Barcelona football club concluded its highly publicised two-day ‘peace tour’ of Israel and the West Bank Sunday night with a football workshop with Israeli children in the presence of 12,000 adoring fans and Israeli President Shimon Peres at Tel Aviv’s Bloomfield Stadium.
The clinic was followed by a friendly match between the world-famous Spanish team and hand-chosen Israeli and Arab children with connections to the president’s Peres Centre for Peace.
Summing up the message of the event, Peres told the crowd in English: “Play football and make friends. Don’t make war and make enemies.”
The whirlwind pre-season tour, which has been in the planning stages since February, was originally scheduled to feature a friendly match with a mixed Israeli-Palestinian team as Barcelona’s opposition, in an echo of a previous match staged at the Spanish club’s Nou Camp stadium in 2005. However, the idea failed to receive approval from the Palestinian Football Association.
The team, which included superstar players Lionel Messi, Andres Iniesta and Daniel Alves, arrived in Israeli Sunday having first stopped over in Bethlehem in the West Bank, immediately heading for Jerusalem’s holiest site the Western Wall, where the players were photographed praying and leaving traditional messages in between the ancient stones.
From the Old City, they travelled to Peres’ official residence for a reception hosted by the President in the presence of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Education Minister Shai Piron and Culture and Sports Minsiter Limor Livnat.
Welcoming the stars to the Jewish State, Peres described it as “a dream come true for all Israeli and Palestinian children”. Hailing the “timely decision”, in the immediate aftermath of last week’s reopening of direct peace talks between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators in Washington, he invoked the club’s ties with humanitarian work, which he said had earned them a reputation as “messengers of peace”.
“At our football academies Israeli and Palestinian children play together. Passing the ball from player to player overcomes any conflict. The children continue to train together even in times of tension. I would like to add that we pray for the success of the current peace talks between us and the Palestinians, their success is crucial for our future. Your visit here is an added contribution to that prayer of peace through the language of football,” he said.
His address was echoed by Netanyahu, as he joked that the footballing giants could succeed where past peace attempts had failed, if only they joined the negotiating team.
Heralding the importance of sport in creating common ties between disparate peoples, he drew comparisons between the game of football and politics, whilst invoking the fragile Middle East landscape, insisting: “You also have common goals: what you usually want to do is score opposite your rivals, but also protect your home base, the goal, your goal. And, you know, there’s something else: if you win, everybody shares in the victory; if you lose… No, no, no, we don’t lose, but if you have a tie, then it’s your responsibility.”
Club President Sandro Rosell described the tour as “a historic moment for us”, as he acknowledged the limitations of a sporting team, but insisted that by drawing on the common support from both Israeli and Palestinian fans alike, they could “find meeting points to help you along the road to peace”.
Invoking the revived peace process, he concluded: “We know that the road to peace through dialogue is a long one and that it will be full of obstacles, but it is a worthwhile objective. Your future is also the world’s future, and that is why we all want this road to lead you to success."
On arrival in the West Bank Saturday, the team visited the renowned Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, which last July was granted UNESCO World Heritage Status in response to a Palestinian Authority (PA) appeal and in spite of Israel arguing against the gift on the grounds that it was a politically-motivated appeal designed at aiding its intended appeal for unilateral statehood at the UN.
Following a group photo outside the Basilica, the team held a private meeting with PA President Mahmoud Abbas at his government headquarters, where the head of the Palestinian Football Association Jibril Rjoub said the visit represented a “big step towards our desire for peace”. Rosell responded that Barcelona would “do everything we can to do our little bit to help resolve this conflict and achieve peace”.