Norway football federation to donate winning from Israel game for humanitarian work in Gaza

The Football Federation of Norway said that it «cannot remain indifferent» to humanitarian suffering in Gaza and will donate profit from an upcoming world cup qualifying against Israel to help work in the region.

Norway plays Israel in Oslo on October 11.

«Neither we nor other organizations can remain indifferent to humanitarian suffering and disproportionate attacks to the civilian population in Gaza for a long time,» said Lise Klaveness of the Norwegian football federation Lise Kaveness on Tuesday in a statement.

«We want to donate the proceeds to a humanitarian organization that saves lives in Gaza every day and offers active emergency aid on the ground,» she said.

It was not immediately clear how much the Norwegian federation expected to earn through ticket sales for the competition, which will start next week.

The Israeli football federation responded to the move on Wednesday by encouraging his Norwegian counterpart to encourage the October 7, 2023, attacks and hostages by Hamas. In a statement first published by British Daily De TelegraafThe Israeli Federation has also called on the Norwegians to ‘ensure that the money is not transferred to terrorist organizations or to whaling’, referring to an issue that Norway has confronted with global criticism of.

The Norwegian Federation said it cooperates with UEFA and the local police on security schemes for the game of 11 October. Extra security is expected to limit the capacity with a maximum of 3,000 tickets, the federation said. Ullevaal Stadium usually has a crowd of 26,000 for national teams.

Since October 2023, Israel cannot organize games in international competitions for safety reasons. It organized his «home» qualification game against Norway in Hungary. Norway won that match 4-2 in March. Norway is currently at the top of the five-countries qualifying group for Israel.

Published on August 20, 2025