Legal experts pen letter to FIFA, outlining ways Israel has broken international law
Thirty scholars, including two former UN rapporteurs, say Israel is violating FIFA's statutes
As Football Palestine has covered previously the campaign to get Israel's FIFA membership suspended for gross human rights violations has yet to produce an outcome. Gianni Infantino, the FIFA President since 2015, has successfully delayed taking a decision half a dozen times since the PFA filed its appeal in March 2024.
Over a year later, two FIFA committees are still investigating the matter. One of the complaints charges the Israel Football Association (IFA) with discrimination, the other seeks to bar Israeli football teams from playing or being based in the illegally occupied West Bank.
The PFA first complained to Fifa about Israeli teams playing matches in occupied West Bank settlements, including Ma’ale Adumim, Kiryat Arba, Givat Zeev, Bikat Hayarden and Ariel, in 2013. Four years later, following an appeal to the Court for Arbitration for Sport (CAS), the FIFA Council's decision not to take any action was upheld citing “final status of the West Bank territories is the concern of the competent international public law authorities”, and that FIFA “must remain neutral with regard to political matters”.
This decision contradicted one taken on Crimean football clubs who were barred from playing in the Russian Footballing Pyramid following Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2014.
Since October 7th, 2023 Palestine has lost over 350 members of its football family. Those include former internationals Mouyid Al-Maghrabi and Mohammed Barakat in addition to Olympic Team assistant coach Hani Al-Masdar.
All footballing installations in the Gaza Strip have been destroyed and in one of the most horrific images of the war Al-Yarmouk Stadium was turned into an internment camp.
“In light of the above, the governance, audit and compliance committee need not concern itself with the question of the legality of Israeli settlements, but simply the issue of whether Israeli teams continue to play football matches in settlements in the West Bank,” the letter reads.
“If that is the case, as the PFA alleges and the IFA has never denied, then the IFA is ipso facto in violation of article 64 (2) of the Fifa Statutes, which states that ‘Member associations and their clubs may not play on the territory of another member association without the latter’s approval’.”
The letter which has been signed by former UN special rapporteurs on human rights in occupied Palestine John Dugard and Michael Lynk, Ardi Imseis, who is representing Palestine at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), Israeli historian Ilan Pappe and William Schabas, states what has been obvious for many years now: Israel is in violation of FIFA's statues.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino highlighted FIFA's efforts to combat racism and protect human rights during May's FIFA Congress in Paraguay whilst also stalling on a decision regarding Israel's membership.
In a nine minute address to the FIFA Congress, Palestinian FA vice president Susan Shalabi said that, “our issue, sadly, again, is stuck in a highly politicized, bureaucratic holding pattern, not unlike the suffering of our people. Visible, undeniable, but sadly ignored.”
Ahead of the 2025 Club World Cup, in a move some analysts said was to appease US President Donald Trump, FIFA dropped its anti-discrimination and anti-racism messaging.