFA murdered soul of football by sportswashing Israel's genocide in Gaza

By Nima Tavallaey Roodsari

As Israel's US-backed genocidal war on Gaza rages on, the death toll of Palestinian footballers has surpassed 320 even as the international governing body of football continues to engage in blatant sportswashing.

On February 24, 2022, FIFA, UEFA, and the IOC issued separate statements condemning Russia just hours after it launched its military operation in Ukraine.

Four days later, the FIFA Council and UEFA Executive Committee banned all Russian teams from participating in international football tournaments.

The IOC Executive Board made similar recommendations on the same day.

Fast forward two years to July 10, 2024, when the US medical journal The Lancet published a report estimating that "up to 186,000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict (war) in Gaza," affecting a population where 47 percent are under 18 years old.

The official death toll from the Israeli genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza is nearly 42,400 now, including more than 17,000 children. However, thousands more remain trapped under the rubble and unaccounted for.

Six months before the Lancet issued its report, on January 26, The International Court of Justice issued an interim ruling in a case originally filed by South Africa declaring that there was a "plausible" case against Israel for committing genocide in Gaza.

This is without even mentioning the horrific images of mutilated and slaughtered Palestinian men, women, and children that have circulated on social media daily since October 7, 2023.

What has been FIFA's response? Under the leadership of Gianni Infantino—who, during the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, expressed a wide range of global identities—the world football’s governing body has engaged in one of the largest and most obscene acts of political gaslighting and sportswashing in human history.

On October 3 of this year, FIFA announced that its Disciplinary Committee would "initiate an investigation into the alleged offense of discrimination raised by the Palestine Football Association."

It further stated that the FIFA Governance, Audit, and Compliance Committee "will be entrusted with the mission to investigate – and subsequently advise the FIFA Council on – the participation in Israeli competitions of Israeli football teams allegedly based in the territory of Palestine."

This ludicrous language came after the decision to take action against Israel had been postponed at least three times.

Infantino stated, "The ongoing violence in the region confirms that, above all considerations, and as stated at the 74th FIFA Congress, we need peace.”

“As we remain extremely shocked by what is happening, our thoughts are with those who are suffering. We urge all parties to restore peace to the region immediately."

It is evident that Infantino, who once famously claimed to feel "African, Qatari, disabled, woman," etc does not extend this sentiment to Palestinians.

Consider the case of Muhammed Bhar, a 24-year-old Palestinian man with Down syndrome and autism, who was killed when Israeli soldiers unleashed a military dog on him.

As the dog attacked, Muhammed tried to comfort it to stop its aggression.

Personally, I doubt Infantino is capable of feeling much at all, except perhaps the sensation of bending over on command, like an obedient Zionist lapdog—after lining his own pockets, of course.

Mark Twain is famously quoted as saying, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

Over the past year, amid unrelenting West-backed Israeli aggression in Gaza and now Lebanon, we have witnessed three levels of hypocrisy: hypocrisy, damned hypocrisy, and FIFA hypocrisy.

By doing so, FIFA has paved the way for European football clubs to sportswash Israel's genocide in Gaza and Lebanon even as innocents continue to die every moment.

A particularly egregious example is that of German football club Borussia Dortmund.

The Bundesliga club faced severe backlash from its own fans when it announced that the German weapons manufacturer  Rheinmetall would be its main shirt sponsor.

On their website, they expressed their "historical responsibility towards Israel," adding that they are "fully committed" to the Zionist apartheid regime's "right to exist."

On October 7, 2024, marking the first anniversary of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Borussia Dortmund and several other Bundesliga clubs released similar statements.

They condemned the Palestinian resistance but remained silent about the nearly 43,000 Palestinians (official toll) killed in the past year, most of whom were women and children. Many of the victims included young football players, including Dortmund fans.

One day earlier, Gaza-based football journalist and Press TV correspondent Abubaker Abed, along with Spanish-Moroccan journalist Leyla Hamed, published a video from Deir El-Balah, a city in the northern Gaza Strip.

The video was recorded the day after Israeli warplanes bombed a mosque filled with people seeking refuge from the indiscriminate bombing campaign.

Beneath the rubble, a torn Borussia Dortmund shirt was discovered, emblazoned with Marco Reus's name and number. Neither Borussia Dortmund nor Marco Reus has issued a statement addressing their devoted Palestinian fans, whether dead or alive.

I suppose the gesture of players from the German national team covering their mouths during the FIFA World Cup in 2022 was less a protest and more a confession of their complicity in what has transpired, what is happening now, and what is yet to come.

This brings us to the chaotic UEFA Nations League match where Italy hosted the Israeli team in Udine. Viral social media posts have documented the presence of snipers on the stadium roof before, during, and after the game.

This is all happening because FIFA, UEFA, and the IOC refuse to apply their own rules and principles to Israel, as they did with such urgency when punishing Russia and Belarus because of Western pressure.

None of this is news to anyone. The more pressing question is: Now that we have established that the "I" in FIFA stands for Israel, what should the civilized world do next regarding sport in general and football in particular?

Through its blood-drenched hypocrisy and sportswashing of Israel's crimes, FIFA has compromised the soul of this beautiful game, at least in the short term.

While the image of 19-year-old Sha'ban Al-Dalou engulfed in flames haunts the conscience of the civilized world, I am left wondering if, as an unintended consequence, FIFA has permanently harmed itself as an international sports organization.

Nima Tavallaey Roodsari is a football journalist and podcast host based in Sweden. He tweets at @NimaTavRood

(The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of Press TV.)

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