Scottish Soccer Fans Wave Palestinian Flags During Match With Israeli Team
Image by Facebook
By Thea Glassman August 18, 2016
Scottish soccer fans held up Palestinian flags during a Champions League qualifying match against an Israeli team in Glasgow — the ninth incident of anti-Israeli protests during a sporting match in the past five years.
The protest came as Celtic, the champions of Scotland’s premier league, defeated Israel’s Hapoel Be’er Sheva, 5-2. The teams will play again in Israel with a spot in Europe’s premier club tournament on the line.
Celtic Fans for Palestine, a pro-Palestinan Facebook community , organized the boycott by posting an event ahead of the match entitled “Fly the flag for Palestine, for Celtic, for Justice.” 1,500 people indicated that they were interested in participating.
“In support of the Palestinians we Celtic fans invoke our democratic rights to display our opposition to Israeli Apartheid, settler – colonialism and countless massacres of the Palestinian people,” the event organizer wrote. “…we stand for justice, for freedom and end to all forms of racism and oppression.”
The Union of European Football Associations does not allow any form of political expression during a sporting match. The Celtic club was perviously fined more than $20,000 for Palestinian flag waving during a game in Reykjavik two years ago.
Later, commenters took to Celtic Fan For Palestine’s Facebook page, to celebrate the collective protest.
“You celtic fans have warmed hearts around the world. What a beautiful gesture you made.” one wrote. “You have done a great thing at a vital time. Good on you all.”
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
