Tag Archives: football

Di Canio in Swindon, the Dog That Didn’t Bark

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Mark Haddon’s book “The Curious Incident Of the Dog In the Night-time” was set in Swindon, referencing the famous dictum by Sherlock Holmes, in the story “The Silver Blaze”

Gregory (Scotland Yard detective): “Is there any other point to which you would wish to draw my attention?”
Holmes: “To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.”
Gregory: “The dog did nothing in the night-time.”
Holmes: “That was the curious incident.”

Throughout the recent furore concerning Paolo Di Canio, the contrast between the reaction to his appointment at Sunderland and his appointment at Swindon has been pronounced. For example, pompous Tory idiot Iain Dale:

It was OK for him to manage little old Swindon Town in League One, but oh no, the thought of him managing Premier League Sunderland is repellent. No, I’ll tell you what is repellent – it’s the so-called ‘liberal left’ deciding who should do what based on whether someone conforms to their own idea of normality or political acceptability. And then, only deciding to enforce their own illiberal ideas when it suits them. Where were the howls of indignation when Di Canio took over at Swindon Town? No one cared, because, well, it was only little old Swindon, wasn’t it?

finalconflictIt is not entirely true of course that there was no reaction to Di Canio’s appointment at Swindon, as I have explained myself before. Several Swindon Town Fans returned their season tickets in protest at his appointment, as admitted by the Club’s chief executive, Nick Watson, in June 2011. Di Canio’s appointment was also noted by the far right, on the neo-Nazi website Final Conflict. (This was not a spoof). Opposition to Di Canio’s appointment at Swindon was also reported in the national press, for example the Daily Mail.

But certainly pressure on Sunderland AFC has been much more sustained. Even the American NBC have reported how the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) have called for Di Canio to be sacked by Sunderland’s American owner, Ellis Short.

Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, dismissed the statement and said Wednesday that Di Canio should be fired, comparing him to sacked Rutgers basketball coach Mike Rice.

“I would say sports is a very special category. Sports plays a very important role with young people,” he said. “I would say racism or bigotry reverberates in a greater way, so the standard needs to be much higher than, I would say, the manager of a garage.”

“Our society uses athletes and sports figures not only to sell Wheaties and sneakers, but also because they are looked up to as role models,” he said. “Here [with Di Canio], I think firing is appropriate.”

Foxman said he believed people could have “an epiphany” about past mistakes and be given a second chance if they had genuinely changed.

“This is not one of those. He [Di Canio] is very clear what he is. He’s both a fascist and a racist and he’s proud of it,” he said.

“For the moment, he denies it [being a fascist and a racist] because his job is at stake,” he added.

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Paolo Di Canio: We Must Oppose Fascism Becoming Acceptable

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di Canio fascist saluteI was delighted at the response of David Miliband in resigning as vice chair of Sunderland after the appointment of open fascist Paolo di Canio as manager. Since then, Durham NUM have asked for their banner to be returned, up until now proudly displayed at the Stadium of Light:

Davey Hopper, General Secretary of the NUM in Durham, and a former secretary at Monkwearmouth pit – on which Sunderland’s Stadium of Light is built – said the fury of his members had sparked the move.

He said: “We are writing to the club asking for the return of the banner unless Di Canio says he is not a fascist. Otherwise his appointment will besmirch the memory of the miners who lost their lives in the fight against fascism in World War II.

“We do not want our union associated with the club now.”

Back in 2011, Wiltshire and Swindon GMB, where I am branch secretary, withdrew our sponsorship and commercial links with Swindon Town FC, when they appointed Di Canio. During the twelve months up to that point we had provided £350 in direct sponsorship, and £3500 in business to the conference/catering arm as we used the club venue for training. We also provided a free advert for season tickets in our branch newsletter with distribution of 5000. These were popular decisions among the branch committee, and the direct sponsorship brought with it free tickets and other benefits that were raffled among members. Small beer compared to some big sponsors, but Wiltshire and Swindon GMB had a genuine commitment to the club.
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They Thought It Was All over

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As England prepare for a World Cup Qualifier double-header Philosophy Football’s Mark Perryman reviews the decline and fall of a Football Nation

Philosophy Football shirtNever mind the debate over the dodgy third goal in ’66, was it or wasn’t it over the line. The most famous piece of commentary in English footballing history, “some people are on the pitch, they think it’s all over, it is now,” proves definitively England’s fourth goal against Germany should have been disallowed. A goal scored with a pitch invasion underway, absolutely against the rules of the game.

And thus England’s 47 years of hurt began. Up to 1966 we’d been World Cup quarter-finalists at best, and no European Cup had been lifted by an English club side either. Spurs had been the first English team to win a European Trophy, the Cup-Winners Cup in 1963, followed by Bobby Moore captaining West Ham to winning the same trophy in 1965.

Immediately after ’66 English club sides did begin to dominate European competitions. In quick succession Leeds, Newcastle and Arsenal won the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, while Manchester United lifted the European Cup in 1968, following north of the border Celtic’s success the previous year. Into the 1970s, apart from the European Cup English club sides continued to do well in the other two European competitions. Chelsea, Manchester CIty, Liverpool, Spurs all won these tournaments, while any Leeds fan of a certain age will tell you that their club, not Bayern Munich, were the ‘true’ winners of the 1975 European Cup with disallowed goals robbing them of victory.

It was the late 1970s to mid 1980s however when English domination of Europe really established itself. Liverpool winning the European Cup in 1977, 1978, 1981, 1984. Nottingham Forest’s back-to-back wins in 1979 and 1980. Aston Villa in 1982. This was a remarkable run of success. But after the 1985-1990 ban of English club sides from European club competitions following the Heysel final involving Liverpool and Juventus which led to 39 deaths from a combination of rioting and poor stadium facilities, nothing like this kind of domination.

Since the English clubs were re-admitted, they have won just four Champions Leagues in 21 years. Spanish clubs can boast 6 wins, Italian 5. As for the UEFA Cup and the Europa League, just one win since 1992, Liverpool’s in 2001.

This season’s failure of a single English club side to make it through to the Champions League quarter-finals has been widely commented on as the worst English performance since 1996. But actually the decline and fall of English club sides’ dominance of Europe goes considerably deeper than this. In ’66 the fans and the clubs might well have thought it was ‘all over’, a golden period of club football about to begin. But despite all the Premier League-driven hype it has never recovered anything like the heights of 30 years ago. The sweet irony of the centrepiece of the FA’s 150th Anniversary Celebrations being a Champions League Final in the season of English clubs’ worst performance in the competition not to be missed.

If the situation for English club sides in Europe doesn’t look too good, this is nothing compared to the England team. After Euro ’96 and reaching the semi-final, the bare minimum surely for a major football nation in a home tournament, there’s been no progress beyond the quarter-finals at a Euro or World Cup since. Never mind the nearly five decades of hurt, these past 17 years have been bad enough. In European terms Croatia and Russia can claim to have done better, with a semi-final each since ’96 and not at home either. Turkey has managed two semi-final appearances. The Czech Republic reached the final in ’96 and the semi again in 2004. Apart from that little lot England can’t claim to come anywhere close to matching the records of Holland, Portugal, Italy, Germany, France and Spain in European Championship and World Cups since ’96. And then there’s Greece, who we squeezed past in 2001 to make sure of qualifying for the following year’s World Cup, and then they had the cheek to go and win Euro 2004, a feat that still remains beyond the reach of England.

What might be the reasons for this spectacular failure? In their excellent book Why England Lose, authors Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski offer a number of reasons, the principle one being that given the size of England’s population and number of professional footballers, being regular quarter-finalists but not much better is the kind of position we should expect in world football. This sits uneasily with our martial and imperial history and the fact we like to think we invented the game; but in reality it’s a theory not too far wide of the mark. It is the expectation that somehow 1966 wasn’t the blip it has proved to be and being a world power in football is our natural position in sporting life that distorts the magnitude of our failure . To that extent the 4-1 defeat to Germany at World Cup 2010 may prove a more important benchmark for the next 47 years than 1966 has proved to be for the past 47 years. It is unlikely ever again, certainly not in 2014 for anybody in their right mind, that England will go to a major tournament expecting to win it. And so when we make it to the quarters and not much further, we can be pleased with ourselves rather than agonising over the latest in the game of what-might-have-beens but weren’t.

I would add some other factors too. Firstly the psychological. In an England tournament squad the players know the expectations are unreasonably high. At club level they are mostly idolised — many have win a cabinet full of winners’ medals already — and they play their international football every season in the Champions League. Yet with England, unless they defy history and get past the quarters they are losers at best, vilified at worst. They can’t win. Secondly, our style of play. And as fans we’re culpable in this too. The English love a fast-moving physical game, ‘get stuck in’ with loads of commitment. Good enough to get England to the quarter-finals, but not many tournaments are won playing like this. Thirdly the narrow base of team recruitment. Despite all the changes in our society, professional footballers still come overwhelmingly from a narrow, and numerically declining, social base. And entire communities are entirely under-represented: Asian, Chinese, East European and other sizeable immigrant communities hardly feature in the professional game. No this isn’t the much touted “political correctness gone mad,” it’s ensuring we draw on all the talents that might be available. England doesn’t.

Fourthly we fail to learn from others. Yes there are foreign players, managers and coaches in English football. But the changes they bring with them still hardly impact on club football, and on the national team scarcely at all. It’s all a bit foreign, and what do we have to learn from the Germans, the Spanish and the Italians anyway? This inward-looking cocksureness largely insulates football from other far more successful sports too. How many of those who’ve excelled in establishing regimes that produce winners in other sports are headhunted to contribute something to football? Finally, our lack of experience of tournament football. Age-group competitions at a European and World Cup level are consistently undervalued, with the best players often not even sent there to represent England. And apart from the 2012 exception no England team competes in the Olympic football tournament, for many young players an essential experience towards a future World Cup. One simple solution: introduce what would be a hugely popular and highly competitive football tournament in the Commonwealth Games.

Five ideas; there will be plenty more. Just the kind of thing the FA should be debating as part of its 150th anniversary. Instead, England appear to be quaking in their boots at the prospect of the must-win game against Montenegro next Tuesday. This is a country with a population roughly comparable to the numbers living in the London Borough of Hammersmith. OK we seem to be as safe as houses facing San Marino in the first of the World Cup double headers, but plucky Montenegro have us worried. Looking back at our accumulated decline and fall, club and country, since 1966 with good reason.

Mark Perryman is the co-founder of the self-styled sporting outfitters of intellectual distinction, aka Philosophy Football

England Should Play a Game of Low Expectations

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Tonight England vs Brazil at Wembley marks the start of the FA’s 150th Anniversary Celebrations. Philosophy Football’s Mark Perryman argues that it is the perfect time to lower our expectations of England’s chances.

Philosophy Football t shirtEngland vs Brazil, friendly or no friendly, is a tasty international fixture to mark the start of the Football Association’s 150th birthday celebrations. It will be a feast of free-flowing football, and England. Never mind, with the other home opponents lined up so far the Republic of Ireland (last qualified for a World Cup in 2002, at Euro 2012 failed to win a single game) and Scotland (last qualified for any tournament, 1998) England fans should be able to look forward to some home victories to savour. Although what exactly the players, manager and coaches will learn by playing such relatively lowly opposition is anyone’s guess. These opponents have been chosen to put bottoms on seats, and stir up memories of old, and more recent rivalries, but never mind the quality of the football.

Meantime Brazil are not only the 5-times winners of the World Cup, and hosts of the 2014 tournament; they also single-handedly invented what Pele famously dubbed ‘the beautiful game’. Or as Brazil international, doctor, philosopher and left-wing political activist Socrates poetically put it, “Beauty comes first. Victory is secondary. What matters is joy.” Words which, naturally have been turned into a Philosophy Football T-shirt available here.

Brazil have had their own problems – a disappointing semi-final defeat at World Cup 2010 following their Quarter Final exit at World Cup 2006. This is a team however whose high expectations are based on recent success: winning the tournament in 2002, that semi-final in 2010, finalists in 1988 is all a lot more recent than anything England has achieved – I’m sorry, I don’t count England getting to a semi-final in ‘96 when we are the tournament hosts.

Philosophy Football t shirt backThe period since Euro 96 has been a successful one for the England team, relatively speaking. Every tournament, except Euro 2008, was qualified for. This compares well with the 1990s when England failed to qualify for World Cup 94, the 1980s when the team failed to qualify for Euro 84 and the dismal 1970s with failures to qualify for the World Cup in both 1974 and 1978. The much maligned Sven Goran Eriksson took England to three consecutive quarter final stages, in 2002, 2004 and 2006. The latter two lost on penalties, while at World Cup 2002 England lost to the eventual winners of the tournament, tonight’s opponents Brazil. Very few England managers have come close to match Sven’s achievement. Roy Hodgson has started well too, surprising many by taking England to the top of their group at Euro 2012 and going out on penalties to Italy in the quarter-finals. Not bad, but not good enough many England fans would argue, with the 47-year old memories of 1966 still fresh in the nation’s memory. Yet as Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski argue in their provocatively titled book Why England Lose comparatively speaking, in terms of England’s size of population and number of professional players, getting into the top eight of the World’s teams is a considerable achievement. It’s just that England’s national psyche, which is largely impossible to separate from the legacy of empire, the martial history and having invented most of the world’s sports, expects to win trophies and nothing much else will do.

Up to World Cup 2010 the popular support for the England team was huge. Every other summer the country would be decked out in St. George Cross flags. Beckham helped football reach a wider audience in the way Gazzamania did before him at Italia 90. And the team resembled serious enough contenders not to lose all hope that when they got knocked out that they might at least do better the next time. The linkage, often unfairly made, of following England with hooliganism also pretty much ended after Euro 2000 with every tournament since then England fans coming home feted for their friendliness.

World Cup 2010 pretty much dented all of this. The team was arguably the strongest since 1996. With Wayne Rooney we had a world-class player in our starting eleven. The spine of the team was looking good too from Ashley Cole at the back, Lampard and Gerrard in midfield. Plus the promise Theo Walcott had shown with his hat-trick against Croatia in the qualifying campaign. The sorry exit at the hands of Germany, losing 4-1, at the last sixteen stage following a series of dismal group games put paid to all of that pent-up optimism. The turmoil over John Terry, his manager, Fabio Capello’s, resignation over the way the FA was treating the matter, his awkward reinstatement, widely perceived as at the expense of Rio Ferdinand, and the apppintment of Roy Hodgson as manager had left pre-Euro 2012 interest at an all-time low. Yes England can still fill Wembley, as it will do tonight, and count on a size of support that dwarfs most other European countries, home and away. But in terms of the much bigger broader audience, with a St. George Cross flying out of every other car window, worn as a T-shirt and daubed on kids’ faces, there was precious little of this during last year’s Euro 2012. The TV viewing figures were impressive enough but this was more a case of going through the motions from the comfort of the sofa; there was little of the magnitude of the spectacle of London 2012. In last year’s summer of sport, from Chelsea winning the Champions League, via Wiggo winning Le Tour, to Europe’s victory in the Ryder Cup and Andy Murray ending the British Tennis version of the years of hurt in New York, well England at the Euros hardly merits even a footnote.

And the immediate future doesn’t look much brighter either. A qualifying group for the 2014 World Cup which had looked easy turned awkward almost from the start. The away qualifier against Montenegro (total population around the size of the London Borough of Hammersmith) has all of a sudden turned into a must-win game; the last time England were there in 2011 we scrambled a draw. And even if England do get to Brazil for the 2014 World Cup the expectations which were low enough for Euro 2012 are likely to be lower still. Meanwhile England will around the same time be hosting the first three days of the Tour de France. A decent performance this year by Wiggo, Cavendish and Froome could leave the previously unrivalled ascendancy of England’s tournament campaign shaping the sporting summer severely dented, if not irreparably damaged,for the second time in three years.

So enjoy the game, but give a thought to the sport’s future as the goals rain in, hopefully in the back of Brazil net, not ours. Optimism cannot be entirely extinguished, otherwise what’s the point of being a fan? However getting used to being around the 8th best team in the world probably isn’t quite how those organising the FA’s centenary in 1963 envisaged the following fifty years through to 2013. A decent performance at the 1962 World Cup, yes once again losing a quarter-final, and spookily it was to Brazil once more, the eventual tournament winners that year too, was the cause of some hope. And they would have been looking forward as well to hosting the World Cup three years later in 1966 with the emerging talent of a youthful Bobby Moore suggesting this team had some considerable promise. Today there is precious little optimism, the crop of young players coming through look decent enough but well-short of being world beaters so far at any rate. The public excitement around the England team will take something really special in the difficult conditions of Brazil to restore it to anything like its previous scale. Still, if we finish the year having beaten Scotland at Wembley, plenty will be happy enough. Maybe actually the FA’s 150th anniversary fixture list is inspired after all, by the management of low expectations?

Mark Perryman is the co-founder of the self-styled ‘sporting outfitters’ of intellectual distinction, aka Philosophy Football.

David Beckham Symbolises Everything That is Wrong in Society

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Becks

David Beckham symbolises everything that is wrong in our society. The fanfare with which he recently announced he is to donate his entire salary from his new club, Paris St-Germain, to local children’s charities in Paris bore all the hallmarks of a cynical PR stunt, performed with the objective of enhancing his public profile. The fact he used the plight of poor children to do so is surely reflective of a sick culture in which wealth and virtue are considered two sides of the same coin.

Let’s be clear: David Beckham is someone who doesn’t visit the bathroom in the morning without pondering over how it will either enhance or distract from a public persona which attests to the massive edifice we have erected to the false gods of celebrity.

Even more insidious has been the plaudits his ‘charitable gesture’ have earned him from a mainstream press which puts the ‘sick’ in sycophancy. The plaudits were exactly as anticipated and intended, with no thought of the deeper implications and/or symbolism of what can be accurately described as the mythological equivalent of Apollo descending from Mount Olympus to bestow his beneficence on us mere mortals.

Too, no one should be in any doubt that Brand Beckham will have been mindful of the changed social attitudes towards the tax affairs of the super rich, both individual and corporations, and obscene wealth in general. Thanks to the sterling work of grassroots campaigns such as UK Uncut a harsh light has been shone on the level of inequality that bedevils our society, and the West as a whole, at a time when the emphasis on the part of governments throughout Europe and the industrialised world, in response to a global economic crisis caused by the greed of the rich, has been to make the poor and ordinary working people suffer.

When are we going to start taxing the rich in this country and beyond in a manner befitting a civilised society? It is no exaggeration to state that the gap between the haves and have nots in the 21st century has reached levels that were last witnessed in ancient Rome.

The owners of David Beckham’s new club, Paris St-Germain, is the Qatar Investment Authority. This is the foreign investment arm of the Qatari Government, controlled by the Al Thani family, who’ve ruled the Gulf State since the middle of the 19th century. Qatar is currently engaged in massive global project to enhance its international profile via the disbursement of some of the billions it is raking in from its considerable oil and gas deposits. Through the Qatar Investment Authority it has amassed significant shares in companies and organisations as diverse as banks, oil companies, football clubs, and media corporations. The Qataris founded and own the news network Al Jazeera. Qatar itself is home to a major US military and air force base.

This is the new company being kept by David Beckham.

On a deeper level isn’t it reflective of something deeply rotten that in a rich economy such as the French there are still children who are reliant on charity? The same rhetorical question can be levelled at the UK, Germany, the United States, and every other western country. And yet we presume to point the finger, and often times missiles, at other countries for what we consider to be the regressive state of their cultural values and civilisation.

Philanthropy and charity on the part of the rich is no substitute for social and economic justice. Progressive taxation and civilisation are inextricably linked, with the amount of the former determining the extent of the latter in any given period. Poor children in Paris or elsewhere do not need a Crassus to care for them. Instead they need a government that understands the immorality of allowing extreme wealth to devolve to a small minority at the same time as millions of its people, children among them, are mired in poverty. One, in fact, is contingent on the other in a circular relationship that in its current state is deeply exploitative and verily reeks of injustice.

The David Beckhams of the world are as much prisoner as perpetrator of this state of affairs. They live a rarefied existence that distorts the human experience, which in the last analysis leaves them bereft of what it is to be human – in other words the bonds of solidarity that give life proper meaning and a true sense of worth.

Time for Uefa to Act on Serbia – or Become an Irrelevance

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European football’s governing body will be complicit in the spread of racism if it fails to take meaningful action after the ugly scenes on Tuesday night
by Greg Leedham, Morning Star

Footballer Danny RoseFootball comment: The sheer effrontery of the Serbian FA to claim that no racism was evident during Tuesday night’s Euro 2013 play-off can surely only be matched by the fear that Uefa will again let them off the hook. At a glance, European football’s governing body has issued fines of £107,000, £16,000 and £11,000 to the Balkan nation’s football authorities for incidents of racism and hooliganism over the last nine years.

On one occasion the punishment extended to Serbia’s away fans being banned from attending three away games. Yet Tuesday night’s match, which saw England’s black players subjected to vile monkey chants as well as being targeted with missiles, is an indicator that these paltry disciplinary measures are having little effect. Worse still, Uefa’s meek response to such incidents seems to have emboldened the Serbian FA, by no means alone in having problems with racism in their country, who have shamefully denied that anything unsavoury took place — despite racist chants being clearly audible to anyone watching the match from the comfort of their home.

Uefa have long talked a good fight on racism and hooliganism. Only last year their president Michel Platini said that Serbia would face a ban if they were involved in another incident like that seen in Krusevac. Now it is time for Platini to make good on his bold words. Otherwise his organisation will become an irrelevance in the fight against racism or, much worse, complicit in its spread. The fact remains that footballers, often criticised for being overpaid, are workers. And, as former footballer Luther Blissett pointed out at the CWU Black Workers’ Conference last weekend, the pitch is a footballer’s workplace — and no-one should have to go to work in fear of being racially abused or assaulted.

The inevitable riposte to English critics of Serbia is that we are in no place to point fingers, given recent racism rows involving Luis Suarez and John Terry. The argument is not invalid, but in both instances the authorities took action, while Terry faced a criminal trial.
Uefa have subjected Serbia to no such scrutiny, something which must now surely change.

Pro-palestinian Activists Score Against Apartheid at Tynecastle Park in Edinburgh

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According to the Sunday Herald:

“It wasn’t much fun being an Israeli footballer at Tynecastle yesterday. Lashed by the rain, barracked by pro-Palestinian demonstrators – and seven goals down at half-time…against a noisy backdrop of protests about the imprisonment of Palestinian footballers. The Israeli national anthem was jeered, and the players booed…the demonstrators’ chants for Scotland to score 10″

Palestinian Hunger Striker Mahmoud Al Sarsak Nears Death

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While millions all over Europe have been feasting on the European Football Championships this past week, Palestinian footballer Mahmoud Al Sarsak remains on hunger strike in Israeli detention in protest at being held for almost three years without being convicted of a crime. At time of writing he has been on hunger strike for over 80 days and his condition is deteriorating rapidly.

Mahmoud was arrested in July 2009 while travelling from his home in Gaza to the West Bank to train with the Palestinian national football team. He had obtained a permit to travel from the Israeli authorities beforehand and yet upon arriving at the Erez Crossing in the Gaza Strip he was arrested and taken for interrogation. He is being held under the Unlawful Combatant Law, which allows Israel to detain Palestinians from Gaza indefinitely without charge or criminal proceedings being brought to court. This means that Mahmoud has not been given any opportunity to hear the evidence against him or defend himself. Moreover, he has been prevented from having any contact with his family whilst in detention.

As with every other Palestinian prisoner held by Israel, Mahmoud was transferred to a prison outside of the Occupied Territories. This is illegal under Articles 49 and 76 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits the transfer of prisoners from an occupied territory to that of the occupying state.

UN Special Envoy to the Occupied Territories, Richard Falk, has called for the 25 year old’s release, saying that ‘he has suffered immensely.’

Mahmoud was only recently visited by an independent doctor in detention, but he continues to be denied treatment in an outside hospital.

The Palestinian prisoners’ support organisation Addameer have posted a list of demands on its website by the Palestinian Council of Human Rights Organisations (PCHRO), which is a coalition of 21 Palestinian human rights organisations operating in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHRI). They

  • demand that all hunger strikers in advanced stages are moved immediately to civilian hospitals where they can receive the standard of care necessary;
  • call for immediate intervention for the IPS to provide all hunger strikers with unrestricted access to independent doctors;demand that all hunger strikers are allowed family visits;
  • urge the Member States of the United Nations to urgently put pressure on Israel to end its policy of arbitrary detention and to abide by the standard rules for the treatment of prisoners adopted in 1955, which set out what is generally accepted as being decent principle and practice in the treatment of prisoners;
  • call on the European Parliament to activate the parliamentary fact-finding mission that includes members of its Subcommittee on Human Rights to investigate the conditions of detention of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons;
  • emphasise that the parliamentary fact-finding mission must include an investigation into Israel’s illegal practice of administrative detention and the use of the “Unlawful Combatant Law”;
  • urge Members of the European Parliament to bring the case of all three hunger strikers to the attention of relevant Israeli authorities without delay.

Notable has been the lack of press coverage of Mahmoud’s plight in the West. This follows the pattern set when 2000 Palestinian prisoners staged a mass hunger recently over Israel’s policy of holding prisoners indefinitely under the Orwellian category of administrative detention, which like the Unlawful Combatant Law allows the Israeli authorities to hold prisoners indefinitely.

As the European Football Championships dominate the minds of football fans in the UK and across Europe, in Israel a young Palestinian football player clings to life in protest at being held in prison for almost three years without any charges being brought.

Consequently, the only conclusion that can be drawn is that Mahmoud Al Sarsak’s crime in the eyes if his Israeli captors is to be a Palestinian.

Argentinian Footballers in Solidarity with the Mothers of the ‘disappeared’

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We are bombarded daily by the World Cup. The organisers of the event claim that it is non-political, yet it is dominated by large multinatonal corporations.

Here you can see a photograph of the Argentine football team holding a banner. THIS PHOTO WAS CENSURED BY THE INTERNATIONAL PRESS AND YOUTUBE HAS ALSO BLOCKED IT TODAY. Why?

The banner simply states that the members of the football team support the call for the for the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Who are these mothers? They are the mothers of young men and women who “disappeared” during the Dirty War carried out by the Argentine Military Junta between 1976 and 1983.

An estimated 30,000 “disappeared”, that is were killed, because they were socialists, communists, trade unionists, community organisers, students, activists and so on who opposed the military dictatorship. Some of these young women had babies, about 500 in total, who were not returned to their natural families to live with their grandparents as their own parents had been killed. The babies were given to military families who supported the dictatorship.

One day a week between 1977 and 2006 the Mothers, now grandmothers, would walk around the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires demanding to know what had happened to their children. They even did this during the dictatorship and for their bravery three of the mothers also disappeared, that is were killed, for daring to question the military dictatorship.

The present football team now supports the call for these mothers to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace.