Amnesty International calls on Fifa and Uefa to suspend Israeli Football Association | OneFootball

Amnesty International has sent a letter to Fifa and Uefa calling on the bodies to suspend the Israeli Football Association (IFA) from tournaments until it bans clubs based in illegal settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory from domestic competition.

The missive - signed by Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General - comes amid growing noise around the issue and top-level discussions in the European game.

Senior Uefa figures this week decided to postpone attempts to meet over whether to ban Israel due to the ongoing peace talks involving the US government.

Amnesty’s letter did reference how “Israel continues to perpetrate genocide”, but the actual call revolves around a more specific claim, and an insistence that the IFA have breached Fifa's own statutes.

That comes from complaints originally made by the Palestine Football Association, and previously taken up by a Human Rights Watch letter, that the global governing body have long been accused of putting off.

Article 64.2 of Fifa's statutes state that “member associations and their clubs may not play on the territory of another member association without the latter’s approval”, and this is a description that applies to at least clubs in settlements in the OPT.

The Fifa Council is scheduled to meet on 2 October, and is notionally supposed to discuss the progress of a PFA complaint initially made in March 2024.

Amnesty’s letter reads: “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. Over 800 athletes, players and sports officials are among the more than 65,000 people Israeli forces have killed in a deliberate campaign of wholesale devastation, forced displacement and starvation of civilians.

“At the same time, Israel is brutally expanding its illegal settlements and legitimizing illegal outposts in the West Bank as part of its unlawful occupation of Palestinian Territory. 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.

“There should be no place in football, or indeed in any sport, for clubs based in illegal settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. The IFA is shamelessly contributing to Israel’s violations of international law by providing sporting and economic opportunities that help sustain these illegal settlements.

“Football is not played in a vacuum. FIFA and UEFA must accept their responsibilities under international law and stop letting Israeli national teams and club sides participate in international or European football until the IFA suspends all clubs from illegal settlements.”