6 days ago
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TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Israeli football team supporters Maccabi Tel Aviv were targeted by a group of thugs in the early hours of Friday after a match against Ajax Amsterdam, said the city's mayor Femke Halsema.
The statement siding with Israel was made by the mayor even though many witnesses claimed that it was the Israeli football supporters who initiated the riots.
Among the dozens of Israelis who were chased and attacked, five were injured and had to be hospitalized, said the police. In total, 63 suspects have been arrested and the authorities promised to conduct an investigation, while politicians at home and abroad expressed their condemnation.
Chronology
Here is a closer look at how the situation escalated: Tension began to rise on Wednesday when some of the 3,000 visiting Maccabi supporters were involved in minor clashes with local residents, including taxi drivers and Ajax supporters in the city center, the police said.
- Tensions escalated on Wednesday when some of the 3,000 visiting Maccabi supporters were involved in minor clashes with local residents, including taxi drivers and Ajax supporters in the city center, the police said.
- A police report said the group of Maccabi supporters burned the Palestinian flag in Dam Square, took down another flag from a nearby building, and damaged a taxi.
- After a call appeared on social media, angry Muslim taxi drivers gathered outside the casino where 400 Maccabi supporters were meeting, and the police intervened in the midst of the confrontation.
- Dutch media have reported a video purportedly showing an attack on a Muslim taxi driver and a group of young men hurling anti-Semitic insults at someone in a canal who was said to be a Maccabi supporter being pushed in.
Reuters could not independently verify the events as described.
- On the day of the match, Maccabi supporters were filmed shouting anti-Arab slogans in front of the National Monument at Dam Square in central Amsterdam, including "To hell with Palestine," in a video verified by Reuters.
- Police were guarding the perimeter but fights around the stadium outskirts were reported.
Pro-Palestine Protest
Dutch pro-Palestine groups planned a demonstration outside the stadium during the match, arguing that the match should have been canceled due to Israel's alleged war crimes in Gaza.
Israel denied committing war crimes, saying they were defending themselves and blaming Hamas for civilian deaths, an allegation denied by militants.
Dutch authorities acknowledged anger over the war in Gaza but saw no reason to cancel the match. Relations between supporters - who are usually a source of violence in football - are generally good between the two teams, said Halsema on Friday.
Ajax has a strong Jewish association, and its fans sometimes bring Star of David flags to matches; Ajax also has many Muslim supporters.
Less than 1% of Amsterdam's population is Jewish after the Holocaust, while around 15% are Muslim, mostly first and second-generation immigrants from North Africa and the Middle East.
The conservative Dutch government has vowed to implement the strictest immigration controls in Europe and reject asylum seekers.
Anti-Semitic incidents have surged in the Netherlands since Israel launched its assault on Palestinian enclaves following Hamas attacks on Israel in October last year, with many Jewish organizations and schools reporting threats and hate mail.
With confrontations between protesters and football supporters seen as the biggest security threat, the mayor shifted the demonstration opposing the match to a distant location.
The most hardcore Ajax supporters, known as F-Side, said politics and football should be separated and that they would "intervene if necessary" if the match continued at the stadium.
Riot police at the stadium kept warring groups separated and only minor incidents were reported when the match ended around 11 p.m.
But in the city center, around midnight, security broke down. Calls to target Maccabi supporters returning home began circulating in Dutch messaging groups, leading to what Mayor Halsema described as an "anti-Semitic hit-and-run attack."
Police said they corralled around 200 Maccabi fans at Dam Square to protect them and escort them back to their hotel, but many were attacked elsewhere in the city, and the perpetrators quickly fled on motorbikes.
Videos circulating on social media and verified by Reuters showed groups attacking Israeli residents, kicking fallen victims, throwing fireworks, and in one incident shouting, "That's Palestine. That's Gaza, you bastard... "now you know how it feels."
Of the 63 people detained, most were later released pending charges.
Amsterdam banned demonstrations over the weekend and granted emergency stop-and-search powers to the police.
REUTERS
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