Dutch city bans Israeli fans from soccer match; Foreign Ministry demands reversal

A city in the Netherlands is barring Israeli fans from an upcoming soccer match due to security concerns, prompting the Foreign Ministry to demand that the decision be reversed.

On Thursday, Dutch club AZ Alkmaar is due to host Hapoel Beersheba. European stadiums are generally required to reserve a portion of seats for fans of the opposing team, but ahead of the match, authorities in Alkmaar, north of Amsterdam, announced in a letter that the game carried a “very high risk due to the geopolitical context.”

Therefore, the letter said, fans of the Beersheba squad will not be allowed to attend, according to a report in The Athletic. The letter cited concerns over potential demonstrations and confrontations between Israeli fans and protesters, and said the decision was made based on a desire to maintain “public order and safety, not on political considerations.”

The letter cited a 2024 match in Amsterdam between local club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv, after which groups of locals assaulted Israeli fans. Dozens were arrested and five people were hospitalized following the attacks.

Those attacks “demonstrate that the combination of football supporters and demonstrators can create a dynamic leading to mutual provocations, resulting in disturbances,” the letter said, according to the Athletic. It added that while a “large-scale police deployment” can keep the groups separated during the game, preventing violence elsewhere is “virtually impossible due to the unpredictability of the encounters.”

The Foreign Ministry is pressing Dutch authorities to reverse the ban, saying in a statement that Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar raised the issue with his Dutch counterpart, Tom Berendsen, and that discussions were held with the Dutch foreign ministry and the Alkmaar municipality, “demanding that Hapoel Beersheba fans be allowed to attend the match and that their safety be guaranteed inside and around the stadium.”

The ministry and Israel’s embassy in The Hague “will continue working with the Dutch government and the mayor of Alkmaar to ensure that Hapoel Beersheba fans are permitted to attend the match and that their safety is guaranteed,” the ministry said.

Israeli clubs, and the national team, have faced adversity elsewhere in Europe as well. In 2025, Israeli fans were similarly banned from a game hosted by English team Aston Villa, in a decision that also cited the 2024 Amsterdam attacks.

But reports later surfaced that the ban was based on inaccurate intelligence and may have resulted from bias. The chief constable of West Midlands Police, Craig Guildford, resigned in the wake of those allegations, and earlier this year, an investigation was opened into allegations of police misconduct.

In recent weeks, Israel’s national team played a pair of matches against the Irish squad, which refused to shake the Israeli players’ hands. The Irish players also bowed their heads during the singing of Hatkvah, Israel’s national anthem. Irish players wore black armbands in the first game, and both teams wore black armbands in the second.

Since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, onslaught and subsequent war in Gaza, there have been repeated calls from Palestinian soccer officials and other critics of Israel for FIFA, the sport’s international governing body, to ban Israel from competition, which FIFA has not done.

Reuters contributed to this report.