Violence agianst Israeli football fans: how to respond?
Pro-Palestinian rioters hunted down and attacked Israeli fans after a football match between Ajax Amsterdam and Maccabi Tel Aviv last week. Europe's press sees the violence as evidence of an antisemitic trend. But it also finds the reactions to the incidents worrying.
Europe far less outraged by what is happening in Gaza
Mladina accuses the Europeans of double standards:
“Paradoxically, on that very same day [of the riots in Amsterdam], a report was published by the United Nations Office for Human Rights according to which almost 70 percent of those killed since the beginning of the Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip were women and children. But nobody got particularly upset about this bad news. That's what wars do. Israel's right to self-defence. But the whole of Europe and the world was unanimous in expressing outrage and solidarity with the Israeli regime, which initially tried to rescue and evacuate the provocative fans through a military air operation. This blatant hypocrisy and double standard is causing irreparable damage to a united Europe.”
On the path to a two-tiered legal system
The Dutch governing parties want tough punishment for Muslim Dutch citizens who attacked Israeli football fans, including their being stripped of their Dutch citizenship. De Volkskrant sees this as a dangerous move:
“The goal [behind charging the perpetrators with terrorism] is clear: anyone convicted of participating in a terrorist organisation can be declared an undesirable alien - that means also those who have dual citizenship would be affected. ... This is a legal disparity that was already highly controversial among experts, and that would nothing short of stigmatising if it were to apply to lesser offences too. The inevitable result would be that an alternative legal system applies to large groups of Dutch citizens.”
The world must wake up
Borys Lozhkin, president of the Jewish Confederation of Ukraine, expresses his horror at the violence in Obosrevatel:
“These were not the usual clashes between football fans. Jews were hit by cars, beaten, stabbed and chased into the river just for being Jewish. ... All this didn't happen in 1938 but in 2024, in the middle of Europe, one day before the anniversary of the so-called Kristallnacht. The Holocaust began this way 86 years ago. It's time for the world to wake up.”
The face of a new antisemitism
Göteborgs-Posten sees the events in Amsterdam as symptomatic of a Europe-wide trend:
“To understand modern antisemitism in Europe, it is useful to read Norwegian historian Johannes Due Enstad. According to his study on antisemitism in Europe since 2018, the presence of a widespread critical attitude towards Israel and a large Muslim community are the main factors that drive widespread antisemitism in a country. According to Due Enstad, this strengthens the hypothesis of a 'new' antisemitism that grows out of hatred for Israel. This insight must be internalised in order to understand that the current events are not isolated phenomena - they are part of a larger problem in Western Europe as a whole.”
Hunted down
The taz doesn't agree with the claims that Israeli fans provoked the violence:
“Yes, the Maccabi Tel Aviv fan scene includes some right-wing hooligans, like the 'Maccabi Fanatics' group. They themselves rioted before the game, tore Palestine flags from windows and sang racist and war-glorifying songs on their way to the stadium. But does this justify the rampant violence that broke out after the game, after a significant time delay? Was it legitimate for people to go searching the city for Israelis, regardless of whether they were Maccabi fans or not? Is it fair to single out every single fan? Women, families, children? What happened in Amsterdam was a hunt.”
Don't fight hate with hate
The debate should not just focus on the police operation, De Volkskrant warns:
“This distracts from the question of why too many rioters cannot separate their abhorrence of Israeli violence in the Gaza Strip from their obvious abhorrence of Jews in general. This must be seen in the context of research that shows that a quarter of Dutch teenagers and young adults now trivialise the Holocaust. ... Long-term efforts are needed to reverse the trend and get people talking to each other again. If the debate is dominated by politicians who in turn push for people to be deported, the country won't make any progress.”
We need a more committed Europe
The EU must focus on the factors driving the new wave of antisemitism, La Repubblica demands:
“To prevent more Amsterdams, we can and must count on a collective mobilisation of consciences. ... But it is also and above all necessary for European governments to muster the courage and determination to create the conditions and prerequisites for putting an end to a conflict that has become the source of the hatred that feeds every antisemitic impulse. All the more so now that Donald Trump, a president who is willing to replenish Israel's arsenals and support the continuation of the war, is returning to the White House.”