The Israel Football Association (IFA) was established as the Palestine Football Association (PFA) in 1928. PFA got reinstated in to FIFA in 1929. Presently the IFA organizes the national Football team and manages numerous professional Football clubs, semi-professional Football clubs, and the amateur Football clubs.
IFA also manages Israel’s league system, which is comprised of 6 levels and 16 divisions. The top three divisions, Ligat Ha’Al, Liga Leumit, and Liga Artzit have 12 member clubs each and operate at the national level. The fourth division is Liga Alef, which consists of two regional leagues and has 28 member clubs. The fifth division, Liga Bet, comprises of 4 regional leagues and 64 member clubs. Liga Gimel is the sixth division that has 7 regional leagues and 91 member clubs. In addition to the leagues, IFA also organizes 2 major cup competitions. They are the State Cup and the Toto Cup.
The Israel national Football team, governed by the IFA and affiliated to the UEFA, has a poor record in the FIFA World Cup and the European Championship. At the Asian Cup, the team emerged winner once. The team, which received UEFA membership in 1994, hosted the Asian Nations Cup in 1964. In 1968 the team competed in the Olympic Games and reached the quarterfinals. It played its second Olympic Games in 1976 and again reached only the quarterfinals. In 1970 the team qualified for its first and only World Cup and played till the first round. Since 1991, 3 years before the affiliation to UEFA, the Israel national Football team started participating in European competitions.
Israel started the European entry with a bang by defeating France 3-2 in Paris in 1993. The golden moment for the National team came in 1994 when Israel achieved the full membership to participate the UEFA championship which came after a gap of twenty long years’s since they left Asia. Following their reasonable success Israel made it to the playoffs of Euro 2000 in 1999 but they failed to proceed any further as they were defeated by Denmark.
Israel continued with their good performance as they finished third in the European Zone group behind France and Switzerland. Further despite their good performance with their unbeaten ten matches with four wins and six draw they failed to qualify for the 2006 FIFA World Cup Finals.
The top goal scorers in Israel’s Football history have been Mordechai Spiegler with 32 goals, Yehoshua Feigenbaum with 24 goals, Ronen Harazi with 23 goals, Nahum Stelmach with 22 goals, Shiye Glazer with 18 goals, Giora Spiegel with 18 goals, Alon Mizrahi with 17 goals, and Eli Ohana with 17 goals. Some of the other prominent Football players have been Yossi Abukasis, Eyal Berkovic, Avi Cohen, Bonni Ginzburg, Yaniv Katan, Uri Malmilian, Ronny Rosenthal, Roby Young, and Daniel Brailovsky.
Year Round
2006 Did not qualify2002 Did not qualify1998 Did not qualify1994 Did not qualify1990 Did not qualify1986 Did not qualify1982 Did not qualify1978 Did not qualify1974 Did not qualify1970 Round 11966 Did not qualify1962 Did not qualify1958 Did not qualify1954 Did not qualify1950 Did not qualify1938 Did not qualify1934 Did not qualify1930 Did not qualify
Asian Nations Cup Record
Year Round Played Won Draw Lost
1968 Third Place 4 2 0 21964 Champions 3 3 0 01960 Second Place 3 2 0 11956 Second Place 3 2 0 1
European Championship Record
Year Round2008 Did not qualify2004 Did not qualify2000 Did not qualify1996 Did not qualify