Amnesty International urges FIFA and UEFA to suspend Israel from international football
The global human rights charity has said Israel's participation violated both international law and FIFA’s own rules.
Amnesty International has called on FIFA and UEFA to suspend Israel from international football, accusing the country’s football association of violating both international law and FIFA’s own rules.
Listen to this article
In a letter sent to the governing bodies, Amnesty urged them to suspend the Israeli Football Association (IFA) from competitions until it bans clubs based in illegal settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories from domestic leagues.
The charity highlighted that six settlement teams currently compete in Israeli leagues, which it says contravenes Article 64.2 of FIFA’s statutes, which prohibits clubs from playing “on the territory of another member association without approval”.
Agnes Callamard, Amnesty International’s secretary general, said: “As Israel’s national football team gears up for World Cup qualifiers against Norway and Italy, Israel continues to perpetrate genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
“It is nothing short of a disgrace that the IFA is still allowing clubs from these settlements to keep playing in its leagues, after multiple warnings for more than a decade.”
Read more: White House vows to prevent Israeli football ban ahead of crunch UEFA meeting next week
Read more: Donald Trump told ‘FIFA makes those decisions’ amid World Cup cities uncertainty
The Palestinian Football Association submitted a formal complaint to FIFA in March 2024, but no action has yet been taken, with FIFA being accused of delaying action.
While the FIFA Council is set to meet on Thursday, reports suggest that a possible suspension of Israel is not on the agenda.
On Wednesday, FIFA vice-president Victor Montagliani said that the matter was for UEFA to decide, since Israel is a member of the European confederation.
Senior UEFA officials had been pushing for a meeting this week to discuss a potential ban, but this has since been postponed amid Trump’s attempts to negotiate a peace deal.
A UN Commission of Inquiry earlier this month concluded that Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.
Responding to calls for suspension, IFA president Moshe Zuares said that suspending Israel “won’t stop a war or what’s happening”.
“I didn’t see that the war between Russia and Ukraine ended after Russia was banned. I don’t see that it solved any problem.”