Tonight, a kind friend is taking me to see Wrexham vs Oxford United. It really is a must win for Wrexham, yet to win a home league game this season. Natch I shall be cheering on “the town” if only to erase the pain of the last time I saw Oxford, a match where my daughter and I expected an easy win for Mighty West Ham but instead witnessed a humiliating cup thrashing.
Other than watching my niece play for Stoke U16s against Wrexham this is my only game this season. I’d like to attend Wrexham at home to Millwall in February for obvious reasons but getting tickets can be hard.
And I shall attend tonight’s game wearing the sweatshirt you can see below.
As you may be aware, Maccabi Tel Aviv fans will now not be able to see their team play Aston Villa in Birmingham in the Europa League. It all started when the local Gaza independent MP and the vile terrorists chum Jeremy Corbyn started a petition saying the Maccabi fans should be banned because their own safety could not be guaranteed. Yes that is correct: Jews excluded to protect Jews. Crazy stuff.
The West Midlands Police took advice from, inter alia, a former Hezbollah terrorist and went along with the ban. At which point the supporters of the ban showed their true colours in saying the next step was to ban all Israeli teams from European soccer. So, it was nothing about safety it was all about most Maccabi fans being Jews, although with 4 Israeli Arabs in the starting XI many Israeli Arabs also support the team. Those wanting to ban the fans did so because they wanted the game “Juden frei”
Then the debate moved on with folks saying that Maccabi fans were hooligans so a few hundred of them threatened the local population and could not be policed. All clubs have hooligans. I still remember with horror a 2009 match I went to at Upton Park against Millwall. There was, I think, one fatality and the whole event was poisonous. Up here in Wrexham folks long for a cup Derby against hated rivals Chester and were there be such a game there would be racist chanting against the accursed English, violence and arrests.
Those calling for a ban cited a match in Amsterdam vs Ajax last year where there was violence, injuries and arrests. But they neglect to mention that the violence was organized weeks before via a social media campaign termed “hunt the Jew” that all those hospitalized were Israelis and nearly all those arrested local Moslems and left wing agitators. The Jews were the victims!
As luck would have it there was then violence in a Tel Aviv derby match. Okay it was the fans of the other Tel Aviv team that was largely responsible but why not attack Man City for the sins of Man United. Again it was logic fail, an excuse just to keep the Jews away.
At that point Tommy Robinson weighed in saying he would go to the game to support Maccabi and, sensing a poisonous riot which would threaten the safety of its fans, Maccabi said it would ask for no tickets to the game. Thanks Tommy, your intervention was not helpful.
And thus those who wanted Jews excluded got their way. That is a day of shame for Britain. And to its credit the Government recognized that and worked to overturn the ban.
I have not always been the greatest fan of Culture secretary Lisa Nandy although we have in common that, as babies, we have both sat on the knee of her maternal grandfather. But she very bravely called out those who organized this outrage as anti semites. In the current toxic atmosphere on the left I really admire her courage and applaud her for it. Bravo Lisa!
It is utterly appalling that folks are effectively being told that there are now no go zones in Britain because of their race or religion. And the folks who are suffering in this way are the Jews. I have already been threatened for standing up and speaking out against this nonsense, this evil, but now we all need to speak out. And so I wear the shirt below to tonight’s game.
I admit I am a tiny bit nervous as Wrexham fans can be rather political and, as I have discovered in the local Tesco, we have anti semites amongst us here in North Wales. But, as a non Jew, it is wrong to stay silent even as the climate becomes more toxic. I know that almost every Jewish household in Britain has had at least one discussion about leaving something that would massively impoverish this country in so many ways. Now is the time to urge Jews not to leave, to say we stand with you and we stand with Maccabi.
