INDEPENDENT politicians and campaigners backed a ban today on Israeli fans attending a football match in Birmingham, calling for the fixture to be cancelled and urging a wider sporting boycott of the country. 

Both Labour and the Conservatives have criticised the decision of West Midlands Police to bar Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters from attending next month’s match against Aston Villa on safety grounds.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer called the decision “wrong” while Kemi Badenoch branded it a “national disgrace.”

However, ministers face fresh questions after the UK Football Policing Unit said the Home Office was briefed “last week” that “restrictions on visiting fans” could be among the measures taken to police the fixture.

Senior officers at the unit voiced support for the ban, saying it was “important that we respect and support the structures in place for making these decisions.”

Left-wing politicians have also welcomed the ban, with some calling for the wider exclusion of Israeli teams from international competitions, similar to the sporting boycott of apartheid in South Africa.

Birmingham Perry Barr MP Ayoub Khan said the match had posed “latent safety risks,” adding the “political dynamics” surrounding the match “cannot be ignored.”

Mr Khan, along with fellow Independent MP Jeremy Corbyn, had initiated a petition calling for the match to be cancelled, held in a third country or played behind closed doors.

The petition said allowing the match to go ahead would send “a message of normalisation and indifference to mass atrocities” and accused Tel Aviv fans of causing “serious disruption and violence” during previous matches.

It said: “Their arrival in Aston — a diverse and predominantly Muslim community — poses a real risk of tensions within the community and disorder.”

The exclusion of away fans from attending stadiums in Britain is not a new phenomenon, with authorities previously imposing bans in response to the use of pyrotechnics and incidents involving disorderly conduct and violence.

The Aston Villa v Maccabi Tel Aviv match was classified high risk by West Midlands Police based on “current intelligence and previous incidents.”

Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) said on X: “Maccabi Tel Aviv fans have a long and sordid history of genocidal chanting and racist violence.

“Last year, they rampaged through Amsterdam, attacking residents, including attempting to drag a taxi driver out of his car.”

The club has been directly involved in Israel’s atrocities, PSC said, including sending “care packages” to Israeli soldiers and organising videos of club employees serving as Israeli soldiers as motivation before matches.

“Israeli football cannot be separated from Israel’s apartheid regime,” PSC added, also calling for the match next month to be cancelled.

Fan safety must remain the top priority for all parties involved, with Green Party deputy leader Mothin Ali saying Sir Keir had been “irresponsible” to “question a safety decision of a local authority.”

He added: “Under normal circumstances, supporters from across the fan base should be allowed to attend and provision taken to ban violent elements, such as the ultras.

“But these are not normal circumstances: these games are taking place in the context of thousands of civilians being killed in Gaza, the illegal occupation of Palestinian land, and the upholding of a system of apartheid.”

The left-wing politicians’ support for the ban puts them at odds with the majority of Britain’s political leaders, who between them signalled the decision was a capitulation to anti-semitism.

Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi, of Jewish Voice for Liberation (JVL), formerly Jewish Voice for Labour, echoed the “terrible” reputation of Maccabi fans for “racist thuggery” and hit back at the anti-semitism claims.

She told the Star: “We’re not talking about a nice, innocent bunch of Israeli friends and families coming over for a football match.

“We’re talking about a bunch of extreme Islamophobic, anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab thugs.

“The whole narrative [of anti-semitism] is completely upside down.”

She said that it was common for Israeli lobby groups to attempt to silence solidarity with Palestine, adding: “Once again, we’re being told that anything critical of Israel for its genocide is offensive to Jews — and that implies that Jews are 100 per cent supportive of the genocide.

“That is [what’s really] promoting an anti-semitic narrative.”