It's not difficult to see that football is what's making the world go round these days, writes Dina Ezzat Saudi Arabia and Tunisia are the only two Arab countries participating in the 2006 World Cupthe Mondiale as it is dubbed in the Arab press. This, however, was no impediment for the Arab press or the Arab world, both of whom demonstrate a huge interest in this once every four years, most watched football tournament being hosted this year by Germany. And when Palestinians were being killed, on more than an average scale by the Israelis, when chaos was rampant in Iraq and politics was being restructured (or rather structured) in Somalia, the press still found enough space on its front pages to put news of the World Cup. In fact, as the first week of the World Cup came to a close and the second began, news of the four-week event, inaugurated on 9 June, was taking prominence over some key political issues on the front pages. On Tuesday, many Lebanese papers gave equal, and at times more prominence to news of this sports fiesta over news of the national Lebanese dialogue. Meanwhile, many newspapers across the Arab world found enough interest from their readers to encourage them to bring out extra sports pages, often printed in full on the Internet. The schedules of the day's games was in some cases on the front pages. Reporting has been wide and ranging. There has been of course the daily reports, at times on the front pages, of who won. But it was not just the sports in play; it was also politics. The defeat of Iran by Mexico 3-1 was reflected in different tones across the Arab world. The newspapers of the Arab Gulf states that are not particularly comfortable with Iran's nuclear ambitions, had headlines like "Iran faces the inevitable defeat before the players of Mexico". Meanwhile, elsewhere in the Arab world, especially in some Syrian and Lebanese newspapers, the score was heralded as "Iran scores one but loses to three goals by Mexico after an impressive performance". The gloating over the 3-0 loss sustained by the US team by the Czech Republic was clearly sensed in the papers of Tuesday morning. And on Tuesday morning too, the newspapers of the former French colonies in the Arab world were busy speculating over the result of the Tuesday evening game between France and Switzerland. Meanwhile, many Arab African newspapers were particularly interested in the performance of several African teams, with many dedicating front page inches to news of the last-minute decision of the Togo coach to abandon his team over unresolved financial problems and the urgent flight of the president of Togo to Germany to meet with his team, resolve the coaching matter and wish them good luck. Not surprisingly, in the letters to the editor section, many a reader lamented the limited Arab presence in this world event, compared to the African presence. And some, including Saudi-based geologist Mohamed Saleh, in a letter to Asharq Al-Awsat on Friday, expressed a wish to live long enough to see the World Cup hosted by an Arab country. Certainly, all the papers had to bow to quality football news related to games involving the famous Latin American teams, especially Brazil, picked by many Arab sports commentator as a potential winner of the World Cup on 9 July. There was much also written about the human side to the 2006 World Cup. Actually, many papers dedicated some of the features, culture and lifestyle inches to run serialised features on the history of the World Cup and the best pictures from 100 years of football. "You pay, you watch", was the headline of an article in the London-based daily Asharq Al-Awsaton Saturday, only one day after the grand German opening of the tournament. The story that appeared in similar format under similar titles in many an Arab publications was about the problem of football lovers in many Arab countries whose national TV channels was denied the right to broadcast the games live and who had no choice but to go to coffee shops that sell soft drinks at exaggerated prices to allow their audiences to follow the games live on subscription channels. Sports news filed from Egypt noted that due to the fact that the World Cup coincided with the country's national cup, some Cairo coffee shops divided their space to allow two TV sets to broadcast the games for the different audiences. In the last of a three-series set of articles by the London-based daily Al-Hayat, Wadie Abdel-Nour noted on Monday that "the Mondiale is an excellent opportunity for a wide range of business-oriented projects included those tailored to address the bored wives of men spending long hours watching the games, including special tourism agencies and non-governmental organisations who would appeal for the duration of the four-week event to be cut by half to spare the wives from boredom." This said, the world still went round and there were enough articles for those who take no interest in the business of football. The regular depressive news from all across the Arab world, as well as from Guantanamo where many Arab nationals have been held captives for years by the US with unclear charges, were there. But interestingly, there was some other news for the depressed reader. On Saturday, the London-based daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi noted in an article filed from Ramallah by Belal Daher that "out of despair of getting any serious attention to their plight, a group of Palestinians spent 18 hours preparing a huge dish of taboula to get attention to the Palestinian cause." And on the same day, the same paper printed an article filed from Al-Nassera, by Zoheir Androus to announce that Sweden had decided to boycott all wines produced by illegal Israeli settlements in the Golan Heights. "In an unprecedented move, the food control agency in Sweden is now tacking special stickers on all wines exported from the Israeli settlements in the Golan and appealed for their boycott to protest the apartheid exercises of the Israeli government," Androus reported.
