SHOWS of support for Palestine have been seen across Uefa competitions this week, as fans at various clubs have organised large displays of solidarity.
It has demonstrated that fan movements can still have an important voice despite some clubs, leagues, and confederations attempting to silence them.
A huge “free Palestine” banner was draped across the stands at the Parc des Princes where Paris Saint-Germain faced Atletico Madrid in the Champions League.
Below the banner was a call for peace which read: “War on the pitch but peace in the world.”
As reported in today’s Morning Star, France’s Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau described it as “unacceptable,” adding that “Uefa rules forbid political messages, and it is a political message.”
It is sad that messages advocating peace are now deemed unacceptable.
During the Europa League game between Galatasaray and Spurs in Istanbul, Galatasaray fans kept a “free Palestine” banner in view for much of the game. The TV cameras could not avoid it no matter how much they were obviously trying to.
The biggest political flashpoint of this week’s European games came in Amsterdam where Ajax supporters and residents had shown support for Palestine ahead of the visit of Israeli side Maccabi Tel Aviv.
It led to tension and inevitably violent clashes after Maccabi fans made anti-Palestine and Islamophobic chants including “let the IDF win,” and tore down Palestine flags on display in the city.
It follows similar conduct from Maccabi fans in Athens ahead of a game against Olympiakos in March.
“They began attacking houses of people in Amsterdam with Palestinian flags, so that’s actually where the violence started,” Amsterdam city councilman Jazie Veldhuyzen told Al Jazeera today.
“As a reaction, Amsterdammers mobilised themselves and countered the attacks that started on Wednesday by the Maccabi hooligans.
“The mayor says the police did act, but I would say they acted at the wrong moments.
“They only intervened to protect the Maccabi hooligans when Amsterdammers stood up to defend their homes.”
A statement from the authorities in Amsterdam said some attacks on visiting Maccabi fans were targeted and anti-semitic.
“This outburst of violence toward Israeli supporters is unacceptable and cannot be defended in any way,” said the statement from the police and prosecution office.
“There is no excuse for the anti-semitic behaviour exhibited last night by rioters who actively sought out Israeli supporters to attack and assault them.”
Some of the framing of this incident in Amsterdam has echoed much of the reporting on Israel’s actions in the Middle East.
It has ignored or excused the racist chanting and vandalism carried out by a right-wing fan group but has then condemned the responses to them and the initial calls for peace.
The actions and response in the relatively insignificant sphere of European football have mirrored the immunity given to Israel that has had catastrophic consequences as its army carries out ethnic cleansing in Palestine.
There have long been related political tensions between fans of various clubs within Israel itself.
Like most nations, Israel has pockets of right-wing football fans and some clubs are more known for leaning this way than others.
In times of political tension, these groups often come to the fore.
Beitar Jerusalem in particular has become known to foster this kind of support and is associated with revisionist zionism – a far-right wing of Zionism based on asserting dominance in the region, territorial and ethnically.
The “from the river to the sea” slogan has been used to show support for Palestine based on freedom and peace rather than land capture and control.
Revisionist zionism, however, aligns “from the river to the sea” with an imperialist idea of claiming territory and asserting Israel’s ethnic control of the region — something that is currently being carried out by Benjamin Netanyahu, himself a Beitar supporter, and the IDF.
Beitar Jerusalem was also prominent in the news in 2020 when a member of Abu Dhabi’s ruling family, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Nahyan, made a bid for 50 per cent ownership of the club.
It eventually fell through, but it promoted a backlash from fans at the club which had never fielded an Arab player.
One supporters’ group, La Familia, told the Guardian via an anonymous spokesperson that “the sale threatened the Jewishness not only of the club but the entire city of Jerusalem.”
Some Israeli clubs, including most prominently Hapoel Tel Aviv—Maccabi’s local rivals — had been fighting back against this idea of a Jewish-only league and region.
The club has set up youth football initiatives for players of all religions, encouraging a pathway for Arab, Druze, and Jewish players into their teams, including youth football projects in the West Bank.
Hapoel also has links with the well-known German left-wing club FC St Pauli, which sent aid to the Hapoel fans and their compatriots following the Hamas attacks in Israel on October 7, 2023.
St Pauli, meanwhile, is one of several European clubs that would normally be associated with shows of solidarity with oppressed peoples that have been relatively silent on the genocide in Palestine.
This led to some of the club's international fan groups abandoning St Pauli earlier in the year.
While clubs including PSG, Celtic, and Galatasaray have displayed their support prominently in high-profile European games, others have been quieter.
Some of this is down to owners and league organisations prohibiting flags or slogans not related to the game or the players involved, which is effectively a ban on showing support for Palestine.
There were no such bans on flags and support following Russia’s attacks on Ukraine. Instead shows of support for Ukrainians were actively encouraged, and rightly so.
However, the support for Ukraine from clubs and governing bodies contrasts with their lack of support for Palestine and other pressed nations, which suggests they might have seen Ukraine as a safe political cause for their own ends, rather than having genuine concern for the Ukrainian people.
Uefa and Fifa also had no hesitation in banning Russia and Russian clubs from international competition but have not applied the same sanctions to Israel.
Banning an entire generation of athletes from global competition based on the actions of their governments seems unfair and disproportionate, but that bans have been applied to Russia across sports, and not Israel, shows double standards.
Despite claiming to be apolitical, those running the game are happy to be political when it suits them.
They use politics as a tool for sportswashing and for cosying up to advertisers, but they will try to silence fans when their politics don’t align with theirs or it might negatively affect advertising revenue and upset corporate sponsors.
This week there has been more condemnation of peaceful messages than there has been of the racism and violence caused by groups of right-wing fans in Amsterdam.
With anti-semitism and Islamophobia on the rise, it is important that calls for peace continue to be prominent, and football fans can play a part in promoting this even if their clubs and leagues won’t.
