And the Iraqi Federation said in a statement on Saturday, “The Lebanese Federation informed us of its apology for not granting the player Ayman Hussein an entry visa to Lebanon as directed by the security authorities, after confirming that he had an Israeli visa stamp for his entry to the Palestinian territories earlier.”
Hussein, the Qatari club’s Umm Salal striker, had visited the occupied territories with his former club, Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya, and obtained a temporary stamp from the Israeli authorities.
This seal is usually outside the passport and can be destroyed later, but Hussein “did not destroy the entry sticker and notify the Lebanese side of that,” according to the statement of the Iraqi Federation.
The Secretary-General of the Lebanese Football Association, Jihad Al-Shahf, said in contact with AFP that the federation has written to the Lebanese authorities regarding the visa of the Iraqi player Ayman Hussein and is working to issue it, adding that “the ban is related to the laws of the Lebanese Republic that prevent the issuance of visas for any visitor to its lands who had previously entered the lands.” Palestinian via an Israeli visa.
“We approached the AFC today and asked it to intervene with the Lebanese authorities to allow the player to enter and grant him an entry visa related to the team’s delegation’s visit to Beirut to meet his Lebanese counterpart on the first of next February,” the managing director of the Iraqi team, Ghaith Muhanna, said in a contact with Agence France-Presse.
Muhanna added that Hussein “will accompany the team’s delegation, which is heading to the capital, Tehran, to play the Iran match, in the hope that we will find a solution to the administrative problem of his passport.”
It is noteworthy that the Iraqi national team will meet its Iranian counterpart on the twenty-seventh of January in Tehran, as part of the first group of qualifiers for the 2022 World Cup.
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