Israel and Argentina were supposed to play a friendly match in Jerusalem on June 9. However, after increasing pressure from Palestine and the Arab world, the game was cancelled.
To get an idea of why this happened, you need to be familiar with the current political situation in Israel. Ever since U.S.A. President Donald Trump decided to move the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, the tensions in the region have been escalating. You see, the holy city of Jerusalem is a place of dispute between Israel and Palestine (along with the rest of the Arab world). As a result, the international community has not officially recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. Therefore, most of the countries’ embassies are located in Tel Aviv. Then, Mr. Trump decided to take the spotlight and all the peace efforts made over the years to keep Israel and Palestine calm went to waste. While Israel was celebrating, Gaza was demonstrating.
Now, every famous person that will visit Jerusalem will be seen as an Israeli supporter, thus scrutinized by the Arab world. That’s exactly what happened here. If it would’ve been a lesser known team, the friendly might not have even made the local news. But, this is Argentina we’re talking about. Messi’s Argentina. After receiving death threats, Messi and his teammates decided that it was too dangerous to go ahead with the plan to play the match as scheduled, despite the Israeli government reassuring their safety. An official statement by the Israeli embassy stated:
“The Israeli embassy is sad to announce the suspension of the match between the Israel and Argentina national teams scheduled for Saturday June 9, as a warm-up for the Russia World Cup,”
“The threats and provocations directed at Lionel Messi, which logically aroused the solidarity of his colleagues and fear of playing the friendly, are no strangers to the daily life of Israel’s civilian population whose sporting stars, to put it simply, have been on numerous occasions the targets of violence and attacks.”
Gonzalo Higuain was satisfied with the news:
“I think that in the end the right thing was done,”
“It’s now behind us, obviously our health and common sense comes first. We think the right thing to do was not to go.”,
while the Palestinian Football Association was overjoyed:
“Values, morals and sport have secured a victory today and a red card was raised at Israel through the cancellation of the game,”
The game was supposed to be Argentina’s final World Cup preparation match.
