This page is subject to the extended confirmed restriction related to the Arab-Israeli conflict.Palestinian sports has deteriorated due to the ongoing Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip.
[6] Palestine was on the verge of the 2026 men's World Cup qualifiers when the latest round of conflict between Hamas and Israel began, leaving the Palestinian National Football Stadium in the Israeli-occupied West Bank potentially unsafe for the tournament.
[6] In recent decades there have been calls to ban Israel from international sporting events in response to the jailing and targeting Palestinian athletes, as well as preventing competitors from Gaza from leaving to join their West Bank teammates to play abroad.
[6] Also, two Palestinian volleyball players, Hassan Abu Zuaiter and Ibrahim Qusaya, who played for the national team and the Al-Sadaka Club, were killed in an Israeli attack that targeted the Jabalia camp in the Gaza Strip.
[11] Jibril Rajoub, President of the Palestinian Football Federation, stated that the conflict in Gaza initiated by Israel has caused significant damage to the sports and youth movements.
[3] According to the non-profit Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, the Israeli army detained hundreds of Palestinians from the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of Gaza City, including dozens of women who have been taken to Yarmouk Stadium.
According to the human rights organization "Palestinian males, including children as young as 10 years old and elderly people over the age of 70, were forced to take off all of their clothes except their underwear and line up in a humiliating manner in front of the women detained in the same stadium".
[16] Many stadiums in Gaza were among the structures destroyed by Israeli air and artillery attacks, and some football fields have been repurposed as temporary burial sites for some of the deceased due to the overcrowding or inaccessibility of many cemeteries.
The Palestinian Football Association also announced sending similar messages to FIFA and the International Olympic Committee, citing the "horrific images" at the time of Israel's attack on Yarmouk Stadium, Gaza Strip.
[27] Both FIFA and the International Olympic Committee have avoided a statement condemning the war between Israel and Gaza and the subsequent humanitarian crisis, unlike how they handled Russian invasion of Ukraine.
If taking over sports facilities are a red line, why silence as Israel converts Gaza's historic Yarmouk football stadium into an internment camp?