Football Australia says its Socceroos will play Palestine in a second-round 2026 World Cup qualifier at the neutral venue of Kuwait on November 21. (Football News)
“As a result of current circumstances in the reg♔ion, the Asian Football Confederation formally requested that this designated home fixture for Palestine be held at a neutral venue,” Football Australi🍃a said in a statement.
Australian football administrators said the match would be pꦿlayed at Jaber Al-Ahmed International Stadium in Kuwait, five dayཧs after the Socceroos open the second round of Asian qualifying against Bangladesh in Melbourne.
Hamas militants killed 1,400 people during an Oc꧟tober 7 rampage in southern Israel, sparking the o𒐪ngoing war. Some 240 people Hamas abducted during the attack remain in Gaza, and more than 250,000 Israelis have evacuated homes near the borders of Gaza and Lebanon amid continuous rockets fired into Israel.
A month of relentless bombardment in Gaza has killed more than 10,300 Palestinians, two-thirds of them women and minors, according the Health Ministry of the Hamas-r൩un territory. More than 2,300 are be♚lieved buried from strikes that reduced entire city blocks to rubble.
