Ireland are set to play Israel - which means we have already lost

It has been some time since the announcement of an Irish football squad has had this level of anticipation. Heimir Hallgrímsson knows that when his chosen squad is revealed on Thursday for the matches against Israel, the attention will be on any omissions not related to a known injury. There may be none; being selected to represent your country remains, for most, the ultimate honour.

This time, however, some players may find that feeling tested by a personal challenge that should never have arisen. The cowardice of the FAI board means responsibility for choosing to play a football match against a nation conducting a genocide rests with each individual player. This is unreasonable and inappropriate.

Those who argue that politics has no place in sport are delusional. Politics is part of every aspect of life. Sport is no exception. Those who argue there are precedents are ignorant of the facts. Never, in my lifetime, has a genocide been sponsored by western powers, as is the case with Israel’s onslaught on Palestine.

There are some who argue the genocide case is as yet unproven but it’s not about a legal process that, correctly, takes years to complete. We must act in the meantime on the basis of known facts and the evidence of Israel’s purposeful campaign of terror meets the genocide charge.

When organisations face decisions of real substance it is for those in charge to fully inform themselves before making a choice. Genocide is considered the most serious international crime so it would seem reasonable as a matter of principle to refuse – point blank – to engage with any nation viewed as guilty of such a horror. The idea of playing football against Israel should be so repugnant that it would register as inconceivable.

Last November the FAI board agreed. It formally asked Uefa to ban Israel. One assumes the board believed then that no nation, no group of players, should be asked to fulfil a fixture against Israel as long as its State-backed barbarism continued. It was rightly applauded for taking this stand, for putting principle ahead of any other consideration.

That was then; from the moment Ireland were drawn to play Israel the principle involved was put away.

[ FAI’s John Martin: ‘I think we all agree we shouldn’t be in the position where we have to play the game’Opens in new window ]

The FAI’s decision to play Israel has to be seen in the wider institutional context. The Government’s shameful delays on the Occupied Territories Bill set a poor example for other institutions. In sport the FAI is not alone in its abandonment of ethical conduct. The GAA has disgraced itself by its refusal to cut its commercial relationship with Allianz. It is the actions of Irish football, however, that offer Israel badly needed succour.

[ Allianz rejects allegation that it is complicit in genocideOpens in new window ]

The matches with Israel will proceed. The implications are profound. The scores on September 27th and October 4th do not matter, once the games are played there’s only one winner and it’s not Ireland.

The protesters have done all we can; the board has won the argument but Israel has won the day.

The Government is no less guilty of breaching the idea that human rights and justice should come before sport. It has failed in meeting many of its responsibilities on this genocide since it began. Its behaviour gives cover to others. The FAI found it in ready supply. In supporting the idea of the games going ahead, Taoiseach Micheál Martin made inane and wildly inappropriate comments about the form of the team. “There’s a rejuvenation, there’s a journey ahead for the Irish team,” Martin said in February. “They’ve been doing very well so far, and we wish them well.”

[ Gavin Cooney: FAI doesn’t want to find out what repercussions of boycotting Israel game would beOpens in new window ]

So now we are days away from putting points and money earned in matches against Israel ahead of the lives of tens of thousands of civilians including more than 25,000 children.

Principle is a cheap enough commodity, it seems.

[ Kenny Cunningham: ‘It would be a good thing to see the Israeli team come on to the pitch in Dublin’Opens in new window ]

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