Al Mayadeen English

  • Ar
  • Es
  • x
Al Mayadeen English

Slogan

  • News
    • Politics
    • Economy
    • Sports
    • Arts&Culture
    • Health
    • Miscellaneous
    • Technology
    • Environment
  • Articles
    • Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Blog
    • Features
  • Videos
    • NewsFeed
    • Video Features
    • Explainers
    • TV
    • Digital Series
  • Infographs
  • In Pictures
  • • LIVE
News
  • Politics
  • Economy
  • Sports
  • Arts&Culture
  • Health
  • Miscellaneous
  • Technology
  • Environment
Articles
  • Opinion
  • Analysis
  • Blog
  • Features
Videos
  • NewsFeed
  • Video Features
  • Explainers
  • TV
  • Digital Series
Infographs
In Pictures
  • Africa
  • Asia
  • Asia-Pacific
  • Europe
  • Latin America
  • MENA
  • Palestine
  • US & Canada
BREAKING
Sources to Al Mayadeen: The news regarding a press conference tonight by the head of the Hamas movement in the Gaza Strip, Khalil Al-Hayya, is false.
Lebanese Ministry of Health: One person was martyred in an Israeli drone strike on the outskirts of Nabatieh al-Fawqa
Al Mayadeen's correspondent: The death toll in the al-Bureij camp massacre has risen to 19
Nicolas Maduro: Maria Corina Machado and imperialism wanted to spread violence and chaos so there would be no elections.
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro: We were able to neutralize 60 attacks on oil refineries and oil facilities and arrest more than 70 individuals involved.
CNN citing sources: Talks between Washington and Tehran are close to reaching a comprehensive agreement that could be concluded during the next meeting.
US Secretary of State: Washington will begin revoking visas for Chinese students affiliated with the Communist Party or studying in sensitive fields.
Israeli media: Western diplomats: There is a possibility that the US administration will sign an interim agreement or understanding with Iran.
Hamas: We affirm that we are making great efforts to stop the barbaric war on the Gaza Strip.
Hamas: We reached an agreement with Witkoff that includes the flow of aid and a professional committee taking over the management of the Gaza Strip's affairs immediately after the deal is announced.

The origins of the anti-Qatar lobby on the World Cup

  • David Miller David Miller
  • Source: Al Mayadeen English
  • 30 Nov 2022 15:18
  • 6 Shares
6 Min Read

The campaign against Qatar has been in full operation since 2018, and at its culmination involved at least the UK, Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and "Israel".  

  • x
  • The origins of the anti-Qatar lobby on the World Cup
    The origins of the anti-Qatar lobby on the World Cup

As the World Cup gets fully underway, we can review the massive international campaign to make sure it never happened. The campaign was – obviously – not a success, but it involved at least seven countries and a host of lobby groups, PR firms, think tanks, and front groups. The first part of this investigation looks at the role of "Israel" which started the ball rolling back in 2014.

The campaign against Qatar has been in full operation since 2018, and at its culmination involved at least the UK, Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and "Israel".  

But its first activities occurred back in 2014. The first sign of a campaign against Qatar as the host nation came in late September 2014. There were two demonstrations outside the Qatari Embassy in London, the first on September 19 both with the slogan “Qatar: stop funding terrorism." A larger event of reportedly 50-100 people was held on Sunday, September 21.

The first demonstration was advertised as being run by Sussex Friends of "Israel" and an obscure group called the Israeli Forum Task Force, and they were joined by two other groups on Sunday: UK Lawyers for "Israel" and StandWithUs. These groups are all, as one headline put it, “Israel supporters”, but in fact, each one has direct links to the Zionist regime in occupied Palestine. 

· Sussex Friends of "Israel" had close links with the Zionist regime including money from an "Israel"-based Zionist faction called Over the Rainbow. Among its key figures is Simon Cobbs. He spoke at the second rally and was an attendee at the “undercover Hasbara trolls” Ministry of Strategic Affairs event in "Tel Aviv" in 2019. 

· StandWithUs is the UK branch of a lobby group headquartered in the US. Financial records show StandWithUs UK is funded by StandWithUs in the US, which, according to the former Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister, Danny Ayalon, "Israel" uses to ‘amplify our power’ and ‘for leverage’. It has reportedly received money directly from the Prime Minister’s Office. The representative of the group who spoke at both demonstrations was Keith Fraser. He is best known for mouthing “terrorist sympathizer” behind then-Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn at the televised election count in the 2017 election. He had stood for election in Islington for the far-right party UKIP.

Related News

Palestine is the real champion of the World Cup 2022: Football fans refuse to 'legitimize Israel'

Qatar World Cup: Stop politicizing sports, Give football back to green

· UK Lawyers for "Israel" is closely connected to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and may have been set up directly by the Ministry. Its Director lawyer Mark Lewis reportedly only joined UKLFI “a few days before the rally." It has been at the heart of campaigns against supporters of Palestine in the UK ever since.

· The Israeli Forum Task Force is an obscure organization that claimed to bring together “Israelis” living in Britain to act as propagandists for “Israel”. It was set up with help from the Jewish Agency and the World Zionist Organisation; two of "Israel’s" so-called “national institutions” and has involved a range of existing Zionist (i.e. British not “Israeli”) groups.

In other words, all four of the groups that launched the anti-Qatar protests in September 2014 are linked directly to the Zionist regime. In a hilarious but unsurprising twist to these demonstrations allegedly against “terrorism”, one of the orange boiler-suited “flash-mob” behind the banner at the first small demo was Gemma Sheridan. Sheridan is known in British far-right circles as a supporter of the Jewish "Defense" League, the organization associated with the far-right Rabbi Martin (later “Meir”) Kahane and which was first deemed a “right-wing terrorist group” by the FBI in 2001. Kahane is, of course, the inspiration for the fascist right in "Israel", including Itamar Ben-Gvir, who will become minister for national security in the new Zionist government.

The central role of "Israel" in the campaign has not diminished over time and we can tell from the slogans adopted back in 2014 what the main issue is; “terrorism”, which is of course the Zionist term for the legitimate resistance to the Israeli occupation as per international law. It might be objected that Qatar’s support for the contra-government forces in Syria post-2011 could also be included in the term “terrorism”. But that would ignore the fact that the Zionist regime gave material support to the terror groups in Syria, including patching up Nusra Front (Al-Qaeda) fighters in an IOF field hospital in the occupied Golan and sending them back to fight.

It is the steadfast support of the Qatari government for the resistance in Palestine that is at the root of all of the vituperation in the public sphere about Qatar, from “terrorism” to “LGBTQ+” issues and “workers’ rights”.

As it happens, the four groups involved in these demonstrations were all key to the campaign against Jeremy Corbyn who was elected as leader of the Labour Party a year later, an indication that "Israel" had the infrastructure to attack Corbyn in place well before the possibility that he could become Labour Leader was conceivable. As one report at the time put it, referring to the Israeli Forum Task Force, “a rowdy new actor has arrived on the British hasbara scene, full of chutzpah and equipped with some very sharp Israeli elbows. It’s still small, … but British Jewish life may be about to become more colorful.”

Later, "Israel" was joined in the anti-Qatar campaign first by the lobby of the United Arab Emirates, both as part of a pre-blockade anti-Qatar strategy and as part of their efforts to cohere and conjoin propaganda assets with the Zionists ahead of announcing normalization. The UAE and its assets in the UK, France, the US, and elsewhere have drawn on key far-right tropes such as the “Eurabia” myth popularized by Zionist writer Gisèle Littman (aka Bat Ye’or) and the Islamophobic Red-Green alliance  - also originated by a Zionist think tank. The campaign was part of a broader Tripartite Alliance effort by to delegitimize, destabilize, and ultimately invade Qatar. The third and junior partner in this alliance was the Saudi regime, stretching back to at least 2017.

The role of "Israel", the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and a group of European nations in the rest of the campaign against the Qatar world cup will be examined in the second part of this investigation. Until then, let’s try and remember that the campaign against Qatar is not an innocent matter of “human rights” but – from the beginning – saturated with geopolitical intrigue and the foreign policy interests of a hostile and illegitimate entity.

The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect Al Mayadeen’s editorial stance.
  • World Cup
  • Palestine
  • Israel
  • World Cup 2022
  • Israeli occupation
  • Qatar
David Miller

David Miller

investigative researcher, broadcaster, and academic. He is the founder and co-director of the lobbying watchdog Spinwatch and editor of Powerbase.info.

Most Read

All
Although the background information does not indicate direct US involvement, considering the broader geopolitical context, it is plausible that the US would have an indirect impact. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Zeinab El-Hajj)

Did 'Israel', US fight a proxy war with China in South Asia during the India-Pakistan escalation?

  • Feature
  • 19 May 2025
The two countries need to sit down and resolve the crisis with maturity, to consider carefully that they could be being manipulated to be easily dominated. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Batoul Chamas)

Algeria and Mali, divided and almost conquered

  • Opinion
  • 25 May 2025
The spirit of Bandung: 70 years on

The spirit of Bandung: 70 years on

  • Opinion
  • 18 May 2025
Eurovision: NATO Psychological Warfare Tool

Eurovision: NATO Psychological Warfare Tool

  • Analysis
  • 24 May 2025

Coverage

All
The Ummah's Martyrs

More from this writer

All
"Israel" appears to be the only place in the world where there are actual demonstrations defending rapists as national heroes precisely because of their crimes. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Batoul Chamas)

'Israeli pride' - Celebrating rape in the Zionist entity

While Salams is intended to be for Muslims seeking marriage, the other companies owned by Match Group are seen as encouraging casual relationships like OK Cupid and Tinder. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Zeinab el-Hajj)

Selling Muslim marriage app Salams to the Zionist pornography complex

David Collier is the Zionist troll operative behind the intimidation of the BBC resulting in the removal of the Documentary How to Survive in a War Zone. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Batoul Chamas)

The pincer movement against the BBC

Palestine Solidarity Campaign shills for the Zionists

Palestine Solidarity Campaign shills for the Zionists

Al Mayadeen English

Al Mayadeen is an Arab Independent Media Satellite Channel.

All Rights Reserved

  • x
  • Privacy Policy
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Authors
Android
iOS