In November 2024, Maccabi fans were violently attacked by fans of the Dutch soccer team Ajax followed their match in Amsterdam. During the premeditated and coordinated violence, Maccabi fans were chased with knives and sticks in the streets, run over by cars, physically beaten, and forced by their attackers to say, “Free Palestine.” Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema called the attackers “antisemitic hit-and-run squads” who went “Jew hunting.”

Mann said the West Midlands intelligence report “conflates” facts and mentions several details that simply “didn’t happen” in relation to the Ajax-Maccabi match in Amsterdam on Nov. 8, 2024. He gave one example about a Maccabi and West Ham match mentioned in the report that never took place. Guildford admitted that it was noted in the report “due to some social media scrapping,” which included a “search through social media to see what’s trending.”

Mann said the intelligence report also falsely claimed Maccabi fans ripped down several Palestinian flags on game day in Amsterdam and threw members of the public in into a river. It further contained the false accusation that 5,000 Dutch police officers were deployed in response.

The report went on to falsely state that pro-Palestinian demonstrators and Israeli soccer fans were fighting in the streets of Amsterdam throughout the day on Nov. 6, 2024, according to Mann. He explained that reports from Amsterdam officials clearly indicate the violence only started after the match ended, and there was only one reported incident of a Palestinian flag being pulled down, on the day before the game. The report also referred to multiple incidents against taxi drivers, when there was only one incident the night before the match, Mann stated. “The suggestion that Maccabi Tel Aviv fans were going around Amsterdam trying to find local people specifically from the Muslim community going into Muslim areas – that didn’t happen,” he added.

“I’ve looked at the intelligence report of the West Midlands Police and I struggle with some of the intelligence within it, including the intelligence about Amsterdam. It doesn’t concur with the discussions I had in Amsterdam and the facts I saw in Amsterdam,” Mann said. “Some of the stuff in the report simply doesn’t match the Amsterdam [police] reports and I think the evidence has been fitted to try and get a solution because obviously [if] you don’t have the Israeli fans, there’s no conflict … A banning of fans needs to be properly intelligence-led. The facts have slightly changed to fit the decision.”

“What you’re trying to say quite clearly is that is that the facts have slightly changed to fit the decision?” an MP asked Mann. “Correct. Correct. That would be a summary of what’s gone on here,” he replied.

In response, Guildford defended the ban against Maccabi Tel Aviv fans, saying the decision “wasn’t taken lightly” and was made after a “careful assessment.” The ban was the “best way of maximizing the safety” of everyone involved, O’Hara said. “Had we allowed the fans and it had gone wrong I feel that I would be sitting here again anyway.”

He also denied “fitting” evidence to support the ban and discredited suggestions of a “conspiracy” within the police force to target Maccabi fans, saying they were “completely wrong and misleading.”

“We’ve acted with integrity. My assurance to yourselves as a panel is that we were not influenced in any way, shape, or form by anybody politically,” he argued. “We did our service to the best of our ability, and the officers acted in line with their training and professionalism.”

Guildford told the Home Affairs Committee that his chief inspector had a virtual meeting on Oct. 1 with three Dutch police commanders and discussed the violence last year when Maccabi played Ajax in Amsterdam. Guildford said he trusted what his chief inspector was told during the meeting and the information they received from Dutch police “swayed” the police force’s assessment not to allow Maccabi fans to attend Villa Park for the game on Nov. 6. The information provided by Dutch police “certainly influenced the way our assessment was heading,” Guildford said.

“The information provided from the Dutch was very, very clear in terms of they reflected on the days before, during, and after the match as a result of clashes between the Maccabi ultras and the local Muslim community,” he explained. “In terms of what we were told, the ultras were very well organized, militaristic in the way that they operated. They attacked members of the local community, including taxi drivers. Tore down flags. People were thrown into the river.”

He added that the Dutch commanders were “unequivocal” that they “would never want to have Maccabi Tel Aviv playing in Amsterdam again in the future.” He also said that Dutch police “probably underestimated the level of threat and risk” from Israeli soccer fans and changed their account of what they told British counterparts in the virtual meeting on Oct. 1 because they were under political pressure.

O’Hara said Sebastiaan Meijer, a spokesman for the Amsterdam division of the Dutch police, “naysayed” some of the intelligence and made it “very clear they’re under a lot of pressure, in their words, from City Hall.”

Mann told MPs he suggested to West Midlands police and the Birmingham City Council alternative solutions before they announced the ban against Maccabi fans, which included ideas like having Maccabi supporters escorted by police in and out of the stadium to avoid any confrontations. Another suggestion he made was changing the game’s kickoff to an earlier time in the day so visiting Maccabi fans did not have to stay overnight in Birmingham, which could reduce the risk of violence ensuing in the area surrounding the stadium. Mann also told the committee he talked to both Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv regarding the concerns ahead of the match, and said both teams handled it “maturely and sensibility” and were “extremely cooperative.”

“I was surprised at the decision to ban the fans. I don’t think that was the most appropriate decision nor the most sensible decision,” Mann noted.