BBC newsIsrael has postponed the demolition of a Palestinian children’s football club in the city of Bethlehem, in the occupied West Bank.
It said the Aida Youth Center pitch was built without the necessary permits.
He said that the demolition is necessary for security.
An international campaign to save it, including a petition with more than half a million signatures, seems to be forcing the authorities to think again. The club, however, said they have not yet received any official notification.
It is roughly a 10th the size of a full football field, has patches of rust on the goal posts and, rising to the height of one of the touchlines, the architecture of the conflict looms large over Israel’s concrete security barrier.
But even if it does not rank high among the iconic places of the world game, this children’s football club finds itself at the center of a tough international campaign for its survival.
And despite asymmetrical difficulties like the one in the state of Israel, that campaign appears – at least for now – to be working.
The club won a reprieve against the threat of demolition by the Israeli military, claiming that the pitch was too close to the barrier.
In the northern part of Bethlehem, the construction of the pitch began in 2020 with the aim of providing a place to practice football for more than 200 young players from the nearby Aida refugee camp.
The narrow and congested streets contain the homes of descendants of Palestinian families who were forced or fled from their homes during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.
On November 3 last year, as the children walked out of the camp for the day’s training, they found a notice posted at the gate of the football field declaring it illegal.
The announcement was followed by a demolition order, which was issued at the end of December.
“We have nowhere to play, 10-year-old Naya told me, wearing a Brazilian shirt with footballing legend Neymar’s name emblazoned on the back.
“We built our dreams here,” he said. “If they destroy our farm, they destroy our dreams.”
I asked another young player, Mohammed, how he reacted when he heard the news that the club was destined for destruction.
“I’m angry,” he told me. “This is a field that I care deeply about.”
The community fought back, posting videos on social media, launching a petition that attracted hundreds of thousands of signatures as well as the reported interventions of senior officials from some of football’s global and regional governing bodies.
In its latest statement, the Israeli military reiterated its claim that the football pitch, built so close to the wall, poses a security issue.
But the BBC understands a political decision has been made to postpone the demolition order “for the time being”.
Israel began building its concrete barrier in the early 2000s in the face of a wave of deadly suicide bombings and other attacks carried out by Palestinians that killed hundreds of Israelis.
It says that it is essential for the defense of Israel and that it has dramatically cut the number of attacks.
Palestinians, however, say it has become a tool of collective punishment, separating them from their workplaces, dividing their communities and effectively annexing parts of their land.
For them, fighting on the football pitch highlights a wider injustice.
While they are denied the right to hold a small sporting facility on the border of one of their cities, Israel approves vast new settlements across the occupied West Bank and which are considered illegal under international law.
The immediate threat may have been avoided for the football pitch.
But the club did not let anyone down.
Mohammad Abu Srour, one of the board members of the Aida Youth Center, told me that they fear the threat may return if the club is out of the spotlight.
“We will continue the campaign,” he told me.