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Between Compassion and Complicity. Money in sport confirms it is political

Aug 17, 2026

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Gianni Infantino and a golden shower world cup final

Between Compassion and Complicity. Money in sport confirms it is political

Yesterday, August 14th 2026, I was in extreme inner turmoil as I watched the World Surf League women’s final in Tahiti.

Erin Brooks represented Canada, and Anat Lelior represented Israel.

Over the last few years, the world has finally woken up to the terrible actions of the state of Israel, not simply since October 7th, 2023, when an atrocity happened to them and their people, but from the beginning of the state of Israel in 1948.

We continue to watch the live feed of settler violence and colonisation, amplification of the apatheid state, the ongoing genocide in Gaza, and the associated destruction of Southern Lebanon. We watch as many young people in the IDF celebrate the destruction of Palestine, cosplay in the clothing of people who have been forced from their homes.

We listen to the endless justification. Yet a total refusal by Israel to allow access to Gaza by Western media is evidence enough that their actions must remain hidden from scrutiny.

Young Palestinian kids are imprisoned for throwing rocks at the Israeli. Meanwhile, the Israelis hold guns. Any statement of equivalence is a sham. The IDF is one of the most resource-rich armies in the world, and its targets defend themselves with whatever they can. As I would if I were in that position. Stones against guns.

The hardcore Zionists believe that they have the supreme right to the land. This is no secret. It is on record. Hardcore Christian Zionists like Mike Huckabee, the American ambassador to Israel, also believe this.

Public opinion of Israel has been overwhelmingly lost. In my country, around 79% of our population no longer supports Israel, higher even among the younger generation.

In the USA, political backing by the long-powerful AIPAC has become a losing bet.

The recent comment by Netanyahu that the UK is now the”Islamic Republic of Britain” was not a slip of the tongue. Netanyahu is a master at manipulating the public narrative to continue his hold on power. He knows the public opinion is lost, so now seeks to use the most popular hate tool the West has. The fear of Muslims taking over our countries and turning us into whatever people fear they will turn us into.

Before Muslims, it was Catholics, or Irish, or Chinese, or black people. There is always another scary group waiting in the wings to usurp ‘our’ way of life. Hate on another is the most well-used tool for the power holders to keep the people distracted.

And Israel continues its bloody and brutal campaign. My government, the USA, Europe – they all continue to back Israel as it amplifies its agenda to the erasure of Palestine. It makes me deeply ashamed.

Not all Israelis, and certainly not all Jews, support the actions of Israel. But the majority of Israelis do.

I read the commentary in the social media posts about the final event yesterday. Many people are upset that the WSL allows an Israeli to compete. As I am. And some people say politics and sport are separate.

That is an idealistic stance. And it is BS. The recent World Cup was built on the most corrupt political platform imaginable. The politics of football invades every nook and cranny of the sport, right down to who gets funding.

We would like sport to be apolitical. The only way this might be even possible is to remove all money from it.

The Israeli woman in the WSL final has served in the IDF. She has kept her political opinion to herself, with the exception of stating that she supports Israel.

Whether she likes it or not, this statement alone is enough to disqualify her participation. By her silence and support, she supports genocide. (The list of genocide scholars, including very prominent Jewish genocide scholars, who agree that Israel is committing genocide is very long and very robust.)

When we say yes, she can participate in an international sporting competition, we are saying, by default, that as a declared representative of her country, she supports genocide. And by default, we silently continue to permit genocide and erasure.

One of the many levers that ended apartheid in South Africa was the boycotts of sport and the economy. It took years of pressure. It took people on the streets. Nelson Mandela was categorised as a terrorist by most major Western Governments. The USA did not remove this label until 2008.

I do not know Anat. She may be a lovely person who does not believe in colonisation. However, when she wears the flag of Israel, she wears a symbol of genocide and apartheid, a fully documented history of violence, and continuing colonial erasure.

To support her participation in sport is to be party to what, in the future, will be considered as evil as the Holocaust, the Khmer Rouge regime, and the elimination of roughly 75% of the Tutsi population in Rwanda. All events the West watched happen, with the associated hand-wringing after the fact.

I wrote this piece, as I often do, to sort my feelings about this.

The majority of my feelings are about how helpless and hopeless I often feel watching evil live-streamed, evil sanctioned and supported by my government and all the governments of the Western world, even as public opinion is against their support.

My anger arises from the sense of disgust I have for the inaction by the elected representatives of the people who disagree with this ongoing evil.

My anger and pain are fuelled by the horror I see every day.

I cannot, under any circumstances, support anyone who supports the continuation of this evil against Palestinians and Lebanese.

Change has only ever come by relentless political pressure, led by the people. That includes me.

That includes sporting bodies.

Boycott has proven, time and again, to be powerful.

The WSL is complicit. My government is complicit. We, the people, need to continue to speak, continue to write, continue to protest, continue to boycott.

When the German people finally confronted the evil they committed, through silence, willful ignorance, and overt racism, they had to confront shame. This is ongoing, for many to this day.

But the seeds of racist hate are well fertilised by the political elite.

I wonder if we humans will ever be able to rise above their deliberate infestations of racism in all of its evil expressions.

I think about the Bodhisattva vow. A sacred promise made by Mahayana Buddhists to attain enlightenment not for themselves, but to save all living beings from suffering, built on a foundation of human compassion.

My life and work begin, and will end, believing deeply that all life has worth, and that the seed of hate begins with the first Little Atrocity, where one person, or tribe, or race, believes they are superior to another.

Each day I have to practice denying the inhabitation of my being by any thought of superiority, for superiority and righteousness are encouraged by a culture that has profited from colonisation and exploitation. My entire lineage is colonisation and exploitation. Some days, I succeed; many days, I fail.

Every day, each of us gets to choose. Do we stand for and practice integrity, do we honour all life? Do we refuse to ignore violence, hate, corruption, racism, sexism, ageism?

Each moment, this choice. Not easy. Speaking up is disruptive. Dangerous. But when we know a crime has been committed, silence is complicity. That is on us.