Roving gangs on scooters attacked and beat Israeli soccer fans in the Dutch capital Amsterdam overnight in an outburst of what authorities called antisemitic violence.
Footage circulating on social media showed supporters of the Maccabi Tel Aviv soccer team being chased down and assaulted on Thursday night, with one video geolocated by NBC News to near Amsterdam's central station that showed fighting on the streets between the Israelis and their attackers.
"Boys on scooters crossed the city in search of Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters," Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema said. "It was a hit-and-run. Football fans were beaten and scared, after which the rioters quickly left again, fleeing the police force that was on the move en masse yesterday.”
A separate video geolocated by NBC News showed Israeli fans taunting pro-Palestinian protesters either before or after Thursday's match by singing “Death to the Arabs” and “Let the IDF win. We will f*** the Arabs,” as well as tearing down a Palestinian flag.
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The war in Gaza triggered by the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas terror attack that killed 1,200 people has caused outrage throughout Europe, including in The Netherlands.
Amsterdam, like many major cities across the world, has been convulsed by large protests condemning the ongoing Israeli invasion of Gaza, the deaths of more than 43,000 Palestinians and the destruction of much of the enclave.
As images of the unfolding violence went viral in the hometown of Holocaust heroine Anne Frank, the Israelis dispatched multiple commercial planes to bring the fans home.
“Yesterday there was an outburst of anti-Semitism such as we had hoped to see no more in Amsterdam," Halsema said. "I express the strongest condemnation of the violence that has taken place. Among our Jewish Amsterdam residents there is fear, dismay, anger, disbelief.”
The fighting erupted after the match between the Israeli team and the Dutch club Ajax. There have been outbreaks of soccer hooliganism and fighting between fans of competing clubs around the world for many years, but it’s unclear how much of that contributed to the violence in this case.
"Rioters" had "actively sought out Israeli supporters to attack and assault them," Halsema's office said in a statement after the incidents.
At a news conference Friday, Halsema said the city has taken emergency measures to prevent any more violence, including a three-day ban on all demonstrations.
Local police said in the aftermath of Thursday's violence five people required hospital care, while 20 to 30 others suffered non-serious injuries, and at least 62 people were arrested.
Eyewitness describes attack
Iddo Gold, 23, told NBC News in a video call Friday that he and other Maccabi fans had taken the train into Amsterdam’s city center after the game. They were ambushed when they got there, he said.
“Everybody ran through the streets,” Gold said. “Whatever they saw in the street, they tried to attack us with.”
Gold said they were chased by attackers on motorbikes and some of their pursuers were armed with knives. He said they fled to their hotels and that he let a fellow fan stay with him because he was too afraid to venture back outside.
When dawn broke, Gold said they were still too "frightened to go into the streets."
In a video shared by the Israeli Embassy is Washington, which NBC News has not been able to independently verify, a man could be seen being beaten as an attacker shouts, “This is for the children! Free Palestine now!”
Tevel Caro, 18, said he and a friend had already made it back to their hotel when they began to receive messages from other Maccabi fans about what was doing on outside.
On Friday, Caro said he was sheltering in a safe house with dozens of other Israelis, worried about how they would get back home.
Caro, who said he will soon be doing his mandatory Israeli military service, said he was disappointed that Israel was not deploying military aircraft in addition to the El Al airliners.
"I felt so lonely," Caro said. "You know, like I'm supposed to get deployed in two weeks and no one cares about me."
The Ajax team has historically been the squad that Amsterdam’s large Jewish community rooted for. And the confrontation between the Israelis and pro-Palestinians appeared to be more about the conflict of Gaza than soccer.
Even before the game, tensions between the Israeli fans and local supporters of the Palestinians were simmering, Amsterdam's acting police chief, Peter Holla, said at Friday's news conference.
As a precaution, hundreds of extra police officers were dispatched to Amsterdam, Hollas said.
Some of the Israeli fans added to the tensions, Holla said, by attacking a taxi Wednesday as well as a Palestinian flag.
There was also a confrontation before the game between Israeli fans and pro-Palestinian demonstrators and police struggled to keep the two groups apart, Holla said.
It was after the match that the violence ensued, he said.
World leaders decry violence
Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof said he was “horrified by the antisemitic attacks on Israeli citizens.”
He described the violence as “completely unacceptable” and said he had spoken to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by phone “to stress that the perpetrators will be identified and prosecuted.”
Other European leaders echoed those sentiments, with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock calling the images emerging from Amsterdam “horrific & deeply shameful for us in Europe,” in a post on X.
Netanyahu was briefed in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ situation room on Friday.
In comments shared by his office, he said Israel “cannot accept this” and that the violence “puts us and them, the free countries and the Netherlands, in danger.”
Netanyahu compared the incident to Kristallnacht, or the “Night of Broken Glass,” when almost exactly 86 years ago, on Nov. 9, 1938, Nazi mobs in Germany launched pogroms and vandalized Jewish-owned homes, synagogues and businesses.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog spoked directly with King Willem-Alexander about the "antisemitic pogrom" in Amsterdam, the Dutch royal family said. The king expressed his shock and said "history has taught us how intimidation goes from bad to worse, with horrific consequences."
"Jewish people must feel safe in the Netherlands," the king said.
U.S. Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt, the special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, condemned the incident and also said it was "terribly reminiscent of a classic pogrom."
Lipstadt said she was also "deeply disturbed by how long the reported attacks lasted and call on the government to conduct a thorough investigation into security force intervention and on how these despicable attacks transpired."
European soccer's governing body, UEFA, condemned the violence in a statement on Friday, saying that it trusted authorities to "identify and charge as many of those responsible for such actions as possible."
UEFA said it planned to "examine all official reports, gather available evidence, assess them and evaluate any further appropriate course of action in accordance with its relevant regulatory framework."
The widening war in the Middle East has sparked protests across the world, including at sporting events. A giant “Free Palestine” banner was unveiled at a Paris Saint Germain game on Wednesday, drawing criticism from France’s interior minister. Israel’s national team is scheduled to play France in Paris on Nov. 14.
Raf Sanchez and Sara Mhaidli contributed.
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