Palestinians thank Argentina for cancelling match with Israel
MEMO | June 6, 2018
Palestinians have thanked the Argentinian football team and star forward Lionel Messi for cancelling their friendly match with Israel scheduled for Saturday, according to the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI).
Football fans and Palestinian human rights supporters had urged the Argentinian team to cancel the match, set to take place in an Israeli stadium built on the ethnically cleansed Palestinian village of Al-Maliha in response to Israel’s violent response to peaceful protesters on the Gaza border that left over 120 dead.
Initially set to be held in Haifa, the Israeli government moved the match to the Jerusalem village, offering the organisers $760,000 in compensation. Israel was reportedly already paying Argentina $3 million to play the match as part of its celebrations to mark 70 years of its independence, when it forcibly expelled more than 750,000 Palestinians from their homes.
“This was all part of the Israeli apartheid regime’s sports-washing policy to use international sporting events to cover up its war crimes and egregious human rights violations against Palestinians. The fact that Argentina fans and human rights activists around the world succeeded in thwarting it gives us a lot of hope,” Omar Barghouti of PACBI said.
In a video message, the football team from the Palestinian town of Nabi Saleh, in the occupied West Bank, thanked Argentina and Lionel Messi. Nabi Saleh is home to Ahed Tamimi, the Palestinian minor serving months in an Israeli prison for slapping a heavily-armed Israeli occupation soldier invading her property.
“You scored a goal for freedom, justice and equality,” the video states.
No comments yet.

Leave a comment