Barcelona Excite Palestinians With 'Peace Tour'

[Folami David]

Tens of thousands of Palestinians are expected to converge Saturday afternoon on Dura football stadium near the southern West Bank city of Hebron to watch the players of their favourite international football team, Barcelona, show their skills and play with young Palestinian athletes.
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The Barcelona team, which will include the world's No 1 player, Lionel Messi, and new signing Neymar, will arrive in the West Bank city of Bethlehem from Jerusalem Saturday afternoon where it will be met by Palestinian officials once they cross an Israeli army checkpoint on the northern outskirts of the biblical city.
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The team will stop there for a photo-op, with the 8- metre high concrete wall Israel has built to separate Bethlehem from neighbouring Jerusalem behind them.
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From there, the team will go to the Church of Nativity, the birthplace of Jesus Christ, for a short visit before moving on to the presidential headquarters in Bethlehem for a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and other officials.
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Following the visit, the team will travel 20 kilometres to reach the Dura football stadium, where at least 25 000 people are expected, not counting those who will be waiting on the roads and nearby areas just to get a glimpse of the players.
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The trip is part of Barcelona's Peace Tour initiative, with the club hosting two football clinics for peace, in Israel and the West Bank, involving children from Israel and the Palestinian territories, the Catalan club said.
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The visit is "a historic trip to strengthen institutional ties with the leaders of the two communities and build bridges of dialogue for peace," it said on its website.
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On Sunday, the team will visit the Western Wall in Jerusalem before a reception with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli President Shimon Peres. The team will then take part in a second clinic, at the Bloomfield Stadium in Tel Aviv- Jaffa, when some 12 000 children are expected.
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At the Dura stadium, this year's Arab Idol winner, Muhammad Assaf, a Palestinian from the Gaza Strip who won the hearts and minds of millions of Palestinians and Arabs for his extraordinary voice, is going to sing as the crowd waits for Barcelona to arrive, which will be after the iftar, or the end of the Ramadan fast at sunset.
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"I can't wait to see the Barcelona team in our country," said Jamal Elabed, 24, from Ramallah who said he is going to be in Dura to watch the team.
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"This is a dream come true," he said, adding, "I diligently watch all their games on TV and I celebrate in the streets when they win and now I have a chance to see them in person. I simply can't believe this is happening."
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Elabed is not the only one waiting with great anticipation to see the Barcelona team, even though he might be one of the lucky ones who plan to be at the Dura stadium. The rest are just going to have to do with watching them on TV or just watch their motorcade drive through Bethlehem streets.
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Jibril Rjoub, head of the Palestinian Football Association, described the visit as "a historic one," and "a turning point in the history of Palestinian sports."
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While he described the visit as "90 per cent sports and 10 per cent politics," Rjoub said he fought pressure from various parties to hold a joint game between the Barcelona team with Palestinian and Israeli footballers during the team's "peace" visit to the region.
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"I personally came under heavy pressure to hold a three-way meeting that includes the Barcelona team with Palestinian and Israeli players but I insisted on having a Barcelona-Palestinian meeting only," he said in an earlier press conference.
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"Many have pushed in the direction of seeing Messi, Muhammad and Shlomo (using typical names of Palestinians and Israelis) play together," said Rjoub.
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"But we are not going to give the (Israeli) occupiers the opportunity to make everything here look like normal and cover up its daily atrocities against our people and our athletes," he said.
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In addition to the thousands who are going to watch the Barcelona team, a pool of 350 Palestinian journalists are covering the visit along with 50 Arab and international journalists and the 60 reporters travelling with the team.