On November 6 and 7, fans of Israeli soccer team Maccabi Tel Aviv went wild in Amsterdam ahead of a match between their team and Dutch soccer club Ajax. They attacked local residents, attacked private property, destroyed symbols of Palestinian solidarity and chanted racist and genocidal slogans glorifying the massacre of children in Gaza and the death of all Arabs.
While Israeli supporters benefited from a police escort, pro-Palestinian demonstrations were either canceled or moved. On the night of November 7, after the match, local residents reacted to these events by attacking Maccabi fans. Five people were briefly hospitalized and then released and 62 people were arrested, including 10 Israelis.
A letter, published by the Amsterdam city council and reporting the events, notes that “from 1:30 a.m. (Thursday evening), reports of street violence rapidly decreased.” The story could have ended there. This is not the case.
Overnight, the Israeli propaganda machine kicked into gear, and on Friday morning the world woke up to the news that “anti-Semitic squads” had embarked on a “Jew hunt” in Amsterdam.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog denounced the “anti-Semitic pogrom,” while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that military planes would be dispatched to evacuate Israeli citizens.
A wave of disinformation unleashed from Israel has been reproduced unchecked by Western media and the usual cohort of Western leaders, each outdoing the other in expressing the utmost outrage.
Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof condemned “anti-Semitic attacks against Israeli citizens” and King Willem-Alexander lamented that “we failed the Jewish community…during World War II, and last night we failed again” . Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema condemned “anti-Semitic” attacks on “Jewish visitors”, drawing comparisons to historic pogroms.
In the following days, the “pogrom” narrative unraveled, as more details and testimonies surfaced. Once the dust settled, one thing became clear: Palestinian solidarity is stronger than ever and Zionism is collapsing.
“Weaponizing Jewish Security”
While mainstream Western media outlets sought to portray the events of November 7 in terms presented by the Israeli government, many failed to stick to the facts. For example, while the violence was framed as “attacks on Jews,” no such attacks were reported against the local Jewish community.
That day, a commemoration of Kristallnacht, marking the pogroms against Jews in Germany in 1938, took place peacefully. Throughout the day, no attacks on any Jewish institution were reported.
What’s more, the violence unleashed by Maccabi fans against local residents has been underreported, if at all, by mainstream Western media. The idea that what happened was perhaps a reaction to the rampage of Maccabi supporters, many of whom are Israeli army reservists, who glorified genocide and chanted for the death of all Arabs, does not was never considered.
Members of the local Jewish community who had critical opinions about what happened were not heard.
Erev Rav, a Jewish anti-Zionist collective based in the Netherlands, for example, called the “militarization of Jewish security” on social media “incredibly alarming.” In an interview, author Peter Cohen, a former professor of sociology at the University of Amsterdam, said that “the Christian West has always constructed forms of anti-Semitism, mild and deadly, causing devastating harm to Jews in ‘Europe’. But he insisted that “those who criticize Israel are doing exactly that,” adding “that doesn’t make them anti-Semites!” “.
The spin the Western mainstream media put on the story – that “anti-Semitic” Arabs and Muslims were attacking Jews – fits into the false but dominant narrative that anti-Semitism in Europe is now exclusively hosted by Arab and Muslim immigrants. Not only does this fuel and normalize anti-Arab racism and Islamophobia, but it also minimizes and obscures very real and widespread European anti-Semitism.
Palestinian solidarity
Following the events of November 7, Amsterdam was placed under an emergency order which bans protests, prohibits the wearing of masks and allows “preventive searches” by police. Local residents, particularly those who regularly demonstrate against Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza, saw this as an undue and disproportionate attack on their rights to freedom of assembly and freedom of expression.
In defiance of the ban on demonstrations, on November 10, hundreds of people gathered in Dam Square, including myself, in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Those who demonstrated represented a broad spectrum of Amsterdam’s population – we were young, old, Dutch, international, Arab, Muslim, black, brown, white and anti-Zionist Israelis, united in our condemnation of Dutch complicity in the Israeli genocide. .
Police responded by confiscating Palestinian flags, banners and musical instruments, arresting people at random and charging at them with batons. A woman suffered head trauma following police violence, according to her lawyer.
Some 340 people, including myself, were arrested on buses and driven through the city, accompanied by several police vans and motorbikes. From the spectacle, one might have assumed that the buses were transporting hardened criminals. In fact, they were transporting unarmed peace activists detained for demonstrating against the genocide.
We were taken to an industrial area on the outskirts of Amsterdam and released, except for one Arab man who was arbitrarily selected, arrested and taken away. Then all that remained of the police operation was a drone hovering over our movements.
As we headed back toward the city center, cars started circling around us and drivers waved us on. They introduced themselves as the Moroccan drivers whose colleague had been attacked by Maccabi supporters on November 6. Out of solidarity, after hours of police repression, they took us back to Amsterdam, making sure we got home safely.
Protesters again defied the ban on demonstrations on November 13, with 281 people arrested and further acts of police brutality.
The game is over for Zionism
At first glance, the narrative that has come to dominate political statements and media coverage of the violence in Amsterdam and the actions of Dutch authorities may appear to be another public relations success for Israel. But that’s not the case.
This is another indication that the demise of Zionism is near. We are witnessing a genocidal regime in the grip of madness, making a last-ditch effort to fulfill the biblical fantasy of creating a greater Israel by erasing the Palestinian people.
As historian Ilan Pappe predicted in a recent article, “once Israel realizes the scale of the crisis, it will unleash fierce and unbridled force to try to contain it.” The desperate attempt to distort the reality of the events in Amsterdam is indicative of this panic, and the willingness of Western leaders and mainstream media to go along with this madness is unforgivable.
After a week of unrest, the pro-Palestinian movement won a small victory: Amsterdam’s city council passed a motion recognizing a “real and imminent genocide” in Gaza and calling on the government to act. Meanwhile, Mayor Femke walked back her statement on the “pogrom”, saying it was a weapon used by Israeli and Dutch politicians. A minister and two parliamentarians have resigned in response to racist remarks made within the government, sparking a political crisis and exposing fissures within the far-right government.
Although painstakingly slow, the fall of Zionism has begun and calls for a liberated Palestine are louder than ever.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Tel Aviv Tribune.