One of the most lamentable things I have heard over the last couple of weeks and months as we talk about whether Ireland should fulfil its fixture against a country we believe is enacting a genocide against another is when people say, "But sure Ireland might lose six points". Ireland might lose six points in a Nations League division 2 game and potentially be put down into division 3, but so what? What do we actually lose even more of if we do fulfil a fixture? A couple of years ago Ireland aligned itself to South Africa's case in the ICJ that Israel was committing genocide against the people of Palestine, yet now somehow we expect people adorned in green jerseys to go out onto a pitch, listen to "Amhrán na bhFiann" and then watch the flag of the same nation that we believe is committing genocide against another people - we have aligned ourselves to a case in the ICJ in this regard. I imagine that if we do that we would lose a hell of a lot more than six points. We would lose a portion of ourselves that believes we can call out what is right and what is wrong. One of the other sadder things people say is that we should not mix politics and sport. When did we become a people who believe that politics and sport should not mix? That appears to me to be a new phenomenon. We, rightly, did not raise objections in 1961 or again in 1976 when apartheid South Africa was suspended by FIFA and, rightly, expelled because of the apartheid it inflicted upon its people. We rightly did not object when the former Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, intervened and said that we should not fulfil a fixture against Yugoslavia. Again in 2022 and 2023, we rightly believed that Russia should not partake in sports at any level because of its horrific invasion of Ukraine. Now and only now do we say that politics and sport should not mix. It would seem a luxury on our part if we were to tell the athletes in Palestine and Gaza, who have been directly targeted precisely because of their profile by the State of Israel that politics and sport should not mix. According to the Hind Rajab Foundation, soldiers in Gaza are planting Beitar, Hapoel and Maccabi Haifa flags in the ruins of Palestinian homes and dedicating killings to their clubs. They tag neighbourhood walls with ultras' slogans and they pose for selfies that are then celebrated by online supporter networks. Israeli soldiers are bringing stadium culture and battlefield atrocity and making it merge seamlessly in the ruins of destroyed homes where people have been killed. This is what we have rightly called a genocide and aligned ourselves to. This is not about six points in a Nations League division 2 game. It is not about whether the FAI might lose a bit of its income. It is actually about who we are as a people - a people who have known oppression, who have learned lessons from the many horrors and atrocities of the past and who recognise that never again should mean precisely that. We willingly signed up to the prevention of genocide convention. In doing so, we did not say we will commit ourselves to doing all we can to prevent genocide with the exception of maybe sacrificing six points in a division 2 Nations League game. The Minister of State, Deputy McConalogue, and the Minister in the Department of sport said that they are not going to attend the game. I say "well done" to the Minister, but I believe in leading from the front. If the Minister of State holds the position that he is not going to attend the game, he should not ask any other young Irish person to stand on a pitch, listen to the national anthem and watch the flag of a state being waved that we believe is committing genocide against another.

Sentiment score: -0.21