{"id":638099,"date":"2026-09-28T02:10:17","date_gmt":"2026-09-28T02:10:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/638099\/"},"modified":"2026-09-28T02:10:17","modified_gmt":"2026-09-28T02:10:17","slug":"near-empty-stadium-no-handshake-no-explanation-rte-broadcasts-uefa-feed-of-israel-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/638099\/","title":{"rendered":"Near-empty stadium, no handshake, no explanation: RT\u00c9 broadcasts Uefa feed of Israel game"},"content":{"rendered":"

An editorial note re: The Journal and The 42\u2019s reporting on the Uefa Nations League matches between Ireland and Israel is available to read here.<\/a><\/p>\n

RT\u00c9\u2019S BROADCAST OF the Ireland v Israel football match in Hungary this evening began without any introduction or continuity announcement about the controversy surrounding the match.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The 42 first reported on 11 September that RT\u00c9<\/a> would be significantly curtailing its coverage of the match and would not be using its own employees on screen.<\/p>\n

RT\u00c9 subsequently confirmed that there would be no studio punditry and no RT\u00c9 commentary of the game, with the commentary instead provided by Uefa\u2019s global coverage.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While these decisions were reported in advance of the game, they were not aired before or during the broadcast.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This evening, RT\u00c9 broadcast began less than 10 minutes before the match kicked-off and began immediately after the credits of the previous programme, wildlife programme\u00a0China\u2019s Wild Guangdong.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The sudden beginning to the broadcast of the Uefa feed was because RT\u00c9 had confirmed that\u00a0there would be no advertising or sponsorship around either game.\u00a0<\/p>\n

RT\u00c9 had also stated that a \u201cminimal technical team\u201d would be used by the national broadcaster for the fixture.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Trade union Siptu earlier this month welcomed this broadcasting approach and said it would support the right of its members in RT\u00c9 to \u201cconscientiously object to playing any role in the sportswashing of the genocidal state\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The fixture, which is part of Uefa\u2019s Nations League, has been completely overshadowed by the questions of whether Ireland should fulfil the fixture and Uefa\u2019s failure to\u00a0impose sporting sanctions on the Israeli Football Association.\u00a0<\/p>\n

RT\u00c9 said it was broadcasting the Uefa feed due to a decision to fulfil its \u201ccontractual obligations\u201d while limiting commercial activity around the game. The broadcaster has been continuing to provide news coverage of the game and the events surrounding it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Journal and The 42 also decided to treat tonight\u2019s match and next week\u2019s corresponding fixtures\u00a0primarily as significant news stories.<\/p>\n

In the 10 or so minutes pre-kick off and during play, the Uefa global feed broadcast on RT\u00c9 2 made no reference to controversy around Israel\u2019s participation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"dara-oshea-aftering-shaking-hands-with-the-referee-team-ahead-of-the-match\"
\n Ireland’s Dara O’Shea after shaking hands with the German officials ahead of the match but not the Israel captain. Ryan Byrne \/ INPHO<\/p>\n

Ryan Byrne \/ INPHO \/ INPHO\n<\/p>\n

The commentator did not mention that Ireland\u2019s captain Dara O\u2019Shea did not shake hands with his Israeli counterpart as part of the standard pre-game formalities.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Irish\u00a0players bowed their heads during the Israeli national anthem and wore black armbands during the game; neither was commented upon.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Similarly, the commentator did not explain the absence of Ireland\u2019s goalkeeper Gavin Bazunu from the matchday squad.<\/p>\n

Bazunu\u00a0said in a statement yesterday that<\/a> he would not take part in the match \u201cbased purely upon my personal belief that the killing of innocent people is wrong\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Because of Bazunu\u2019s withdrawal, defender Jimmy Dunne was listed as a goalkeeper<\/a> in the Ireland squad, as rules dictate that three goalkeepers are required.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mentioning this quirk, the Uefa commentator said: \u201cIreland\u2019s reserve goalkeeper Gavin Bazunu has chosen to make himself unavailable, so defender Jimmy Dunne will take his place on the bench.\u201d<\/p>\n

The game in Debrecen, Hungary is notionally the \u2018home\u2019 fixture for Israel but only a small allocation of tickets was made available by the\u00a0Israel Football Association for its own fans.\u00a0<\/p>\n

No tickets were made available to Irish fans for the match but on a number of occasions the broadcast coverage cut to about 10 people who were cheering for Ireland.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The commentator said that these people had \u201cmade the trip\u201d but again did not explain the significance behind the extraordinary circumstances.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An editorial note re: The Journal and The 42\u2019s reporting on the Uefa Nations League matches between Ireland…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":638100,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[319,2126,1128,42,60,3410,43,9277,6085,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-638099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-broadcasting","tag-controversy","tag-football","tag-headlines","tag-ireland","tag-israel","tag-news","tag-none","tag-rte","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638099","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=638099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/638100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=638099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=638099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=638099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}