{"id":318690,"date":"2026-02-26T17:52:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-26T17:52:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/318690\/"},"modified":"2026-02-26T17:52:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-26T17:52:07","slug":"rte-releases-statement-regarding-broadcast-of-upcoming-ireland-v-israel-uefa-match","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/318690\/","title":{"rendered":"RT\u00c9 releases statement regarding broadcast of upcoming Ireland v Israel UEFA match"},"content":{"rendered":"

RT\u00c9 have given a statement regarding the broadcast of the upcoming Ireland<\/a> v Israel UEFA Nations League match.<\/p>\n

Ireland was drawn to play against Israel with the home leg scheduled at Dublin’s Aviva Stadium sparking widespread controversy because of the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine, particularly the humanitarian crises in Gaza.<\/p>\n

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Supporters have argued that playing the match gives legitimacy to Israel’s involvement in international sport while committing genocide and war crimes in Palestine.<\/p>\n

The Football Association of Ireland (FAI) however argue that sport should be separate from political disputes and that Ireland is obligated to fulfil its fixtures under UEFA rules.<\/p>\n

The FAI have already confirmed that Ireland will play both matches and that cancelling the games could have “serious sporting consequences”, including losing points, relegation in Nations League standings, weaker seeding for Euro 2028 qualification and harm to Ireland’s FIFA ranking.<\/p>\n

Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin and the Minister for Sport Patrick O’Donovan have also publicly backed the decision to proceed, stressing that there is no official state boycott of Israel and that sporting ties should be distinguished from political issues.<\/p>\n

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Now RT\u00c9 have released a statement after questions arose whether the State broadcaster would air the matches,.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The statement reads,<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the match goes ahead \u2013 and that is a decision for the FAI as the relevant national sporting body \u2013 RT\u00c9 will broadcast it in line with its contractual and therefore binding legal obligations and of course our overall commitment to supporting Ireland\u2019s national teams.<\/p>\n

“In essence, the decisions regarding participation by Ireland\u2019s national soccer team in any tournament are the responsibility of the appropriate official national sporting body \u2013 in this case the FAI. Decisions relating to the broadcast of these events are therefore dependent on such decisions.<\/p>\n

“RT\u00c9\u2019s decision in this case is different to RT\u00c9\u2019s decision regarding the Eurovision Song Contest, which is owned and run by the EBU, for one main reason.<\/p>\n

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“In that case, it is national public service broadcasters\/media (PSM\u2019s) who operate the selection process to decide which song\/artist will represent their country in the Contest and therefore it is entirely the decision of the PSM whether to take part or not.<\/p>\n

“In Ireland, the responsibility obviously falls to RT\u00c9 as Ireland\u2019s national PSM, and a member of the EBU. So, RT\u00c9 was able to make an independent decision on both participation and broadcasting of the Eurovision.\u201d<\/p>\n

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ADVERTISEMENT – CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"RT\u00c9 have given a statement regarding the broadcast of the upcoming Ireland v Israel UEFA Nations League match.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":318691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1113,97,61,60,3410,43,4268,6085],"class_list":{"0":"post-318690","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-fai","9":"tag-gaza","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-israel","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-palestine","15":"tag-rte"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318690\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/318691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}