By: John Waage – CBN News; cbn.com
JERUSALEM, Israel – Before the FIFA World Cup soccer championships began in Qatar 10 days ago, Israelis were optimistic that the event could break cultural barriers in sports and within the Muslim world at large. After all, the government in Doha allowed direct flights from Israel and was even setting up a Kosher kitchen to accommodate Jewish tourists.
Qatar is the first Muslim country to host the world cup, and although protests against the Gulf nation’s funding of terrorism and other issues were prevalent before the games. Kan, Israel’s public broadcaster, built an entire studio to cover the matches in Doha despite the Israel team’s failure to qualify for the final 32 teams. In the afterglow of the Abraham Accords and given Israel’s passion for soccer, it seemed like a solid decision.
Since then, the talk of Kosher kitchens has given way to darker accounts. The Associated Press describes an incident before the matches began when an Israeli Kan journalist was wandering through the venue and found a Qatari man in a traditional headdress and white robe, and approached him for an interview:
cont’d…