World Soccer Chief Pushes Back Against Suspending Israel

By JTA May 7, 2015

The president of FIFA reiterated that Israel will not be suspended from international soccer’s governing body.

Sepp Blatter made his remarks in a meeting Wednesday with the heads of Israel’s soccer association at FIFA headquarters in Zurich.

According to a FIFA news release, Blatter “reiterated his position that any member association that is fulfilling its statutory duties should not be suspended. This would also apply to the IFA as long as they fulfil [sic] such duties.”

The Palestinian Football Association has pushed for a vote at next month’s FIFA congress to suspend Israel from FIFA for “racist behavior against Arabs” manifested through travel restrictions between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. The Palestinian association claims that the travel restrictions inhibit their athletes from training properly.

Israel is currently competing in Euro2016 qualifying events. If FIFA were to suspend Israel, it would be barred from all international soccer events, including World Cup qualifications.

Blatter had initially expressed his opposition to suspending Israel last month.

In 2013, he threatened to suspend Israel from international play for excessive government interference in soccer.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.

This year, we have stood together in strength and sorrow. Our Forward team has worked around the clock to help you find clarity amid the chaos.

If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.

Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO