Sinn Féin TD to lobby FAI for friendly match between Ireland and Palestine

A Dublin Sinn Féin TD has revealed he plans to lobby the FAI on holding a potential friendly match between Ireland and the Palestine national football team.

Dublin Mid-West TD Mark Ward told Dublin People that officials from the Palestinian football association are planning to visit Dublin in August, and Ward says he hopes to convince the Irish football association to host the match, which would mark the first time Palestine have ever played a team from Europe.

“It would be a way of extending the olive branch between Ireland and Palestine, as it were,” he told Dublin People.

The Sinn Féin TD noted that Palestine have been full FIFA members since 1998, but have never played a match against a team from in the UEFA region.

Palestine played and subsequently won a friendly against UEFA member Azerbaijan in 2012, but the match was not formally recognised by FIFA, the sports governing body.

Ward’s proposal to have Ireland play Palestine comes in the wake of Robbie Keane’s controversial move to become manager of Israeli football team Maccabi Tel Aviv.

Deputy Ward said it was “disappointing” that Keane chose to manage the team based in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv, saying that he was contributing to the practice of “sportswashing.”

“Obviously Keane is a legend in Irish football, we all loved watching him play and he is our record goalscorer, but surely an Irish player, who has played for Celtic, would be well aware of people’s opinions on the issue.”

The Dublin Mid-West TD noted that “Ireland and Palestine have a strong, shared history and sense of solidarity, and it is disappointing that Robbie is so blind to that.”

“I was in Palestine last November and I have seen first-hand the apartheid regime that Israel have implemented,” he said.

“I have seen it with my own eyes, it is a two-tier society in Palestine and there is clear occupation taking place,” citing Amnesty International and United Nations criticism of the Israeli government’s behaviour in the Palestine region.

Ward raised the issue in the Dáil on Wednesday, stating “when people of the stature of Robbie Keane ply their trade in Israel, it is an attempt to gloss over and legitimise the apartheid regime,” and called on Taoiseach Leo Varadkar to raise the issue of “sportswashing.”