With the World Cup in faraway Brazil coming at a time of unprecedented sectarian violence and soaring tensions in the Middle East, some Arab football fans have been reduced to watching matches in secret or even and this is where it gets convoluted on a channel owned by Israel.
Since the World Cup kicked off three weeks ago, Sunni Muslim extremists have seized territory in Iraq and Syria and declared an Islamic state. Lebanon has been hit by a spate of suicide bombings. Israelis and Palestinians were pushed on the edge of full conflict after the murders of four teenagers.
Egypt's political divide grew wider as hundreds of people charged with supporting the ousted Muslim Brotherhood group were convicted of terrorism-related crimes including three journalists for Qatar-owned Al-Jazeera network.
Many accuse the Doha-based network of editorial bias in favour of the now banned Islamic group in Egypt and of Sunni insurgents fighting Shiite-dominated governments in Syria and Iraq.
Qatar's media conglomerate owns broadcasting rights to the World Cup in the Middle East, charging from USD 110 to USD 320 for a three-month subscription that includes the 64 World Cup matches a tournament that should be a welcome escape for millions of soccer fans from endless political turmoil.
Most fans can't afford to pay for the satellite broadcasts of the World Cup, which was previously shown around the region on state free-to-air channels. Some Egyptians refuse to subscribe to Qatar's channel for political reasons.
Watching a recent match in a cafe in downtown Cairo, 21-year-old student Mohammed Mostafa said his family is boycotting Al-Jazeera and instead tunes in to an Israeli channel that has been broadcasting the World Cup for free, with commentary in Hebrew a foreign language to most Arabs.
"My parents refuse to give money to the Brotherhood," Mostafa explained.
That kind of attitude has outraged officials in Egypt, where state media has lashed out at Israel by saying it has opportunistically barged into the Arab broadcasting market.
"Israeli media penetration into the Arab community is more devastating than its missiles," said Mohammed Shabana, the director of Egypt's Sports Writers Association.
But he also criticised Qatar, saying the oil-rich Gulf state should have dismantled Israel's plot to win over Egyptian fans, and offer a subsidised deal to the Cairo government that would air the World Cup to its citizens for free.
Israel "is our biggest enemy," Shabana said. "If the only way (to avoid Israel's channel) is to give money to Qatar, then we should do it.
