SOUTH AFRICA U23 SOCCER SQUAD IN PALESTINE
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Earlier this year South Africa’s U23 Soccer squad was in Palestine for a friendly international football match. A letter by Fifa President Sepp Blatter to South African Football Association President Danny Jordaan was read out shortly before kick-off saying: "South Africa is a country that knows too well what it means to fight for the cause of freedom, and I am sure that South Africa's visit to Palestine will be a great encouragement to their Palestinian brothers.” Click here for more information.
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PALESTINE TO REQUEST FIFA EXPULSION OF ISRAEL
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President of the Palestine Football Association Jibril Rajoub is due to seek Israel's expulsion from FIFA later this month on 29 May 2015 in Zurich. Rajoub said he "would not make concessions" because nothing has improved in the way Israel is "persecuting Palestine footballers, athletes and the movement of sporting equipment ... enough is enough … Israel is still behaving like the neighbourhood bully, or worse.” Palestine has already tabled its motion and it is on the upcoming FIFA congress' agenda. Click here for more information. |
SA PREVIOUSLY ALSO EXPELLED FROM FIFA
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South African was also previously expelled from FIFA in 1961. South Africa was readmitted in 1963 by pro-Apartheid supporters who tried to argue that politics should stay out of sports. However, South Africa was eventually re-expelled in 1964 until Apartheid and its human rights abuses ended in South Africa. Click here for more information. |
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PROMINENT SOUTH AFRICAN BUSSINESSMAN TOKYO SEXWALE IN PALESTINE DISCUSSING SPORTS RACISM |
Yesterday evening prominent South African businessman Tokyo Sexwale departed from Johannesburg’s Oliver Tambo Airport en route via Jordan to Palestine. Sexwale is in Palestine on a 2-day fact finding mission as the President of the anti-racism campaign, Global Watch. Global Watch is a brainchild of Sexwale and is supported by the Nelson Mandela Foundation, Ahmed Kathrada Foundation, as well as several other organizations and groups. Speaking at OR Tambo Airport Sexwale said: “The objectives of the visit is a listening visit and also a fact finding mission to understand the problems that are prevailing around sporting issues in particular in reference to Palestinians and Israel and where we can play a role as Global Watch...its unacceptable that a situation prevails within Palestine and between Israel of hostility that also finds itself on the sporting field. Part of our mission, we will be working with Mr Blatter... and members of FIFA."
Sexwale was invited to Palestine by Palestine Football Association (PFA) president Jibril Rajoub. Rajoub is due to seek Israel's expulsion from FIFA later this month at the upcoming FIFA Congress on the 29th of May. CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION. |
ISRAELI ABUSE AND ATTACK ON PALESTINIAN SPORT AND SPORTS PEOPLE
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Human rights organizations have for a long time accused Israel of attacks and interference in their sport. Earlier this year, on 31 January 2015, without warning, Israeli forces shockingly attacked two young Palestinian athletes on their return home from football training in the central West Bank. Israeli forces shot the Palestinian athletes repeatedly in the feet, unleashed attack dogs that mauled their arms and legs and dragged them hundreds of feet on the ground, beat them and broke their knees. The Palestinian youths, cousins Jawhar Nasser Jawhar, 19, and Adam Abd al-Raouf Halabiya, 17, will never play competitive sports again. Among the victims of last year’s Israeli bombardment of Gaza was a Palestinian football legend. Ahed Zaqout is remembered by some as possibly “the best midfielder Palestine ever had”. Israel shelled Zaqout's house in Gaza as he slept and the former star turned TV commentator became another “statistic” amongst the 2014 victims of Israel’s onslaught on Gaza. Some 32 sports facilities also succumbed to Israel's bombing of Gaza in 2014. During Israel's 2006 bombardment of Gaza, Israel bombed the Palestine Stadium. FIFA later provided funds to support the stadium's reconstruction after which it was against destroyed by Israeli bombing in November 2012. CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION. |
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