Maccabi Tel Aviv prepare to play in Europa League despite calls for ban
Maccabi Tel Aviv Football Club is set to play against Dynamo Kyiv in a UEFA Europa League match tonight despite calls from rights groups for Israeli teams to be banned from European football competitions.
Last November, Maccabi Tel Aviv fans clashed with apparent pro-Palestinian protesters before and after a Europa League football match in Amsterdam. Videos shared on social media at the time showed them chanting racist, anti-Arab songs, vandalising a taxi and burning a Palestinian flag.
Dima Said, a spokesperson for the Palestine Football Association and former captain of Palestine’s women’s national football team, said that FIFA’s decision to suspend Russian teams from all international football competitions following its invasion of Ukraine in 2022 highlights the “double standards” shown towards Palestinian lives.
Ahead of a Beitar Jerusalem game in Riga, Latvia, earlier this month, she told Al Jazeera that seeing Israeli football fans being allowed to shout anti-Palestinian chants without punishment around Europe is “as a Palestinian athlete … one of the hardest things to watch”.
“For me to see that those people who publicly support genocide, who publicly advocate for children to be killed, is something that’s very harmful for me as a human being, first, but secondly, as a Palestinian, it should not be allowed,” she said.
Israel carrying out ‘mass slaughter of civilians’: CAIR
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has called on US lawmakers to publicly acknowledge Israel’s mass killing of Palestinian civilians, after today’s report indicating that 83 percent of all those killed in Gaza were civilians.
As we reported earlier, the Guardian and Israeli news outlets +972 and Local Call uncovered the stark civilian casualty figures in Israeli military intelligence data.
“This newly-revealed secret Israeli data confirms what human rights organizations, journalists, and survivors have been saying all along: the Israeli government has been carrying out a mass slaughter of civilians in Gaza with impunity and with U.S. complicity,” CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad said in a statement.
“This is not collateral damage — it is calculated, industrial-scale slaughter. Congress can no longer hide behind Israeli propaganda. The time to recognize this genocide is now. Silence is complicity.”
The US has provided Israel with billions of dollars in military assistance and staunch diplomatic support since its war on Gaza began.
Why is Canada ‘choosing not to speak out’ on Gaza journalist protection?
Human rights advocates in Canada are questioning why the Canadian government has failed to sign onto a letter calling on Israel to guarantee press freedom and the protection for journalists in the Gaza Strip.
As we reported earlier, the Media Freedom Coalition released an open letter today urging Israel to ensure the safety of Palestinian journalists in Gaza and to allow foreign reporters into the bombarded enclave.
“Canada is a member of the Media Freedom Coalition, yet is missing from this statement signed by 27 countries that urges foreign media access into Gaza and condemns violence against journalists,” Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East wrote on X.
“Why is [Foreign Minister Anita Anand] choosing not to speak out?”
Canada is a member of the Media Freedom Coalition, yet is missing from this statement signed by 27 countries that urges foreign media access into Gaza and condemns violence against journalists. Why is @AnitaAnandMP choosing not to speak out? https://t.co/HmFgugHNnu
— Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (@CJPME) August 21, 2025
