???????? Ce matin, des militants du @CollectifBAI_PB et @SamidounRP
étaient mobilisés devant le siège de la Ligue de Football Professionnel en marge d'une réunion du CA pour dénoncer la tenue du Trophée des Champions à Tel Aviv.
https://t.co/EJkQGjwO5s#NONauTDCaTelAviv pic.twitter.com/0hk3BvyeAc

— Samidoun Paris Banlieue (@SamidounPB) June 30, 2022

The LFP, which operates under the French Football Federation, has taken on the responsibility of organizing the final match of the Champions Trophy between PSG (Paris Saint-Germain) and FC Nantes on 31 July, 2022, in an Israeli stadium. This is the second consecutive year that the Champions Trophy will be held in Tel Aviv.

This sporting investment in Israeli occupation benefits the occupier at the same time that it is accelerating its policies of terror, colonization, racism and apartheid against the Palestinian people. The Zionist state views Palestinians as a “demographic threat” and systematically aims to dehumanize the Palestinian people. It is responsible for forced displacement, mass incarceration without charge or trial, legal, spatial and economic segregation, land confiscation, as well as acts of torture, assassination and killing against the Palestinian people.

If Israel intends to cover up this reality by exploiting high-level sport, the LFP will not be allowed to ignore it. As the LFP’s board of directors gathered, activists “awarded” the LFP with the “trophy for the best accomplice of apartheid,” symbolized by a cup dripping with red paint.

The activists requested a meeting with Mr. Vincent Labrune, the president of the LFP, but were denied. Nevertheless, the head of human resources at the LFP came to meet them, and they delivered the petition denouncing the holding of the Champions Trophy in Tel Aviv signed by more than 80 organizations. The “bloody” cup was placed on the reception desk of the LFP.

Demonstrators also unfurled a banner in front of the LFP headquarters and chanted various slogans denouncing the LFP’s complicity with Zionism, apartheid and colonialism. They called for a boycott of Israel in support of the Palestinian people and urged the two competing clubs, PSG and FC Nantes, to withdraw from the field of Israeli sportswashing.

A change of location would allow the LFP to align itself with the social responsibility it purports to advance. If the LFP claims to reject hatred, racism and discrimination in the stadium, consistency would dictate that it, therefore, must not host tournaments in the stadiums of a state committing apartheid, a crime based in racial discrimination and a recognized crime against humanity.

Sports associations, human rights organizations and other supporting groups can sign the petition to the LFP at this address:
https://nonautropheedeschampionsatelaviv.fr/

Ce jeudi nous étions avec @SamidounRP devant le siège de la @LFPfr, pour protester contre l’organisation du Trophée des Champions 2022 en Israël. Cette rencontre jouée à Tel Aviv a pour but de sportwasher les crimes de l’occupation et de l’apartheid israéliens. #NONauTDCàTelAviv pic.twitter.com/j6xASIPoHQ

— Collectif Boycott Apartheid Israël- Paris Banlieue (@CollectifBAI_PB) July 3, 2022

In a statement, the Gaza Democratic Sports Forum “condemns and deplores the decision of the French Football Association to organize the final of the Champions Cup on Palestinian land occupied by the Zionist entity… The Democratic Sports Forum calls on all sports federations to fight this decision and to send a message to Arab and international clubs to take a stand against the holding of this event on Palestinian land… France, which claims to brandish the slogans of freedom and human rights, must not engage in such behaviour which only encourages the occupation in its increasing brutality and oppression against our people.”

During a football match between the Nuseirat Club and Al-Jalaa Club on 19 July in the Gaza Strip, both teams held banners against the Champions Trophy in Tel Aviv. They emphasized that Palestinian lives and futures in sports are being constantly hampered and suppressed by the occupation supported by the French Football Federation. Palestinian football players in Gaza cannot travel to matches, while local clubs struggle to survive due to the economic situation caused by the illegal blockade that has persisted for over 15 years. In addition, many Palestinian athletes are injured or killed in Israeli occupation attacks, while other promising athletes are imprisoned and detained, like professional footballer Mahmoud Sarsak, imprisoned and then released in 2012 following a lengthy hunger strike.

More than ever, we strongly condemn the holding of the Champions Trophy in Tel Aviv and pledge to develop the boycott of Israel in all areas against colonialism, racism and apartheid. 

Source: Collectif Palestine Vaincra

This year, once again, the Ligue de Football Professionnel (LFP, Professional french Football League) has decided to hold the next edition of the Champions Trophy (French Super cup) in Israel.  This official match between Paris Saint-Germain, the 2022 champion of France, and FC Nantes, winner of the 2022 French Cup, is to be held on Sunday 31 July at the Bloomfield Stadium in Tel Aviv. ¹

Like the previous edition, the LFP is organising this event together with the Israeli-Canadian businessman Sylvan Adams, “self-proclaimed ambassador of the State of Israel” ² and Comtec Group, the Israeli firm specialising in events organisation, which has among its clients the Israeli government and companies based in illegal colonies in the occupied West Bank.³  For several years, Sylvan Adams has become involved in high-level sports in order to change and improve Israel’s image.⁴

We are strongly opposed to the holding of this match in Israel. This is a sportwashing event, aiming to whitewash the military occupation, the colonisation, the apartheid system of the Israeli State and its crimes.

Since the start of 2022, the Israeli occupation forces have killed almost 60 Palestinians.⁵ Among those victims were two journalists — Shireen Abu Akleh, the star reporter of Aljazeera, and Ghufran Warasneh – as well as 16 teenagers, including two young footballers: Mohammad Ghneim and Thaer Yazouri.

At the same time, the Israeli colonisation goes on apace.  The imprisonments, the threats of imminent expulsion, and the attacks carried out by the settlers, have all intensified.

The Supreme Court of Israel has ruled that almost 1,000 Palestinians can be forced out of their villages in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron in the occupied West Bank, so that their lands be transformed into a new military training zone, whereas the government approves a plan to build 4,500 homes in the illegal colonies.⁶

Israel continues to detain 4,450 Palestinian prisoners, including 160 children.  600 are in ‘administrative detention’, with neither charges nor judgement, like the Franco-Palestinian lawyer Salah Hamouri, held arbitrarily since March 2022.  Since the start of this year, the occupation forces have arrested over 2,140 Palestinians, mainly in occupied Jerusalem and in Jenin.⁷

Israeli settlers, protected by the soldiers, have carried out 133 attacks on Palestinians and their properties in the occupied West Bank.⁵

One year after the last murderous attack by the Israeli army on the Gaza strip, nothing has actually changed.  The territory is still under an illegal blockade.  Few buildings have been reconstructed.  Gaza remains an open-air prison, and still comes under regular Israeli bombardment. Thousands of children in Gaza suffer from mental trauma.⁸

The right of return of millions of refugees, adopted by the UN, is still not respected by the State of Israel, which keeps in conditions of misery the inhabitants of the refugee camps, be they in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Jordan, etc., and which represses their resistance in the occupied territories, as seen recently in Jenin and in Hebron.

These dramas take place in line with several decades of colonial and apartheid policies against the Palestinian people.⁹  To play this match in Tel Aviv would help to mask these realities.

We refuse to see French football and these two teams become complicit in the Israeli violations of international law and of Palestinians’ human rights.

The LFP recently took a strong position by withdrawing from Russia  the rights to broadcast the Ligue 1, in order to punish its invasion and war of aggression in Ukraine. ¹⁰

We urge Mr Vincent Labrune, LFP President, Mr Waldemar Kita, owner and President of Nantes FC and Mr Nasser  Al-Khelaïfi, President-Director General of Paris Saint-Germain, to relocate this event to France or to move it to another country.

We call upon the players and staff members to join us by supporting our request.

Signatories

Football clubs and sports associations

Football du Peuple. Montpellier

Les Débuteuses

Ménilmontant Football Club 1871

Spartak Lillois

Football Populaire de Caen

Supporters’ groups

Paris Saint-Germain Fan Club – Malaysia

Associations and organisations

Football 4 Palestine

Collectif Boycott Apartheid Israël – Paris Banlieue

Jeunes pour la Palestine – Nantes

Collectif Boycott Désinvestissement Sanctions 45

Collectif Boycott Désinvestissement Sanctions 57

Orléans Loiret Palestine

Association France Palestine Solidarité

Association France Palestine Solidarité – Albertville

Association France Palestine Solidarité – Paris Sud

Association France Palestine Solidarité – Nîmes

Association France Palestine Solidarité 63

Association France Palestine Solidarité – Gentilly

Association France Palestine Solidarité 44

Association France Palestine Solidarité – Chambéry

Association France Palestine Solidarité – Paris 14-6

Association France Palestine Solidarité 59/62

Comité France Palestine de Rueil et Suresnes

Collectif Ivryens Pour la Palestine

Association des Palestiniens en France-Aljaliya – Union des associations palestiniennes en France

Forum Palestine Citoyenneté

Collectif Palestine Vaincra

Samidoun Région Parisienne

Mouvement pour une Alternative Non-violente

Mouvement pour une Alternative Non-violente Orléans

Parti communiste des ouvriers de France

Campagne Unitaire pour la Libération de Georges Abdallah

Union Juive Française pour la Paix

Nantes Révoltée

Organisation de Femmes Egalité

Collectif Marseille Gaza Palestine

Collectif Solidarité Palestine Ouest Étang de Berre

Islam & Info

Perspectives Musulmanes

Association des Universitaires pour le Respect du Droit International en Palestine

Les Amis du Théâtre de la Liberté de Jénine

Association Médicale Franco-Palestinienne d’Aubagne

Union syndicale Solidaires

Nouveau Parti Anticapitaliste

Rete dei Comunisti

Front Uni des Immigrations et des Quartiers Populaires – Paris Banlieue

Action Antifasciste Paris-Banlieue

Section du Parti Communiste Français de Rueil-Malmaison et de Garches

Union Nationale des Étudiants de France – Auvergne

Football clubs, sports associations, supporters groups, human rights organizations etc can sign this text by sending an e-mail to signature@nonautropheedeschampionsatelaviv.fr

References

¹ LFP – 17 Mars 2022
https://www.lfp.fr/Articles/Communiqu%C3%A9s/2022/03/17/le-trophee-des-champions-de-retour-a-tel-aviv

² https://www.challenges.fr/economie/sylvan-adams-l-ambassadeur-milliardaire-d-israel_719175

³ https://www.comtecint.com/clients/

⁴ Sylvan Adams is one of the owners and financial backer of the Israel Cycling Academy cycling team, which became Israel Start-Up Nation and then Israel-Premier Tech. This is the first professional Israeli cycling team to get a UCI World Tour license, allowing it to participate in major competitions including the Tour de France.

https://www.radiofrance.fr/franceculture/le-sport-de-haut-niveau-pour-changer-l-image-d-israel-4464466

https://www.francetvinfo.fr/replay-radio/planete-sport/planete-sport-le-milliardaire-qui-voulait-faire-rayonner-israel-par-le-cyclisme_4045671.html

⁵ https://pchrgaza.org/en/israeli-human-rights-violations-in-the-occupied-palestinian-territory-weekly-update-26-may-01-june-2022/

https://www.insideworldfootball.com/2022/04/11/palestine-mourns-death-another-footballer-shot-dead-israeli-forces/

⁶ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/may/05/israeli-court-evict-1000-palestinians-west-bank-area

https://www.francetvinfo.fr/monde/proche-orient/israel-palestine/cisjordanie-israel-approuve-pres-de-4-500-logements-dans-des-colonies_5135032.html

⁷ https://addameer.org/ https://www.addameer.org/media/4759

Israeli authorities have renewed Salah Hamouri’s administrative detention for three months, until September 5th.

https://www.humanite.fr/monde/salah-hamouri-les-autorites-israeliennes-prolongent-sa-detention-administrative-752916

⁸ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANuSxZzKUqE

https://www.franceinter.fr/emissions/le-zoom-de-la-redaction/le-zoom-de-la-redaction-du-vendredi-20-mai-2022

⁹ see reports from NGOs Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch et Betselem
https://www.amnesty.org/fr/latest/news/2022/02/israels-apartheid-against-palestinians-a-cruel-system-of-domination-and-a-crime-against-humanity/

https://www.hrw.org/fr/news/2021/04/27/des-politiques-israeliennes-abusives-constituent-des-crimes-dapartheid-et-de

https://www.btselem.org/publications/fulltext/202101_this_is_apartheid

¹⁰ https://www.leparisien.fr/sports/football/guerre-en-ukraine-la-lfp-stoppe-la-diffusion-de-la-l1-en-russie-04-03-2022-R4BFF3E7OJDEZKMJEO5IGZJJQA.php