Why are Turkey, Israel, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan in UEFA?
Turkey: Why not, as they do have territory within Europe? Kazakhstan & Azerbaijan: Ex-Soviet territory, hence always covered by UEFA, and in any case at least part of their territory is in Europe. Israel: Because their Asian neighbours refused to play them for political reasons. Israel originally played in the Asian Confederation, then qualified for the 1970 World Cup by playing in the Oceania Confederation, beating New Zealand 6-0 and Australia 2-1 on aggregate. They entered the 1982 World Cup qualification as part of UEFA, and for the 1986 and 1990 qualification in the Oceania Confederation (for 1990, they won the Oceania qualification competition, but lost the playoff against Colombia 1-0 on aggregate, since Oceania only has half a place in the finals and they have to play-off against the 5th placed South Americans). Since Israeli clubs started playing in the European club competitions in 1991, the national team has been put back in UEFA since then. FIFA will place countries in what
