Contours of future Israeli-Palestinian battles emerge on football pitch

Legal and diplomatic battles in U.N. organizations and international sport associations involving charges of war crimes and efforts to suspend membership of one or the other are likely to shape future Israeli-Palestinian relations in the wake of last month's electoral victory by Benjamin Netanyahu.

The contours of the coming battles are emerging on football pitches even before Netanyahu forms his cabinet with a Palestinian campaign to suspend Israeli membership at FIFA and the petitioning by an Israeli law firm of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate Palestine Football Association (PFA) President Maj.-Gen. Jibril Rajoub for war crimes allegedly committed during last year's Gaza war.

A statement on the PFA's website sought to win support for a PFA resolution calling for the suspension of its Israeli counterpart, the Israeli Football Federation (IFA), slated for submission at FIFA's Congress in May. In the statement, Rajoub said the resolution was designed to force Israel and the IFA to:

-  Lift all restrictions on the free movement of Palestinian players, staff and officials within Palestine defined as both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as well as on the import of football equipment;
-  Removal of all obstacles to the development of Palestinian football;
- The banning of football clubs belonging to Israeli settlements on the West Bank from playing in IFA competitions, a demand that goes to the core of disputes over occupied territory between Israelis and the Palestinians;
- Take firm action to combat racism in Israeli football, a reference to Israeli club Beitar Jerusalem, the only top Israeli club that refuses to hire Palestinian players and whose fan base is overtly racist. The IFA, the only Middle Eastern...