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New Israel Fund partners with Israel Football Association on racism project as IFA segregates Israeli youth league

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The New Israel Fund (NIF) has partnered with The Israel Football Association (IFA) to form a new campaign called “Kick Racism Out of Israeli Football“. The campaign was announced through the video “We’re all equal – we’re all one team”, that was released October 28, 2014, to “promote Israel’s national soccer teams (men, women, and youth) as a shining examples of equality, tolerance and coexistence.” The video is engaging and stars two children and a gaggle of notable Israeli football players.

However, back in reality, during the initial stages of this new partnership, and likely during the same timeframe this lovely video was produced, the IFA chose to segregate the Israeli children’s national football league in Israel’s Triangle area which is home to the majority of Israel’s Palestinian citizens.

Seriously, we don’t make this stuff up.

Last month Adalah, The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel filed a petition with the court demanding IFA cancel their decision. Before exploring the blatant hypocrisy on display and the underlying reasons, recently revealed, which led the IFA’s discriminatory decision, check out Adalah’s press release:

Adalah petitions District Court on behalf of a family against segregation of Arab and Jewish teams in children’s football league

23/10/2014

On Tuesday, 21 October 2014, Adalah filed a petition to the Tel Aviv District Court on behalf of a family demanding the cancellation of the decision by the Israel Football Association (IFA) to divide the children’s national football league in the Al-Shomoron area (the Triangle area) into “Shomoron 1”, comprised of 12 Jewish teams and 2 Arab teams, and “Shomoron 2”, comprised of 13 Arab teams. The division effectively imposes segregation between Jewish teams and most Arab teams.

In the petition Adalah argued that the IFA’s decision runs contrary to previous years when Arab and Jewish teams in the same area were merged into the same leagues. The petition contended that segregation between children based on their national belonging delivers a negative message that Arab teams are unwanted and are not skilled enough to play with Jewish teams. This message is offensive to children and violates their right to equality with Jewish children. Additionally, Adalah demanded the enactment of equal and clear standards for the distribution of teams in children’s football leagues in different areas and districts.

Adalah petitioned the court on behalf of Attorney Muhammad Lutfi from Umm al-Fahem, who spoke to the IFA after discovering that the team on which his son plays, Maccabi Umm al-Fahem, was merged with a group consisting of Arab teams only, although in previous years they had played with teams from Jewish towns as well. For example, the teams for the towns of Iksal and Jisr az-Zarqa were incorporated into the same league as Maccabi Umm al-Fahem, although the towns are 50km away from each other. At the same time, teams from Jewish towns that are closer to the Arab towns instead play in another league.

Adalah Attorneys Sawsan Zaher and Muna Haddad stressed in the petition that the decision of the IFA to segregate the teams, even if only in certain areas, reinforces discrimination and prejudices against Arab citizens of Israel. Furthermore, the IFA’s decision to not distribute teams according to objective general standards, regardless of national belonging, will strengthen and perpetuate the lack of respect and lack of acceptance of others. This is particularly important in the matter of children’s sports, where it should not only teach children to be successful but to also teach them the values of mutual respect for different people. Attorneys Zaher and Haddad added that the IFA is subject to the principles of Israeli public law, which clearly prohibits segregation based on national or religious belonging or gender, in any area. This segregation negates the right to equality and dignity.

In its response on 22 October, the IFA hinted that the division of the teams was based on requests from Jewish families. The response stated that: “we will not contradict the desires of the clubs (regarding the divisions), and we will not force a child to play in a league that is not joyful for him/her and that does not help his/her professional development”. Judging from this response, it seems that the IFA preferred social considerations and the desires of Jewish families over the principle of equality between the teams. Adalah will continue to follow-up on this case.

Case Citation: Civil Case 31842-14-10 Jad Mahajni v. The Israel Football Association

The IFA is state institution under the purview of the Israeli government’s Ministry of Culture and Sport. But apparently at the behest of some Jewish families who didn’t want their children playing sports with Palestinian-Israeli children, they will not “contradict the desires of the clubs”, even when the desires of Jewish families runs afoul of the law.

Curious if the New Israel Fund was aware its partners in this project had chosen a segregated solution for the children’s national football league in the Triangle region, a source in Israel contacted the NIF to ask if they were aware of the information reported by Adalah and how it would effect the partnership. This was the response of their contact at the NIF:

“There is close cooperation with the IFA in the struggle against racism and violence in the stadiums, which is a matter of the utmost importance, especially now. However, the Fund is not familiar with the issue of the youth leagues, and cannot assume responsibility for every IFA action. If there is truth to Adalah’s argument, we have no doubt that the matter will be handled in an appropriate manner”

After another year where the killing and maiming of Palestinian soccer players persists, the Israeli football association is under increasing international pressure demanding the expulsion of Israel from FIFA.

Red Card Israeli Racism (RCIR) has written a letter to  FIFA president Sepp Blatter renewing the call to FIFA for suspension of IFA, and blasting IFA’s recent actions. Below is a portion of the text, read the full letter here.

It is an utter disgrace that, in the 21st century, a national children’s league should be organised along racial lines. Obviously, the IFA’s actions in Al Shomoron constitute an egregious breach of FIFA’s statutory prohibition of racism, and its statutory obligation to promote humanitarian values “particularly through youth and development programes”1.

It is notable that, in its submission to the Tel Aviv District Court, the IFA has stated quite candidly that it has acted in response to pressure from Jewish clubs and families. You will be aware that anti-Arab racism in Israel has reached unprecedented levels over recent months2. The IFA could have refused to bow to such pressures, instead it has chosen to participate in the current wave of hatred.

No wonder the IFA has been of so little help to the Palestine Football Association in its ongoing struggle against military oppression. It shares the racism that fuels the brutality.

We urge FIFA to take these steps:

suspend the IFA’s membership of FIFA at December’s Executive Committee meeting.

investigate the Israeli national children’s league thoroughly with regard to the prohibition on racism

The New Israel Fund may have “no doubt that the matter will be handled in an appropriate manner” but we sure don’t.

(Hat tip Ofer Neiman, Karen Platt)

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Israel is nuts:

“Monday’s Tel Aviv derby descended into chaos and was abandoned at half-time after a supporter invaded the pitch and attacked a player, who was subsequently sent off for retaliating.

Maccabi Tel Aviv’s Eran Zahavi equalised against Hapoel Tel Aviv, a team he used to play for, after 22 minutes and was greeted by an opposition fan on the field, who ran up to him and attacked him. Zahavi fought back but was sent off and he promptly ushered his team-mates off the pitch.

With more Hapoel fans running amok at Bloomfield Stadium – which both teams share – officials suspended play and while the game did briefly resume, futher invasions prompted the match to be abandoned.

The Hapoel manager, Eyal Berkovic, who played for West Ham and Manchester City, and who was pictured arguing with his Maccabi counterpart, Jordi Cruyff, was quoted in the Jerusalem Post as saying: “I’ve been saying for years that local soccer is too much like war. I asked the referee to stop the match. It is about time we understand that soccer is sport. As soon as the pitch becomes a battlefield there is no point in playing. Both teams should receive a very heavy punishment. This is a dark day for local soccer.””

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/nov/04/hapoel-tel-aviv-maccabi-derby-brawl-fan-player-abandoned

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RE: “. . . the IFA chose to segregate the Israeli children’s national football league in Israel’s Triangle area which is home to the majority of Israel’s Palestinian citizens.” ~ Annie Robbins

FOR THE POTENTIAL IMPLICATIONS OF SUCH SEGREGATION, SEE:
“Rich People Just Care Less”, By Daniel Goleman, N.Y. Times, 10/05/13

[EXCERPT] . . . In politics, readily dismissing inconvenient people can easily extend to dismissing inconvenient truths about them. The insistence by some House Republicans in Congress on cutting financing for food stamps and impeding the implementation of Obamacare, which would allow patients, including those with pre-existing health conditions, to obtain and pay for insurance coverage, may stem in part from the empathy gap. As political scientists have noted, redistricting and gerrymandering have led to the creation of more and more safe districts, in which elected officials don’t even have to encounter many voters from the rival party, much less empathize with them.
Social distance makes it all the easier to focus on small differences between groups and to put a negative spin on the ways of others and a positive spin on our own.
Freud called this “the narcissism of minor differences,” a theme repeated by Vamik D. Volkan, an emeritus professor of psychiatry at the University of Virginia, who was born in Cyprus to Turkish parents. Dr. Volkan remembers hearing as a small boy awful things about the hated Greek Cypriots — who, he points out, actually share many similarities with Turkish Cypriots. Yet for decades their modest-size island has been politically divided, which exacerbates the problem by letting prejudicial myths flourish.
In contrast, extensive interpersonal contact counteracts biases by letting people from hostile groups get to know one another as individuals and even friends. Thomas F. Pettigrew, a research professor of social psychology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, analyzed more than 500 studies on intergroup contact. Mr. Pettigrew, who was born in Virginia in 1931 and lived there until going to Harvard for graduate school, told me in an e-mail that it was the “the rampant racism in the Virginia of my childhood” that led him to study prejudice.
In his research, he found that even in areas where ethnic groups were in conflict and viewed one another through lenses of negative stereotypes, individuals who had close friends within the other group exhibited little or no such prejudice. They seemed to realize the many ways those demonized “others” were “just like me.” . . .

ENTIRE COMMENTARY – http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/05/rich-people-just-care-less/

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RE: “The New Israel Fund (NIF) has partnered with The Israel Football Association (IFA) to form a new campaign called ‘Kick Racism Out of Israeli Football’.”

LONG TERM, KICKING RACISM OUT OF ISRAELI SCHOOL TEXTBOOKS WOULD BE AN EXCELLENT PLACE TO START:
“Academic claims Israeli school textbooks contain bias” ~ By Harriet Sherwood, guardian.co.uk, 8/07/11
Nurit Peled-Elhanan of Hebrew University says textbooks depict Palestinians as “terrorists, refugees and primitive farmers”

[EXCERPT] Nurit Peled-Elhanan, an Israeli academic, mother and political radical, summons up an image of rows of Jewish schoolchildren, bent over their books, learning about their neighbours, the Palestinians. But, she says, they are never referred to as Palestinians unless the context is terrorism.
They are called Arabs. “The Arab with a camel, in an Ali Baba dress. They describe them as vile and deviant and criminal, people who don’t pay taxes, people who live off the state, people who don’t want to develop,” she says. “The only representation is as refugees, primitive farmers and terrorists. You never see a Palestinian child or doctor or teacher or engineer or modern farmer.”
Peled-Elhanan, a professor of language and education at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has studied the content of Israeli school books for the past five years, and her account, “Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education”, is to be published in the UK this month. She describes what she found as racism– but, more than that, a racism that prepares young Israelis for their compulsory military service. . .

ENTIRE ARTICLE – http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/07/israeli-school-racism-claim

• VIDEO of interview with Peled-Elhanan (08:48) – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t91McXHxiXY

● ALSO SEE: Is Change possible in Israel? (VIDEO, 07:49) – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIj0l6C5VqE
Prof. Haim Bresheeth tries to answer this question – why can some Israelis change, and support the Palestinian cause, but change seems elusive in Israel? Should we wait and hope for such change?

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Yet another instant Israeli classic. There’s the PR and then there’s the provable (i.e. glaring), diametric reality.

As just said, “Israel is nuts.”

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RE: “The New Israel Fund (NIF) has partnered with The Israel Football Association (IFA) to form a new campaign called ‘Kick Racism Out of Israeli Football’.”

FOR AN ESPECIALLY EGREGIOUS EXAMPLE OF RACISM IN ISRAELI FOOTBALL, SEE –
“Suspicion and Hate: Racist Attacks On Arabs Increase in Israel”, By Julia Amalia Heyer, Spiegel Online, 6/05/13

[EXCERPT] . . . Football fan Asi, 23, says that he isn’t a racist, just a nationalist. “I have no problem with Arabs, as long as they raise the Israeli flag and sing along when our national anthem is played.” Lieberman used the same logic to justify a bill he introduced calling for new citizens to deliver an oath of allegiance.
Asi, who lives in a small village near Caesarea [a town in Israel located mid-way between Tel Aviv and Haifa], supports the Beitar Jerusalem football club. On a Thursday evening, he and other Beitar fans are standing at an intersection in Herzliya. Asi has a friendly face and a neatly trimmed beard. Like his fellow fans, he is here to demonstrate against the club’s owner.
When it was revealed in January that the Club planned to sign two Muslim Chechen players, the stands in the stadium became filled with hateful signs, with words like “Beitar — Pure Forever.” The fans chanted: “We are chosen, we are holy, but the Arabs are not.”
Beitar Jerusalem, says Asi, that’s the holy menorah on a yellow background. The team, he says, can only win as a Jewish team, which is why Muslims shouldn’t be allowed to play in the club.
Beitar’s management has since cancelled the contracts with the Chechens and sent the two men back home. There were simply too many problems [most especially, Israeli racism – J.L.D.], the club wrote in a statement.

ENTIRE ARTICLE – http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/racist-attacks-against-arabs-increase-in-israel-a-903529.html

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