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FIFA chief supports Palestinian goals on home debut

SoccerNews in General Soccer News 26 Oct 2008

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FIFA head Joseph Blatter, in the West Bank on Sunday for the first Palestinian football international to be played at home, gave his backing to Palestinian political goals off the field.

“I can tell you that football brings you hope,” he said, standing alongside Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and prime minister Salam Fayyad.

“Football is hope for politicians to reach the goal. This is a small goal, as the president and the prime minister try to reach a big goal,” said the president of football's world governing body.

Blatter said he was “proud” to be attending the Palestinian-Jordan international to be played later Sunday in Al-Ram, saying it would be an “historic” event.

Speaking to reporters outside Abbas's headquarters in the nearby West Bank town of Ramallah, he voiced support for the “political goals” of the Palestinian people.

In the past, the Palestinians have hosted international games outside their own territory, mainly in neighbouring Jordan, because of the precarious security situation and the lack of adequate infrastructure at home.

But on Sunday, they were to play a friendly against Jordan at a newly-built stadium at Al-Ram just outside Jerusalem, the first in the territory to meet the requirements for international play set by FIFA.

The game is the culmination of months of tireless work by Jibril Rajub, a general who has headed the Palestinian football federation since May after gaining a reputation for toughness as head of the Palestinian Authority's feared preventive security agency.

“This match is a significant message to the world that the Israeli occupation, the closures and the difficult living conditions have not defeated the determination of the Palestinian people, who keep smiling and believe in a better future,” Rajub told AFP.

Under Rajub's leadership, a Palestinian first division championship was revived in October, eight years after it was halted amid the violence of the Palestinian uprising known as the intifada.

The games are broadcast to the Arab world by the Saudi-owned ART television network.

Palestine has been affiliated to FIFA since 1998 even though the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip are yet to gain independence.

The federation financed the construction of the stadium, which features a synthetic lawn and 6,000 seats and is named after Faysal Husseini, an east Jerusalem Palestinian leader who died in 2001.

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