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Chapter 1: What protest is planned outside Dáil Éireann today?
First, though, a planned protest gets underway outside Dollar Air and later today, organised by the Irish-Palestine Solidarity Campaign, which is calling for the Ireland v Israel Nations League fixtures this autumn to be cancelled. The group says the fixtures could be seen as sports washing, and has called on the FAI to cancel Ireland's participation in both legs.
Our reporter Brian O'Connell joins me now. Brian, good morning to you. Today is part of a campaign and there may be more protests to come.
Yes, good morning, David. Organisers of today's protest, it begins at half past 12. It goes on until 2pm outside of Dáil Éireann. And they say it's part of a series of protests until either the Irish government or the FAI cancel it. these two fixtures that Ireland has against Israel after the summer. Now, those behind the protest, they say the FAI has a unique opportunity to lead on this.
They point to the fact that last month, a PFA, which is a Professional Footballers Association survey of over 200 players, showed that 63% of those surveyed said the games should not go ahead. Now, one of the organisers of today's protest is Seamus Fox.
Chapter 2: What reasons do organizers give for canceling the Ireland v Israel fixtures?
And I asked Seamus why the protest is taking place.
This is part of an ongoing campaign that literally started from the moment that the National League matches against Israel were announced. Already, we have leafed it at seven League of Ireland games. We have leafed it at the Ireland versus North Macedonia game. On top of that, we've been organising a very, very powerful email campaign to the FAI.
And our whole purpose in this, Brian, is to get these games cancelled because we think it's absolutely unconscionable that these games should go ahead.
I suppose the counter argument would be Ireland has certain commitments in relation to fulfilling fixtures and that perhaps this is a protest that should be taking place outside the headquarters of UEFA. That's a reasonable enough point.
However, the people who can't get this game cancelled are either the FAI or the Irish government. And that's who the pressure has to go on. To us, it's not only a moral obligation, but a political obligation. when at the various demonstrations and leafleting, there's been a very strong response from the Irish soccer community, the Irish football community.
Do you have any sympathy for the FAI, Seamus?
Oh, I have indeed, and I very much have a strong football background myself. However, Brian, this is just a step too far. I was involved many years ago as part of the Irish anti-parathite movement getting the rugby matches against South Africa cancelled. This is a similar, in my mind, a similar crossing point. These matches are allowed to go ahead. It'll be a shame. on the Irish soccer community.
Is there more protest planned? Oh, yes. Our idea is to have rolling protests between now, well, as you probably know, the first game, the away game is due at the end of September and the home game at the 4th of October. And what we intend doing is building up the campaign over that time. We'll continue our online actions. We'll continue our street actions.
There will also be various meetings bringing together key people from the community.
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Chapter 3: How is the Irish football community responding to the protest?
But we didn't ask Rhys McLennigan or Eamonn Montgomery or James Hickey not to go and compete against the Israeli gymnast. They all went and won medals at that World Cup event and they build up qualification points for the LA Olympics. it would have been absolutely terrible to deny them that opportunity. So that's my own personal view.
And my own personal view will always be informed by the athlete-centric approach. And the other thing that informs it is the governance piece. Sport Ireland don't have any remit here over, you know, what athletes from Ireland compete at international events. The government also, by the way, don't have any remit there. UEFA really is, you know, who should be making the call.
And in fairness to the FAI, they did... put a vote out to their members and they voted in favour of bringing a motion to UEFA. UEFA decided not to accept that motion of taking Israel out of the competition and that's kind of where the book stops. UEFA didn't take this difficult decision and so Ireland have to play that fixture. They will be fined if they don't.
They will have suspensions and they will have fines. Their players will be, as I mentioned already, their players will be left without getting to play a match for their country. And none of this means that people who aren't calling for a boycott are not empathetic to the people of Palestine. You can't conflate the two. There is no monopoly here on empathy.
But I don't want our athletes to have to bear the brunt of that. And they didn't have to do it a few months ago when it was gymnastics.
That was Senator Yvonne McQuillan there. And Brian, you spoke with another current politician who is not supportive of cancelling these fixtures.
As I said, just to get a sense, David, of different political perspectives around this, I spoke to Independent Ireland's Ken O'Flynn. Now, he understands why a protest is taking place outside Dáil Éireann today. He believes that sports and politics, though, should be kept separate. This is some of what the Cork North Central TD had to say.
Well, look, my always thought is when let sports be sports and let politics be politics. Look, I understand where people are coming from. Absolutely. And of course, people have the right to protest. In fairness to the FAI, they came out and they flagged this with UEFA a number of months ago. I don't think we can blame the FAI at all for this. But we have to think about the players.
We have to think about these young men have a very limited time span in their career. We have to think about Ireland standing in the world of sports. And I think we have to be calm about things. And we have to allow sports be sports.
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Chapter 4: What arguments are made against the protest by supporters of the FAI?
So you're questioning what Ireland, not fulfilling this fixture, would actually achieve?
They should be protesting outside Fianna Fáil HQ, outside Fine Gael HQ, and saying, what are you doing with the Occupied Territories Bill? I think that's where it needs to be directed. Politics should stay in its lane of politics, and sports should be allowed to be sports.
Kenneth Flynn there of Independent Ireland. Now, Brian, you also spoke to a former politician who has strong views on this issue.
Well, I spoke with former Fine Gael Minister for Justice Alan Shatter. He felt as well it was unfair on players to be calling for a boycott, but he also felt strongly about this planned protest today, which gets underway at half past 12 outside Dáil Éireann. This is some of what Alan Shatter had to say.
I think this group of people should stop spreading hate. They're running a campaign called Stop the Match. I say to them, stop the hate. Stop trying to sabotage international soccer. Stop trying to sabotage our international football team, which I hope is on the road to recovery after two or three very poor years.
and stop targeting sportspeople with your ideology and your extremism, and stop contaminating League of Ireland football with political banners designed to spread falsity and spread hate.
I suppose if we go back through history, I mean, there are instances where politics and sport have intertwined. Apartheid, I suppose, in South Africa was a big one where there was a lot of pressure on teams not to tour. You don't see this as being part of that tradition of opposition.
There's no similarity at all, and I suspect what this group, who are dedicated to spreading hate and have no interest in peace and harmony breaking out in the Middle East, their sole occupation is to demonise the Israeli state. They're fearful of the Israeli team being seen in Dublin. And I'll tell you why they're fearful of the Israeli team being seen in Dublin.
Because the Israeli team gives the lie to the false depiction of Israel as an apartheid state. Because the Israeli football team represents all communities in Israel until two years ago, their captain was from the Circassian community. There are members of the Jewish community, Muslim community, Christian community have represented Israel at international football level.
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