FIFA orders legal review of Palestinian call to suspend Israel

BANGKOK - Soccer's world body FIFA ordered an urgent legal evaluation on Friday of a proposal by the Palestinian Football Association (PFA) to suspend Israel over the war in Gaza, promising to address it at an extraordinary meeting of its council in July.

FIFA President Gianni Infantino took the decision at an annual Congress in Bangkok, where the PFA president made an emotional plea to delegates to hold a vote to suspend Israel from all club and national competitions, accusing it of multiple breaches of FIFA statutes.

The Palestinian proposal accuses the Israel Football Association (IFA) of complicity in violations of international law by the Israeli government, discrimination against Arab players, and inclusion in its league of clubs located in Palestinian territory. The IFA rejected that.

The request for sanctions against the IFA comes two years after FIFA's decision to suspend Russia from international competitions over its invasion of Ukraine.

"FIFA cannot afford to remain indifferent to these violations or to the ongoing genocide in Palestine, just as it did not remain indifferent to numerous precedents," PFA President Jibril Rajoub said.

"How much more must the Palestinian football family suffer for FIFA to act with the same urgency and severity as it did in other cases? Does FIFA consider some wars to be more important than others and some victims to be more significant?"

Since an Oct. 7 cross-border raid by militant group Hamas that Israel says killed more than 1,200 people, the Gaza offensive has left more than 35,000 Palestinians dead, according to Gaza health officials. Israel says its strikes are targeted at militants.

Rajoub said 193 Palestinian players had been killed, football infrastructure destroyed, its leagues suspended and its national team required to play World Cup qualifiers abroad.

'CYNICAL, POLITICAL AND HOSTILE'

The proposal was sent to FIFA in March and added to the Congress agenda with the support of the Algerian, Jordanian, Syrian and Yemeni federations.

The Asian Football Confederation gave its backing on Thursday for action against Israel.

IFA chief Shino Moshe Zuares said the proposal was based on motives and ambitions that "have nothing to do with the spirit of sports or the FIFA value of separating sports from politics".

"Today, maybe more than ever, I believe that football must be a key element in healing the fractures and the wounds, helping us and everyone to recover," he told the Congress.

"Yet, once again, we are facing a cynical, political, and hostile attempt by the PFA to harm Israeli football.

"I am holding myself back and will not speak about the true motives out of respect for this institution," he said.

Infantino expressed extreme shock over the Oct. 7 attacks and the offensives in Gaza and said due to the "obvious sensitivity of the issue", independent legal experts would be brought in urgently to analyse the Palestinian allegations.

Those findings would be referred to the FIFA Council, its main decision-making body outside of the Congress, to convene an extraordinary meeting in July and take appropriate decisions, he said. REUTERS