In a televised interview earlier this week, Mayor of Amsterdam Femke Halsema denied that a pogrom took place in Amsterdam and regretted she didn’t call out the violence instigated by the Israeli Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters. She was making comments on the recent riot instigated by the Israeli Maccabi Tel Aviv fans in Amsterdam, when Maccabi Tel Aviv played and lost against Ajax 5-0.
Maccabi Tel Aviv fans started a riot in Amsterdam after they were looking for ganging and beating up Arabs in the streets of Amsterdam. The Maccabi Tel Aviv hooligans also damaged private and public property as they searched the streets of Amsterdam for Arabs. Violence escalated after Maccabi Tel Aviv hooligans beat up a Moroccan taxi driver. Late at night Arabs, mostly Moroccans fought back against the Maccabi Tel Aviv fans prompting the Israeli government to send two emergency planes to evacuate them.
The Battle of Amsterdam was followed with a very coordinated propaganda and disinformation campaign by the Israeli government that accused Dutch Arabs and Moroccans of committing a pogrom against Jews/ the Israeli government also pressured the Dutch government to expel the Dutch Arabs involved in the violence. Dutch Prime Minister and his cabinet colleagues blindly adopted the Israeli government’s narrative on the event prompting Minister Moroccan-Dutch Minister Nora Achahbar to resign over racism allegations.
The Mayor of Amsterdam Femke Halsema has said:
“In hindsight, I should not have used the word ‘pogrom.’… We were completely overtaken by Israel. At 3 am, Prime Minister Netanyahu suddenly gave a lecture about what had happened in Amsterdam, while we were still gathering the facts. […] The Israeli government spoke of a ‘Palestinian pogrom on the streets of Amsterdam,’ and in The Hague, the words were used to discriminate against Moroccan Amsterdammers, Muslims. That is not what I meant or what I wanted. I saw how the word ‘pogrom’ became very political and turned into propaganda.”
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