{"id":424846,"date":"2024-11-28T20:09:16","date_gmt":"2024-11-28T20:09:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=424846"},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"-0001-11-29T14:00:00","slug":"Orban-s-soft-power-shines-as-Hungary-hosts-Israeli-match","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/Orban-s-soft-power-shines-as-Hungary-hosts-Israeli-match\/","title":{"rendered":"Orban’s soft power shines as Hungary hosts Israeli match"},"content":{"rendered":"

Since the start of the Israel-Hamas war in October last year, many home fixtures of Israel’s national football team and clubs have been moved to Hungary.<\/p>\n

It is quite the coup for Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, whose passion for sports, especially football, provides a counter to his relative isolation within the EU.<\/p>\n

And as anti-Israeli sentiment and reported anti-Semitic acts surge globally — amid Israel’s war against Iran-backed Islamist militants in Lebanon and Gaza — the central European country has also provided the venue for their away games.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, the Europa League clash between Besiktas and Maccabi Tel Aviv will be played in the eastern Hungarian city of Debrecen, which already hosted a Belgium-Israel Nations League match in September.<\/p>\n

“This is Hungarian soft power at work,” Simon Chadwick, professor of sport and geopolitical economy at France’s SKEMA Business School.<\/p>\n

“Orban is using football for political purposes… accentuating some of the more positive credentials of himself and Hungary,” the expert added.<\/p>\n

Authorities are careful to avoid incidents.<\/p>\n

This week’s Besiktas-Maccabi Tel Aviv fixture will be held behind doors in Debrecen instead of the more multicultural Budapest, where Israel beat Belgium 1-0 in another Nations League game last week.<\/p>\n

– ‘Safest county in Europe’ –<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n

Following the outbreak of the Gaza war, Orban banned pro-Palestinian protests and regularly boasted about Hungary being “the safest country in Europe for the Jewish community”.<\/p>\n

His government leveraged high-profile anti-Semitic acts in Western countries as fodder to vindicate its anti-migration stance, including the attacks on Maccabi Tel Aviv fans in Amsterdam earlier this month — condemned by Dutch and Israeli authorities as anti-Semitic.<\/p>\n

In places “where immigration has not been stopped… they cannot stop anti-Semitism,” Orban’s chief of staff, Gulyas Gergely commented on the disturbance at a recent press conference.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Israelis are taught to be cautious” because of such incidents in Western Europe and “do see Hungary differently from the more liberal democracies”, Gayil Talshir, a political scientist at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem told AFP.<\/p>\n

But she warned against idealising Hungary, which has problems with more traditional forms of anti-Semitism, not linked to the Palestinian cause.<\/p>\n

“Authoritarian leaders like Orban like to build on inherent anti-Semitic and racist tendencies in their societies to keep power.”<\/p>\n

“It’s dangerous for Jews”, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “ignores it” according to Talshir, because he is more interested in cooperating with Orban as a fellow “conservative-populist” leader.<\/p>\n

The Hungarian premier has repeatedly been accused of veering into anti-Semitism as his government has run poster campaigns vilifying Hungary-born Jewish financier George Soros and his son Alex.<\/p>\n

In 2017, Israel’s then-ambassador denounced one such drive saying it “sows hatred and fear”, but the Netanyahu-led government quickly issued a statement backing Budapest’s anti-Soros campaign.<\/p>\n

Orban was also forgiven for praising wartime leader and Hitler ally Miklos Horthy — an autocrat, who ruled Hungary from 1920 to 1944, passed anti-Jewish laws and oversaw the deportations of several hundred thousand Hungarian Jews to Nazi death camps — as an “exceptional statesman”.<\/p>\n

Even after those incidents, Netanyahu welcomed him as a “true friend of Israel” in Jerusalem.<\/p>\n

Their closeness is also reflected by the invitation, that Orban extended to his Israeli counterpart last week to defy an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC).<\/p>\n

– ‘Make Hungary great again’ –<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n

Hungary has long been punching above its weight in global sports.<\/p>\n

“Going back to the communist period,” the nation of 9.6 million people was an “important centre of sports power”, Chadwick explained.<\/p>\n

But during the democratic change in 1990s, “sport somehow got lost to a certain extent.”<\/p>\n

“Orban is revisiting past glories and drawing from the country’s sports heritage to make Hungary great again, so to speak.”<\/p>\n

“He has the vision and strategic intent for sports that (the rest of) Europe lacks,” Chadwick added.<\/p>\n

Since the Hungarian premier returned to power in 2010, the country has organised multiple high-profile international sporting events including the World Athletics Championships last year.<\/p>\n

During Euro 2020, Budapest’s Puskas Arena was the only tournament venue without a spectator limit and the stadium will host the Champions League final in 2026.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, World Aquatics and the international canoe federation have both recently decided to move their headquarters from Lausanne to the Hungarian capital.<\/p>\n

Still, Orban’s ambitious dream of hosting the Olympics remains unfulfilled.<\/p>\n

Budapest applied to host this year’s games but withdrew its candidacy in 2017 after activists collected enough signatures to force a referendum on the issue.<\/p>\n

The Hungarian premier has publicly said his government would back another bid “1000 percent” if the capital’s leadership supports it.<\/p>\n

ros\/mw<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Israel played Belgium in a Nations League game in Budapest last week<\/p>\n

-Attila KISBENEDEK
<\/figcaption><\/figure>

<\/p>\n

Sha’Carri Richardson won gold in the women’s 100m and 4x100m relay at last year’s world championships in Budapest<\/p>\n

-Ben Stansall
<\/figcaption><\/figure>

<\/p>\n

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban (L) and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a 2019 meeting in Jerusalem<\/p>\n

-Ariel Schalit
<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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