The head of Palestinian football who questioned Israel’s participation in the FIFA World Cup has claimed the decision to deny him a visa to Australia was politically motivated.
President of the Palestinian Football Association and head of the team’s FIFA committee Jibril Rajoub will not join his national team ahead of a qualification match in Perth tonight.
He told ABC News from Ramallah in the West Bank that he believed there was “some kind of Israeli influence on this decision”.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Monday the decision was made “at arm’s length” by the Immigration Department.
“I think this is a political decision, this is a shame for those who took such a decision … I should attend the game, I should be with our team,” Mr Rajoub said.
Australia is set to play Palestine in a 2026 FIFA World Cup qualification match at Perth Rectangular Stadium tonight.
Mr Rajoub had been vocal against Israel’s participation in the competition last month, claiming it had systematically violated FIFA’s objectives.
The world football’s governing body then postponed a vote on a motion to temporarily suspend Israel over its actions in the Gaza conflict.
Head of the Israeli Football Association (IFA) Shino Moshe Zuares responded to Mr Rajoub by saying it was an “injustice … to fight for our basic right to be part of the game”.
“Make no mistake, the IFA never violated rules set by UEFA or FIFA and will never do so in the future,” Mr Zuares said.
In addition to his role as president of the Palestinian Football Association, Mr Rajoub is also a well-known Fatah operative and a former assistant to the late Palestinian president Yasser Arafat.
Mr Rajoub spent several years in Israeli prisons before being released in a prisoner exchange deal in the 1980s.
Israel Minister for Foreign Affairs Israel Katz on X, formerly known as Twitter, described Mr Rajoub as a “convicted terrorist” who the Australian government had “banned … from entering the country”.
“Rajoub who praised the Hamas massacre on October 7th and called for a similar massacre in Judea and Samaria, is not fit to attend international football matches — he should stay in the Muqata and play wall ball instead,” Mr Katz wrote on Sunday.
