Not Just a Soccer Game ─ Colonialism and Conflict Among Palestinians in Israel

Having witnessed the outbreak of deadly violence between supporters of rival soccer teams from neighboring Palestinian Arab towns in northern Israel--the predominantly Christian town of Kafr Yassif and the predominantly Druze town of Julis--and the subsequent revenge attack on Kafr Yassif a few days later, Shihade (international studies, Birzeit U., Palestine) undertook an investigation of the events in question, assessing the relative credibility of the official Israeli state narrative of events (namely, that the violence came as a surprise, the police did all they could, and the violence was just an expression of the inherent violence of Palestinian Arab culture) versus the widely expressed belief in Khafr Yassif that the police deliberately looked the other way and even prevented neighboring towns from intervening to stop the violence. Shihade judges the latter narrative to be more credible and situates it within a larger pattern of Israeli state actions that show the soccer game-sparked violence in Kafr Yassif to be the result of official policy of allowing and encouraging sectarian violence amongst its Palestinian Arab citizens as part of its large framework of colonial control. He also identifies internal community factors that may have contributed to the violence (albeit factors still connected to the politics of Zionism) and considers the role of local politicians in exploiting the incident. Annotation c2011 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Magid Shihade teaches at the Abu-Lughod Institute for International Studies at Birzeit University. His research interests focus on modernity, violence, and identity.