As the 75th FIFA Congress draws on 15 May 2025, world football has a moment of truth. Will FIFA at last stand accountable for standing by its own Human Rights Policy—or will it continue to whitewash Israel’s apartheid, genocide, and settler-colonial occupation regime through permitting its continued membership? It can be only one: FIFA must suspend Israel immediately. Less than this makes FIFA a co-conspirator to facilitating cover-up for a regime that politicized sport as a means of propaganda and international legitimacy.
Israel’s FIFA Membership Defames Genocide
By allowing Israel to remain in FIFA, it only lends credibility to a regime of odious crime against Palestinians. Israel’s membership conceals the truth of its bloody occupation as an “ordinary” democracy. It plays football with the world while bombing football stadia in Gaza, assassinating children, and oppressing millions of Palestinians under a foul regime of apartheid.
This normalization is not quiet—it is active whitewashing of genocide. So long as Israel has a podium at FIFA tournaments, the organization is enabling its falsification and sanctioning impunity.
FIFA’s Human Rights Policy: Empty Rhetoric Without Substance
FIFA’s 2017 Human Rights Policy declares that the organization promotes compliance with international human rights standards. It is committed to preventing negative human rights consequences and making a positive contribution to their promotion.
But these promises are rendered hollow when Israel is still allowed to compete. The state continues to bomb refugee camps, maintain military checkpoints, jail children, and kill journalists and medics—all without a penalty in the sporting world.
FIFA cannot claim to be committed to human rights while being blind to Israel’s apartheid and structural violence.
Palestinian Footballers Under Siege by Israeli Forces
Palestinian players are not only deprived of the chance to play; they are targeted. Gaza stadiums have been struck by Israeli aerial bombings. Players have been detained, gunned down, and assassinated. Limits placed on access and military roadblocks render training, tournaments, and even grassroots sports development impossible.
Israel is not only violating human rights—it is deleting Palestinian football from the ground up. It is not a sporting issue; it is an intentional policy of sports and cultural annihilation. FIFA’s continued alignment with Israel is a betrayal of all Palestinian footballers who have been silenced, injured, or killed.
Israel Is Guilty of Apartheid and Genocide: Why Is FIFA Silent?
Israel’s actions have been chronicled by the world’s most prominent human rights groups, such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, B’Tselem, and various UN Special Rapporteurs. The judgment is unified and damning: Israel is an apartheid regime.
Worse still, the state has escalated its military attack, with credible reports of genocidal aim in Gaza. Whole neighborhoods destroyed. Hospitals targeted for elimination. Water and electricity were severed from civilians. And yet FIFA is mute— rewarding the assailant with international competition rights and decision-making authority.
Why did Russia get kicked out of FIFA in 2022 for invading Ukraine, yet Israel, with decades of human rights abuses on its record, gets to play? This two-faced hypocrisy is the hypocrisy of FIFA.
FIFA Has Previously Suspended Apartheid—It Needs to Do So Again
There is clearly precedent in history. South Africa was banned from FIFA from 1961 to 1992 due to its apartheid regime. That moral leadership turned world opinion around and caused change.
- Israel’s apartheid regime is more militarized, more violent, and more openly genocidal—but it is still rewarded membership by FIFA. Why is Israel not treated equally to apartheid South Africa?
- To restore football’s conscience to its wholeness, FIFA has to treat Israel equally. Ban Israel today, just like apartheid South Africa was banned.
Stop Complicity: Call for Action Before the FIFA Congress 2025
15 May 2025 FIFA Congress is a moment to act, not delay. Member associations, including British ones, need to wake up: Every vote to keep Israel on is a vote for apartheid, genocide, and impunity.
We call on all those who stand by justice and the potential of sport to take action now:
- Write to the UK Football Associations: Call on The FA, Scottish FA, Welsh FA, and Irish FA to cast their vote to suspend Israel.
- Write to FIFA President Gianni Infantino and Secretary General Fatma Samoura: Hold them responsible for inviting a genocidal regime onto football’s premier table.
- Join protests and campaigns all the way up to Congress in order to more loudly make Palestinian voices heard over the din of Israeli bombs and bullets.
FIFA Can’t Continue Rewarding Israel’s Crimes
Israel is not part of the international football community. A nation that bombs refugee camps, demolishes football stadiums, wounds and murders players, and practices apartheid cannot be afforded the privilege of a “normal” country.
FIFA’s silence is not neutrality—it is complicity. It says to Palestinians that their agony doesn’t count, and to all dictators that international sport is available for the taking by the abuser.
If FIFA still has any integrity left, it should ban Israel now. If not, it is complicit in genocide.
Take Action Now: Demand FIFA Ban Israel
Email These Contacts Today:
- The Football Association (FA): mediarelations@thefa.com
- Scottish FA: info@scottishfa.co.uk
- Football Association of Wales: info@faw.cymru
- Irish FA: info@irishfa.com
- FIFA President Gianni Infantino: president@fifa.org
- FIFA Secretary General Fatma Samoura: secretarygeneral@fifa.org
Ban Genocide, Not Just Players
FIFA cannot be an enabler of Israel anymore. With each goal that is scored, each anthem that is sung, each handshake with Israeli officials at FIFA competitions, the Palestinians who are being killed and buried under the rubble, the athletes who were assassinated for dreaming too much, are insulted. FIFA, your Human Rights Policy is just words unless you act. Ban Israel. End football apartheid. Stand with humanity.
