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Red Card Israeli Racism

Fight Israeli Racism through football

The Israeli government violates international law.  It discriminates against Palestinian Arabs through laws and actions involving ethnic cleansing, cultural genocide and collective punishment.  This discrimination is severe, widespread, and unrelenting.  It is generally unrecognised.

Palestinian footballers suffer their share.  They are arbitrarily arrested and imprisoned without charge, cannot travel freely and cannot meet properly for games and training.

Shamefully, Western governments do almost nothing to stop this racism. We believe that sporting activities can do much to improve relations between communities.  Yet by admitting Israel to international sporting organisations those organisations directly condone the racism. By trying to cut off Israeli inroads into international sporting activities we believe that we can bring pressure on Israel to drop its racism and apartheid policies and laws.

Red Card Israeli Racism objectives.

The RCIR campaign’s main objective is the suspension of the Israeli Football Association (IFA) from UEFA and FIFA until Israel respects the human rights of Palestinians and observers international law.    Subsidiary objectives are:

  • Exclusion of the IFA from hosting any Euro 2020 tournaments
  • Replacement of Israel as host of the UEFA 2015 Women’s U19  tournament.
  • Boycott by UK teams and players of any tournaments planned in Israel and of any matches with Israeli teams
  • Direct support of Palestinian football teams

RCIR also intend to help establish visits by British football teams to Palestine.

Action

To achieve these RCIR challenge football institutions, demonstrate at matches, and spread the message through fan groups.  They work in partnership with all those in the football world and with activists across Europe who oppose racism and oppression wherever it occurs.

About RCIR 

RCIR campaign activists are mostly British or Irish members of organisations that strive to support the Palestinian people: PSC (Palestinian Solidarity Campaign), FOA (Friends of Al-Aqsa),  JBIG (Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods), BIN (Boycott Israel Network) and BNC (Boycott National Committee, Palestine). This work is part of the wider BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) activity that was formally established by Palestinians in 2005.

This campaign is now in its second phase.  The first phase 2011-13  had an immediate objective to move the UEFA June 2013 Under 21 Men’s finals tournament from Israel.  For almost two years UEFA resisted our demands and the demands of footballers and eminent supporters of Palestinian rights.  However, the campaign’s publicity spread widely across Europe and generated the demand for further action.

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