Where are the Referees On Gaza? - a podcast by Laura Flanders

Not so long ago, as I watched the World Cup soccer final, I couldn’t help but wonder where the referees are when you need them -- in the Middle East, for example?

The final soccer match between Germany and Argentina was close; tied until the bitter end, with lots of heads smashed and jerseys tugged and at least a few intentional-looking kicks and trips by the players.

By the time Germany scored, in overtime, the referee had handed out four yellow cards for deliberate or dangerous foul. The players all play innocent. The ref still puts them on notice. Three fouls and you’re off. The crowds hoot and holler, millions strong, but everyone understands the same rules apply to everyone.

While I watched safely in Brooklyn, Palestinians in Gaza watched the game under bombardment. Simply watching while Palestinian can get you killed under the Israeli bombing campaign that’s been raging. Just a week earlier, an Israeli missile struck a café in Gaza City killing eight of the twelve people who’d come out to watch the world cup semi final.

Israel claims its bombardment is a legitimate response to the abduction and murder of three Israeli teenagers in the West Bank, allegedly by Hamas. But where’s the referee?

At the end of a week of bombing hundreds of rockets had been fired on Israel from Gaza,, but they’d caused no direct killings. The Israeli attack, on the other hand, had killed at least 175 Palestinians, among them, 36 children and 24 women. Seventeen thousand people had been displaced, by bombs that damaged or destroyed 940 homes -- in a tiny place. The Gaza Strip is barely twice the size of DC. Half its population is 18 years old or younger.

Some people did speak out: a spokesperson for the U.N. high Commission for Human Rights said Israel’s attacks likely violated international law. The UN Security Council demanded a ceasefire, but no one sent any one off the field of international relations for committing foul.

To the contrary, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called a ceasefire, "not even on the agenda”. Hamas has made a ceasefire contingent on Israel lifting its eight-year blockade of Gaza, and the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners.

The bombing continued and, a few protests aside, the world was mostly silent.

But imagine: what if one World Cup team could simply pulverize the other with no ref calling foul? It would be a boring game to watch and the outcome would be rather predictable.

The fact is, we need more than red and yellow cards from the refs and world refs with real rules that apply to everyone. We need world public attention, and noise as large and as loud against this ill-matched, deadly conflict, as we heard, the world over, for football.

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I’m Laura Flanders.

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