Banners calling for Israeli hostages to be released confiscated at Uefa match

Telegraph

2 days ago

The brother of an Israeli hostage claims to have been banned from bringing signs demanding his release into a Uefa match a day after it displayed a 'Stop Killing Children – Stop Killing Civilians' banner before the Super Cup.
The incident is alleged to have occurred before Beitar Jerusalem played Riga in the qualifying round of the Conference League in Romania on Thursday night.
The signs calling for the release of Rom Braslavski, kidnapped during the October 7, 2023, terrorist attack on Israel, are said to have displayed messages including: 'Bring back Rom'; 'I want my brother'; and 'The voice of my brother's blood is calling to me from the tunnels – Bring Rom and the rest of our hostages back home.'
It is unclear who would have blocked the banners, with the ongoing war in Gaza having forced Beitar to play Thursday's home leg of their third-qualifying-round tie at Romanian club Petrolul Ploiesti's Ilie Oana Stadium.
Braslavski's brother, Amir, who travelled to the game, nevertheless called on Uefa to intervene over the 'hypocrisy' of a decision made a day after the governing body displayed its own sign on the pitch when Tottenham played Paris St-Germain in Udine, Italy.
He was quoted in Israeli media saying: 'We demand that Uefa reverse this shameful decision and allow us to hold his flag and signs until he returns home alive and well.'
A spokesperson for the Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) also said: 'Rom Braslavski has been held captive by terrorists for nearly two years in conditions deliberately intended to prolong his suffering. To European football, Jewish lives don't matter.'
Uefa's own banner saw it accused on Thursday by the CAA of promoting a 'blood libel' that Jews murder children.
A spokesperson said: 'Uefa has said nothing about the Jewish hostages kept in barbaric captivity for almost two years, nor about the incessant attacks on Israeli civilians throughout this war from terrorists in Gaza and throughout the Middle East.
'But all of sudden, they have chosen a Spurs match – a club commonly associated with the Jewish community – to unfurl a banner reading 'Stop killing children – Stop killing civilians'. For centuries, Europe has traded in the blood libel that Jews kill children, and clearly the trope remains as popular as ever. Uefa says that 'the message is clear'.
'After two years with no acknowledgement of the Jewish children murdered, maimed and traumatised by this war, the message is clear indeed. This selective outrage tells us everything about the double standard that still poisons European discourse on Jews.'
Uefa was also accused of 'cowardice' by Amnesty for failing to identify Israel on the banner.