In October 2025 we documented BBC New website and BBC Sport portrayal of a ban on Israeli football fans attending a match in Birmingham.
BBC PROMOTES A NARRATIVE USING MISLEADING PORTRAYALS OF AMSTERDAM ATTACKS
One of the reports discussed in that post (which was also promoted on social media by the “UK’s most watched morning programme” BBC Breakfast) referred to the cancellation of a football match in Tel Aviv due to “public disorder”, with BBC Sport telling readers that:
“The unrest comes just days after officials in the UK said that Maccabi fans should not be allowed to attend the Europa League match at Aston Villa in England next month because of safety concerns.”
As we noted at the time:
“However, the anonymous BBC Sport writer did not inform readers that the fans who threw red and white flares onto the pitch and refused to disperse outside the stadium were – as documented by local sports journalists – the Hapoel Tel Aviv supporters.”
On December 7th the Jerusalem Post reported that eighteen people had been arrested in connection with that incident, noting that:
“According to the police, suspects associated with Hapoel Tel Aviv’s “Ultras” allegedly smuggled pyrotechnics into the stadium while covering their faces to avoid identification.”
BBC Sport has not amended that misleading report, which remains available online.
As was also noted in our post, that report and additional ones promoted distorted accounts of events in Amsterdam in November 2024. Similarly misleading portrayals were seen in additional BBC reporting in October and November 2025, both before and after the fixture that Israeli fans were barred from attending.
BBC NEWS AND BBC SPORT FRAMING OF THE BIRMINGHAM FOOTBALL MATCH STORY – PART ONE
BBC NEWS AND BBC SPORT FRAMING OF THE BIRMINGHAM FOOTBALL MATCH STORY – PART TWO
One of those reports linked to a Guardian report from October 21st:
“The Guardian reported the [West Midlands police] force’s intelligence concluded the biggest risk of violence came from extremist fans of the Israeli club, with scores of fans connected to a past history of violence and shouting “racist taunts” likely to travel to Birmingham.”
That Guardian report – which is still available online – tells readers that:
“According to sources, police intelligence said:
-
- Scores of extreme Maccabi fans with a past history of violence and shouting “racist taunts” were expected to travel to the Birmingham game.
- Dutch police told their British counterparts that the Maccabi fans had instigated trouble in Amsterdam at a game last year.
- They had randomly picked Muslims in Amsterdam to attack. That led to reprisal violence with some Dutch Jews attacked.
- A huge Dutch police effort, involving 5,000 officers across three days, was needed to quell the trouble.
- A community impact assessment by West Midlands police recorded that some Jewish people wanted the Maccabi fans banned because of the trouble that might ensue if they attended.”
That latter claim – which was repeated in a select committee meeting on December 1st – turned out to be false and an apology was made. As reported by the Jewish Chronicle:
“Minutes taken at meetings to discuss the ban on Maccabi Tel Aviv fans in Birmingham in November fail to back up West Midlands Police’s (WMP) claim that it was supported by the local Jewish community, according to records released to the JC following a Freedom of Information request. […]
Discussing the move in a hearing with the Home Affairs Select Committee, though, Assistant Chief Constable Mike O’Hara claimed that the ban had been supported by members of the Jewish community, who had expressed their views to the force.
However, the official record of the SAG meeting on 16 October, the day the ban was confirmed, shows that the force did not make that same claim during the meeting itself.
According to the minutes, there was no suggestion from the force that the ban was supported by the community, even during the section of the meeting dedicated to “community sentiment and impact”.”
On November 19th the Jewish Chronicle reported that the official Dutch report on the events of November 2024 “paints a very different picture of the events in Amsterdam”. Three days later the Sunday Times published a similar report.
“A British police force used false intelligence to secure a ban on Israeli fans attending an away game in Birmingham this month, according to Dutch law enforcement. […]
In a confidential report setting out its justification, the [West Midlands police] force detailed violence when Tel Aviv played Ajax in Amsterdam last year, claiming that Israeli fans threw “innocent members of the public into the river”, that between 500 and 600 “intentionally targeted Muslim communities” and that 5,000 police officers were deployed in response. […]
The national police force of the Netherlands has said the claims were incorrect. Sebastiaan Meijer, a spokesman for the Amsterdam division, said he was “surprised” by other allegations, including one that 200 travelling Maccabi fans were “linked” to the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). He said his force would never have had such intelligence and that Israel had a policy of conscription, making the claim meaningless. […]
The Dutch police issued its denial after the intelligence was leaked, describing information cited by its British counterparts as “not true” and in some instances obviously inaccurate. None of the disputed claims appear in an investigation by the Dutch justice and security ministry dated in May. […]
On the notion 5,000 officers had to be deployed, he [Meijer] said: “In total we came to 1,200, in different shifts, though … I read 5,000 police. That number is so not true.” He said there was no evidence 600 people “deliberately” targeted Muslims, saying the force did not have “a number of how many actually partook in the disorder”. […]
The claims are further undermined by a Dutch government inquiry published earlier this year.”
Two days after that Times report appeared, an article was published on the BBC news website with the tag West Midlands Police which focused more on reamplification of the WMP claims than on the information provided by the Dutch police.
“MPs want answers on Villa-Maccabi game intelligence” Tim Page, 24/11/25
“MPs have demanded police give a fuller account of allegedly exaggerated intelligence that led to a decision to ban Israeli fans from their club’s match against Aston Villa.
A report in the Sunday Times claimed West Midlands Police (WMP) had overstated the threat posed by Maccabi Tel Aviv fans ahead of the match on 6 November, citing violence around a game in the Netherlands last year. […]
The newspaper article on Sunday said an intelligence report relied on by the force had claimed some Maccabi-Tel Aviv fans were “highly organised, skilled fighters with a serious desire and will to fight with police and opposing groups”.
It had also suggested that 500 to 600 of them had targeted Muslim communities in Amsterdam and fans had been thrown in a river, claims which the newspaper said had been denied by Dutch police.”
On December 1st, BBC West Midlands reported on the select committee hearing.
“Maccabi fan ban evidence ‘changed to fit decision’, says antisemitism adviser” Vanessa Pearce, 1/12/25
“Evidence cited by police which led to the controversial banning of Maccabi Tel Aviv fans from a match against Aston Villa was based on facts changed to fit a decision, a group of MPs has heard.
The government’s independent adviser on antisemitism, Lord Mann, told the Home Affairs Committee he “struggled” with some “inaccurate” details given by the West Midlands force.
Some of the evidence “conflated” different things in regard to a fixture against Ajax in Amsterdam, he said, giving one example of running street battles that did not occur on a match day. […]
Lord Mann also highlighted an error in the West Midlands Police intelligence report which referenced a match between Maccabi Tel Aviv and West Ham, which had never happened, he said.
The chief constable admitted that had ended up in the report “due to a social media post”.”
On December 8th the Times reported that:
“The decision to ban the Israeli team’s supporters was based on “intelligence” obtained by West Midlands police about disorder involving Maccabi fans attending a game against Ajax in Amsterdam last year that the Dutch police have since dismissed as false.
Last week Craig Guildford, the chief constable of West Midlands police, said that the “intelligence” to justify the ban came from an online Zoom meeting between Mike Wilkinson, a chief inspector and the force’s football liaison officer and Dutch police commanders on October 1.
The meeting was not recorded and no minutes were taken by West Midlands police. Wilkinson sent only a single subsequent email.”
And:
“Guildford also admitted at last week’s committee hearing that the intelligence report used to justify the ban had included a reference to a “fictitious match” between West Ham and Maccabi in 2023, for which he blamed “social media scraping”.
Research by Nick Timothy, a Conservative MP and Aston Villa fan, has since found that the reference to the West Ham match was generated by AI.”
Multiple BBC reports uncritically promoting that highly problematic West Midlands police “intelligence report” remain online in their original form, including the one that links to the Guardian’s “exclusive” but inaccurate report.
As we know, the BBC describes its online archive as “permanent public record” and more often than not refuses to update reports after new information comes to light. That of course means that in this case, the BBC’s online archive continues to promote the West Midlands Police’s inaccurate claims about what happened in Amsterdam in November 2024, even though the Dutch police have refuted the false allegations. Clearly the existence of such misinformation in the BBC’s online archive does not serve the public interest.
Perhaps a FOI request to the West Midlands Police will shed some light on all the issues.