“Play allows children to express their emotions and alleviate the tension and fear resulting from the war,” said Tamara Awartani of Palestine Sports for Life.
John Wessels / Keystone
Switzerland is giving FIFA money to build football pitches in Palestine as “safe spaces” for children. Amid continued violence in the region, some wonder whether this is the best way to meet young people’s most urgent needs.
When a group of world leaders met in Washington in February to talk about Gaza at US President Donald Trump’s newly created Board of Peace, they were treated to a short video. In it, a shiny new football stadium rises from the ashes of shelled-out buildings as the narrator declares: “A simple ball. A shared field. A reason to believe again.”
With that, football world governing body FIFA announced plans to raise $75 million and buildExternal link 50 mini- and five full-sized pitches, a national stadium and a football academy in the war-ravaged territory. Investing in the sport, FIFA president Gianni Infantino told delegates, would help “the recovery process”.
Just a few months earlier, with less fanfare, the organisation had revealed another initiative, this one in partnership with Switzerland, to build ten mini pitches in Palestine and Israel.
These “safe spaces”, the foreign ministry told Swissinfo, will make a “concrete contribution to improving everyday life for children and youth”. With financing worth CHF60,000 (about $76,500) per pitch, it is the ministry’s first such partnership with FIFA, and one that some experts believe can offer benefits.
“Mini pitches are not merely places to play – they are safe havens providing psychological and social support,” said Tamara Awartani, director of Gaza-based NGO Palestine Sports for Life. These spaces, she explained, can allow children to vent stress caused by conflict, form friendships and experience joy.
Connor Spreng, who heads the Swiss Academy for Development (SA4D), a non-profit that offers sports and play-based programmes for children, agreed. But he cautioned that, to succeed, such a project “has to consider the context carefully”.
The situation in Palestine is complex. FIFA has come under fire for allowing Israeli football clubs to play on land seized from Palestinians in the West Bank. In Gaza, violence continues despite a ceasefire agreed in October, while humanitarian NGOs struggle to maintain a presence amid Israeli government restrictions.
‘Safety is most important thing’
FIFA reportedly approached Switzerland about funding the mini pitches last summer. The foreign ministry said it undertakes “thorough risk assessments” for projects, and the likelihood of benefits for local kids outweighed potential harms.
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Yet ahead of the agreement with FIFA, internal emails obtained by Swiss public radio RTSExternal link showed dissenting voices within the ministry.
“In the current context, the odds of making a positive contribution to children are weak, especially given their needs are urgent,” one staffer wrote. “To organise a football tournament while violent settlers run Palestinians off their olive farms just makes no sense – our involvement would send the wrong signal,” wrote another.
Deadly attacks have persisted in Gaza despite the ceasefire. Up to 90% of the population are displaced, while according to Awartani, only a little over 10% of sports infrastructure remains standing after two years of war between Hamas and Israel.
Yarmouk Sports Stadium in Gaza City, which previously hosted football matches, was damaged during the war and is now a makeshift shelter for thousands of displaced Palestinians.
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In the West Bank, where the first two pitches are reportedly already being built, the Israeli government continues to expand unlawful settlements and settler violenceExternal link is growing. Tens of thousands of Palestinians are being displaced amid “relentless harassment, intimidation, and destruction of homes and farmland,” the United Nations reported. Israel has blamedExternal link these attacks on a “fringe minority”.
“Safety is the most important thing, and putting up a pitch doesn’t mean that children will be able to go safely,” said Tomáš Bokor, Palestine country director for child-focused Swiss NGO Terre des Hommes, who noted that schools and infrastructure have come under attack.
The foreign ministry declined to say where the mini pitches will be located, although documents seen by RTS indicate the first two sites are in Tulkarem in the northern West Bank and Wadi Al-Nis in the south. The project has faced delays due to the security situation, but the other eight are expected to be completed next year.
The area in and around Tulkarem has so far this year seen Palestinian shepherds attacked by settlersExternal link, refugees displacedExternal link by the extension of a military order, and a pipe bomb factory discovered by the Israeli army, according to the UN and local media reports.
A secondary school near Nablus, West Bank, suffered fire damage after an attack by Israeli settlers in early January, the Wafa news agency reported.
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Besides safety, Spreng of SA4D said the project should ensure future viability: “We must ask about longer-term ownership and community involvement, in order to avoid abandoned pitches. Who is responsible for repairs [for example]?”
In response, the foreign ministry said local authorities and national football associations will ensure sustainability and monitoring.
‘A public relations exercise’
Switzerland’s project partner, FIFA, is itself mired in controversy in the region. In February, a coalition of advocacy groups named Infantino in a criminal complaintExternal link at the International Criminal Court. The groups allege he is “aiding war crimes and crimes against humanity” by allowing Israeli football clubs “based in illegal settlements on occupied Palestinian territory” to play in Israeli leagues and supporting them financially.
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This practice, they claim, “legitimises Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine”. Palestinians, they note, are banned as spectators, players or managers of these clubs.
In March, FIFA finedExternal link the Israeli Football Association CHF150,000 for racism and discrimination following complaints from the Palestinian Football Association. But it declined to slap sanctions over the settler clubs, claiming the “final legal status of the West Bank remains an unresolved […] matter under public international law”. Israel argues these are disputed lands, but the International Court of JusticeExternal link and most of the international community regard Israeli settlements as illegal under international law.
When asked about the complaints, the Swiss foreign ministry said it would not comment on the football body’s decisions but “welcomed all efforts to eliminate racism and other forms of discrimination”. FIFA, which is headquartered in Zurich, did not immediately respond to Swissinfo’s inquiries.
Nick McGeehan, director of FairSquare, a London-based NGO on rights and sport, called the Swiss-FIFA partnership “a notable but – in my view – deeply problematic initiative”.
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The project “is very much a public relations exercise” to deflect from pressure over the settler clubs, he argued. “This was a way for FIFA to say in the aftermath of the ceasefire that it was doing something to address the conflict in non-political terms.”
McGeehan, whose organisation filed an unrelated ethics complaintExternal link with FIFA against Infantino for allegedly breaching the body’s political neutrality, pointed out FIFA’s finances are substantial enough to fund this initiative on its own.
“Why is the Swiss government providing money to an organisation that has billions in reserves and already benefits from tax breaks in Switzerland?” he said. “FIFA provides millions to its member associations every year, and part of that money is there to do stuff like provide pitches.”
Switzerland’s partnership with FIFA to build mini pitches is part of the Alpine country’s CHF23 million humanitarian assistance package for Gaza, announced in November. FIFA has a goal to install 1,000 mini pitches around the world by 2030. Between March-November 2025, it inaugurated 30 mini pitches in 15 countries.
The world football governing body has its headquarters in Zurich, where it is registered as a non-profit association that serves the public interest. Such associations are exempt from corporate tax if they reinvest their income into their statutory purpose, which in FIFA’s case is the promotion of football around the world.
FIFA had a total of $2.7 billion in reserves at the end of 2025, and stands to makeExternal link some $11 billion from the 2026 World Cup. Its mini pitches are usually financed by host countries and their national football associations, RTS reported, and rarely by a third donor, as in the Swiss scheme.
Acute humanitarian needs
As Switzerland and FIFA eye mini pitches, the humanitarian needs of Palestinians remain acuteExternal link and include essentials such as emergency shelter.
But NGOs are struggling to meet these. They face new registration rules, including the obligation to share the personal data of all Palestinian staff with Israeli authorities. Over a dozen leading international NGOs, including Terre des Hommes, have refused to do this, fearing it would put them in breach of data protection laws in donor countries such as Switzerland, Bokor explained. They’re also concerned for the staff themselves, whose safety he said Israel has refused to guarantee.
Inside one of Terre des Hommes’ temporary learning spaces in Al-Fajr camp, Al-Mawasi, Khan Younis, earlier this year.
Terre des hommes/Majdi Fathi
Access restrictions are also impeding NGOs. Half-a-million dollars’ worth of cargo for Terre des Hommes funded by the European Union and Switzerland has sat in Cairo for over a year, after Israeli authorities rejected multiple requests for it to enter Gaza. The cargo contains hygiene kits and supplies for its support activities for children, such as colouring books, pencils and toys.
For the equivalent of CHF120,000 – the price of two mini pitches – Terre des Hommes could set up ten of its temporary learning spaces for 1,000 children for a six-month period, Bokor said.
“Palestinians are eager for their children to learn but they are being systematically denied these opportunities,” he said. By June 2025, 84 schools faced demolition orders in the West Bank, the UN reported. In occupied East Jerusalem, six UNRWA schools closed last year, affecting hundreds of students.
“In principle, it’s good to provide safe spaces for children,” Bokor added. “Is building mini pitches going to achieve that in the West Bank?”
Swiss Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis told the pressExternal link last November that they could. The pitches, he argued, will fill a need for children to play and offer them a quick distraction: “That is far more important than many other activities we undertake.”
Edited by Tony Barrett/vm/sj
