Hamas’ attack on Israel and its consequences are also affecting football. The Bundesliga reacts with a minute’s silence and looks for the right way to deal with it.
When the eighth matchday in the men’s Bundesliga begins on Friday evening (October 20, 2023) with the game between Borussia Dortmund and Werder Bremen, it shouldn’t be about goals or points. Before the game there will be a minute’s silence to remember the “many innocent victims in connection with the events in Israel and the Gaza Strip.” This is what the German Football League (DFL) announced the day before.
It has been almost two weeks since innocent people died in a Hamas terrorist attack in Israel. Since then, the conflict has also been omnipresent in Germany. German football is no exception. Here, too, people are looking for a way to deal with all of this, with terror, suffering, death.
Mazraoui remains an FC Bayern player
This has been clearly seen in recent days with the example of FC Bayern. Last weekend, Munich defender Noussair Mazraoui shared a video on social networks that can no longer be found, wishing the Palestinians a victory against Israel. The excitement was great. It made little difference that Mazraoui said he was against “all kinds of terrorism, hatred and violence.”
FC Bayern announced a conversation, but took its time reacting. It was only on Friday that the record champions announced that Mazraoui would remain a player at the club. Chairman of the board Jan-Christian Dreesen also has his say in a press release from the association. He says: “Noussair Mazraoui has credibly assured us that, as a peace-loving person, he firmly rejects terror and war. He regrets if his posts have caused irritation.”
Mainz releases El Ghazi
At the weekend, FC Bayern will play against 1. FSV Mainz 05, where they also had troubled days recently after player Anwar El Ghazi shared an anti-Israel social media post. Mainz released El Ghazi on Tuesday (October 17, 2023). El Ghazi, Mainz 05 said, had taken a “position on the conflict in the Middle East in a way that was intolerable for the club.”
Post from the DFL
The social media posts of their footballers can be a challenge for the Bundesliga clubs, and they are not only aware of this in Munich and Mainz. But that is not the only challenge. On Thursday (October 19, 2023), the DFL sent a letter to the Bundesliga clubs to sensitize those responsible before the match day, probably also for possible anti-Semitic protest actions. The fear is that they could come from spectators, and possibly even from footballers.
The Sportschau asked the 18 first division teams how they deal with the letter from the DFL and how they deal with developments in Israel and the Gaza Strip. Not all clubs responded. TSG Hoffenheim writes that the procedures surrounding the home game against Eintracht Frankfurt were “discussed at the highest club level”. The DFL’s information was passed on to the responsible security service manager. SC Freiburg also announced that the DFL’s handouts had been forwarded to the security services.
And Bayer Leverkusen said it was not necessary to make the players aware of the situation. “We are in constant communication with our players, in this situation as in any other.” RB Leipzig, on the other hand, announced that a conversation had taken place with players and those responsible about “the recent escalation in the Middle East conflict”.
The DFL is also looking for words
The DFL is also looking for the right way to deal with the situation in the Middle East, at least verbally. On Monday (October 16, 2023), the DFL contacted all first and second division clubs and recommended that they organize a minute’s silence at the start of each game to “remember the victims following the devastating events in Israel.”
It’s not a particularly happy formulation, as it doesn’t exclude civilian victims in the Gaza Strip, but it doesn’t explicitly include them either. These words can still be found on the DFL homepage. In its letter on Thursday, the German Football League used different words; it wrote about “innocent victims” in Israel and the Gaza Strip.
The DFL created a text for the minute’s silence and sent it to the first and second division teams. It is available to the sports show. “Hamas’ terrorist attack on the Israeli population and the State of Israel began two weeks ago. We are shocked by this terrible attack and the events on site,” writes the DFL. “Today we would like to remember the innocent victims and their families together. We ask for a moment to pause – as a sign of peace.”
At Sportschau’s request, the DFL said it was merely a text suggestion. The clubs are “not obliged” to use this.
“Never again is right now”
And then there are the organized fan scenes; reactions to the situation in Israel and the Gaza Strip can also be expected from them in the stadiums at the weekend. Werder Bremen fans have already commented. Last weekend, Werder’s women played against 1. FC Köln, with more than 21,000 people watching in the Weser Stadium. They saw an Ultra group presenting a banner that read: “Bring back our friends, bringing back all the hostages. Never again is right now.”
One of the friends whose plight the group wanted to draw attention to is Hersh Goldberg-Polin, a young Israeli with a love of football. When terrorists attacked a music festival in southern Israel, Goldberg-Polin is said to have been there too. Werder Bremen had previously discussed its fate on the X platform, formerly Twitter. The club writes there that Goldberg-Polin was “presumably abducted to Gaza.”
“Don’t be afraid, if attackers come, we’ll box them out”
Supporters of Eintracht Frankfurt have also already positioned themselves. When the regional league team Chemie Leipzig played a friendly against the Bundesliga club Frankfurt during the international break, Hamas called for violence against Israelis almost at the same time.
The bar owner Eldar Fano actually planned to close his shop in Leipzig the day after the friendly match. When he stood in front of the door, two people were already waiting there – albeit with the best of intentions. They were Eintracht fans, Fano told the Hessenschau. “They said: Don’t be afraid. If attackers come, we’ll box them out.”
2023-10-20 21:52:56
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