By Romana Rubeo  

In a wide-ranging FloodGate interview, Bassil Mikdadi explained how football has become a powerful arena for Palestinian identity, solidarity, and resistance.

In a recent episode of the Palestine Chronicle’s FloodGate Podcast, journalist and founder of Football Palestine Bassil Mikdadi spoke with host Ramzy Baroud about how football has become a space where politics, identity, and solidarity converge for Palestinians. 

The conversation highlighted the role of European supporters, the destruction of Gaza’s sports infrastructure, and the rise of the Palestinian national team on the international stage.

It also underscored football’s role in shaping and reflecting Palestinian struggles. Through stadium solidarity, grassroots campaigns, and the persistence of the national team, football remains one of the most visible stages where Palestinians assert unity and demand recognition.

Stadiums as Sites of Solidarity

Supporters’ groups across Europe have increasingly made Palestine part of their match-day culture.

“The PSG ultras have always been committed supporters of the Palestinian cause,” Mikdadi said. “We saw Palestinian flags behind the goal. We saw them march through Munich with a Palestinian flag — something you can actually be arrested for in Germany.”

Mainstream sports media, however, rarely acknowledge these actions.

“Even when there’s a huge Palestine banner in the stadium, coverage acts as if it’s just not happening,” he noted. “It’s frankly ludicrous and a little surreal.”

Football as Political Space

Mikdadi drew a sharp distinction between two kinds of football audiences: those who consume the game as a product and those who live it as supporters.

“There are people who consume the product and there are people who are actual supporters,” he explained. 

“The people who fall in the latter category get the essence of football — that it is a community event and your values are represented by your club.”

He stressed that it is this second group, the ultras, who have taken a clear stance on Palestine.

“What we’ve seen is the people who are actually part of the latter group stand up and say, ‘I really hate this. I don’t want to be affiliated with providing cover or aiding and abetting a genocide. I support the Palestinian people.’”

Attempts to silence or punish these expressions, Mikdadi added, have only strengthened their determination to make Palestine visible in stadiums across Europe.

Gaza’s Central Role and Its Destruction

Mikdadi emphasized that Gaza has always been at the heart of Palestinian sport, making the current devastation especially severe.

“It’s very hard to see long-term how Palestinian sport recovers from this, because Gaza has been integral to Palestinian football,” he said. 

“If you break it down, maybe 10 percent of the footballers who have ever represented Palestine internationally are from Gaza. And it’s always been a factory.”

He noted that while current national team players mostly play abroad, the losses in Gaza are deeply felt.

“I know footballers who played with the national team who have died,” he recalled. “Two players from the first national team, Muhammad Barakat, and a coach from the under-23s — people who were not just average footballers but well-known and part of the team’s history.”

With more than 50 sports clubs destroyed and hundreds of athletes killed, Mikdadi warned that what had been painstakingly built over the years could be undone.

The National Team as a Unifying Force

Even as infrastructure is destroyed and players are lost, Mikdadi stressed that the Palestinian national team remains one of the strongest symbols of unity.

“The national team is the most representative body of Palestinians that you can find anywhere in the world,” he said. 

“You look at a starting eleven and you have players from Gaza, from the West Bank, from Jerusalem, from inside the Green Line, from the diaspora. And when they’re playing in the team, you don’t think: this guy’s from Gaza, that one’s from the West Bank, or that one’s a ’48. They’re all Palestine.”

According to Mikdadi, this sense of togetherness has been central to the team’s progress.

“There are no cliques within the squad — they are all brothers and they are all unified. That’s been the secret to their success,” he explained.

For fans, the team’s collective spirit resonates deeply, offering a rare and tangible expression of Palestinian unity on the global stage.

FIFA’s Double Standards

Asked about FIFA’s decision to suspend Russia but not Israel, Mikdadi did not mince words.

“Obviously, it’s hypocrisy. I don’t think there’s any other explanation,” he said. 

“With Russia, players from Poland, Sweden, and the Czech Republic said, ‘We’re not playing.’ That forced FIFA’s hand. With Palestine, the Association just keeps going to FIFA with legal arguments. That’s not enough.”

Grassroots Pressure and the Future

Mikdadi pointed to grassroots campaigns as a critical force in shifting the conversation.

“Belgium refused to host Israel because municipalities said no. In Norway, fans came to the stadium, displayed Palestinian flags for the entire 90 minutes, and forced the club to donate 100 percent of the gate receipts to Gaza relief,” he recalled.

For Mikdadi, such actions offer a model for change.

“Real change will come when players and fans push together. The Palestinian Football Association doesn’t have a plan B — but it needs one.”

(The Palestine Chronicle)