The head of the Palestinian football association pledged to appeal Monday against FIFA’s 12-month ban for comments made about Lionel Messi, calling it an “unjust and political decision.”
TEL AVIV— The head of the Palestinian Football Association, Jibril Rajoub, said he would appeal FIFA’s decision to ban him for inciting fans to “hatred and violence” against Argentinian soccer player Lionel Messi as part of an intense Palestinian campaign that he launched in a bid to stop Argentina from playing a warm-up game in Israel this summer.
Geneva – FIFA on Friday hit the Palestinian Football Association chief with a year-long “match” ban after he called for protests against Lionel Messi over plans for Argentina to play Israel in Jerusalem.
Egypt’s devout Muslim goalkeeper Mohamed El-Shenawy declined to receive a player of the match trophy at the FIFA World Cup for religious reasons.
Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) jihadists have for months incited a push against the soccer World Cup venues, most recently calling for lone-wolf attacks in a series of posters published as Russia kickstarts the world-renowned competition on Thursday.
“The U.S. has put together a STRONG bid w/ Canada & Mexico for the 2026 World Cup,” Trump wrote in April on Twitter. “It would be a shame if countries that we always support were to lobby against the U.S. bid.”
TEL AVIV – Amid calls from Israel demanding soccer’s governing body FIFA to investigate threats against Argentinian players, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed concern that the South American country’s “disappointing” decision to cancel its friendly soccer match against Israel would not set a precedent.
TEL AVIV – Israeli sports minister said the cancellation of the Argentina’s decision to cancel its friendly game with Israel scheduled for Saturday amid pressure from pro-Palestinian groups was “terror, not BDS.”
JERUSALEM — The sports-crazed nation of Israel was in uproar Wednesday over Argentina’s abrupt cancellation of a World Cup warmup match following pro-Palestinian protests, with some of the country’s leaders accusing Lionel Messi and his teammates of caving to terrorism.
A report suggests that President Trump’s “sh*thole countries” remark and proposed travel bans, has made FIFA officials resistant to the idea of granting the United States the right to host the World Cup in 2026.
Mexican sports fans have brought their habit of screaming a gay slur into the National Football League as the NFL sent the New England Patriots and Oakland Raiders to Mexico City. But CBS was able to use a crowd noise sound effect to drown out the Mexicans yelling “puto” over and over again.
The flurry of sexual abuse allegations that have rocked the entertainment world are no longer merely confined to the entertainment world.
Seattle Reign midfielder Megan Rapinoe is ripping FIFA after the organization nominated an amateur player for its female Player of the Year award this year.
Contents: UAE official says Arab blockade was engineered to prevent Qatar hosting 2022 World Cup; Numerous controversies surround FIFA’s award of World Cup 2022 to Qatar; A new ‘risk report’ raises doubts about Qatar hosting World Cup 2022
GENEVA — FIFA fined the German soccer federation 32,000 Swiss francs ($33,000) on Monday because fans chanted Nazi slogans at a World Cup qualifying game in the Czech Republic.
President Donald Trump is the most powerful man in the world. How powerful, exactly? Apparently, he’s so powerful that he’s the only man who can prevent the United States from hosting the World Cup in 2026.
United States soccer team goalkeeper Brad Guzan was taunted with gay slurs yelled by Mexican fans as the World Cup qualifier game started in Mexico City on Sunday night, reports say.
A Saudi cleric named Mohamed Alarefe has tried to spur FIFA towards imposing an official ban on players who make the sign of the cross during games.
TEL AVIV – Amid the international soccer governing body Fédération Internationale de Football Association’s annual congress, a tournament named after the terrorist responsible for the murder of 125 Israelis took place under the auspices of the Palestinian Football Association – the same group that is demanding that Israel’s FIFA membership be revoked.
TEL AVIV — Muhamad Alarefe, a prominent Saudi religious leader, has demanded that FIFA, the international soccer governing body, instruct players to stop making the Christian sign of the cross.
More than 30 Israeli families who have lost relatives to terrorist attacks have signed a letter to FIFA, the world governing body for soccer, accusing the Palestine Football Association (PFA) and its president, Jibril Rajoub, with severe violations of its statutes, including incitement to terrorism.
Israel is launching a diplomatic offensive against Palestinian calls for FIFA to impose sanctions over football clubs based in Jewish settlements in the occupied territories, an official said on Thursday.
The North American soccer ruling body will announce Monday that the United States, Mexico and Canada will make a bid to host jointly the FIFA 2026 World Cup.
TEL AVIV – A U.S.-based anti-Semitism watchdog is calling on the German government to suspend a new deal funding Palestinian Authority sports agencies until they stop their “blatant sanctification of Jew-killers” by naming tournaments after terrorists.
The premier Dutch soccer league is launching an eSports division that will recognize players as official members of their respective soccer teams.
The governing body of international soccer has fined the Mexican soccer federation $20,000 after fans again broke out in a homophobic chant, this time directed at the U.S. team during a recent World Cup qualifying game.
The four British soccer federations were fined Monday by FIFA for displaying poppies at World Cup qualifying matches in November to honor their war dead.
Football’s ruling world body, Fifa, has banned footballers from wearing poppies on their shirts during an England v Scotland match to be played on November 11 – Armistice Day.
A Palestinian soccer team’s players have posed for a photograph with a banner praising the Palestinian attacker behind this week’s deadly shooting in Jerusalem and calling him a “martyr” and a “hero.”
Malaysia has relinquished the rights to host the 2017 FIFA Congress, a sports official said Monday after the predominantly Muslim country refused to issue visas to Israeli delegates.
Almost 150,000 signatures have demanded international football’s governing body forces the Israel FA to eradicate six of its clubs, or be kicked out of FIFA altogether.
Statistics recently released by the government of Qatar indicate 58 percent of people in the country live in government-designated “labor camps,” highly-monitored neighborhoods designed to control the movement of migrant workers.
The investigation into corruption at the top of FIFA, the governing body of international soccer, alleges that officials entered into a “coordinated effort to enrich themselves through annual salary increases” to the tune of upwards to $80 million over the last five years they held their positions.
The former head of international soccer’s governing body has filed an appeal to have his six-year suspension from the sport reversed.
Authorities in Switzerland and France teamed up on Tuesday to raid the offices of the French Football Federation in connection with the corruption investigation of former FIFA President Sepp Blatter.
A FIFA official has pleaded guilty to taking bribes, money laundering, and wire fraud in a far-reaching investigation that has resulted in indictments for 40 soccer officials.
Despite his candidate not receiving the final nod, U.S. Soccer President Sunil Gulati praised the newly elected FIFA president as a man “committed to reform.”
FIFA’s Extraordinary Congress voted overwhelmingly for a set of reforms Friday morning that the organization describes as sweeping.
Sepp Blatter, former FIFA president, and Michel Platini, the president of the Union of European Football Associations from 2007 until 2015, who were originally banned from soccer for eight years after being found guilty of a conflict of interest in a two million Swiss franc deal, had their sentences reduced to six years by the FIFA Appeal Committee.
UNITED NATIONS (UNITED STATES) (AFP) – A UN study of new sources of financing for its multi-billion-dollar aid operations is recommending a voluntary tax on football matches or concerts as one option to raise funds. The report released Sunday in Dubai
