The Palestinian identity struggle through football. Al Wehdat FC in Jordan

Abstract

Palestinian national identity has developed in a context of exile and dispossession, mainly within the refugee camps distributed throughout the Middle East. In Jordan, Palestinians make up at least half of the country's population and their sense of Palestinianness is especially reproduced in the camps, places laden with symbolism and "invented traditions." This article discusses the role of football, especially the al Wehdat club, as a symbol and sounding board of Palestinian nationalism in the Hashemite kingdom and its role in refugee political activism. Through a historical approach to relations between the Palestinians and Jordan as a host country and the subsequent theoretical analysis of the relationship between sport and the development of nationalisms, this article describes how the confrontation between the two main teams of the Jordanian league constitutes a reflection of the disagreements between the two communities that support them. On the one hand, the Jordanians of Palestinian origin and al Wehdat as a symbol of the lost homeland, Palestine; and on the other hand, the native Jordanians who, through their support for the Faisali team, publicly demonstrate their rejection of those they consider foreign or unloyal to the Hashemite regime.