Police have detained pro-Palestinian protesters rallying in central Amsterdam in defiance of a ban imposed after violence stemming from a football match between Ajax and Israeli club Maccabi Tel Aviv.
Dozens of demonstrators, some with Palestinian flags, chanted “Amsterdam is saying no to genocide” and “Free Palestine”.
Police in riot gear encircled the group and they were detained and put on buses.
Police with expanded stop-and-search powers in the Dutch capital have detained or removed hundreds of demonstrators since last week’s clashes under emergency measures imposed until Thursday.
“We say: Free Palestine. Stop killing innocent people. Stop killing the children,” said one demonstrator, Max van den Berg, 32, calling on the Netherlands to halt its support for Israel.
Israel denies genocide in Gaza. It says that forces combating Palestinian Hamas militants that attacked Israel on 7 October 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking about 250 hostages, do not target civilians.
More than 43,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s military offensive on Gaza, according to health officials there, and much of the territory has been destroyed.
Amsterdam’s police department said Maccabi fans attacked a taxi and burned a Palestinian flag and were chased down and beaten by anti-Israeli gangs on scooters after an online appeal to taxi drivers.
Five people were treated for injuries and discharged from hospitals. Police escorted hundreds of Maccabi fans to their hotels.
Israeli and Dutch politicians have denounced the attacks as antisemitic and recalled persecution of Jews during the second world war. Pro-Palestinians countered that they responded to an attack by the Maccabi supporters and provocative anti-Arab chants.
Four out of 62 suspects detained during the violence, which included 10 Israelis, remain in custody. Police are still looking for suspects.
A detailed report published this week by the city’s mayor, Femke Halsema, concluded that the violence was sparked by “a toxic cocktail of antisemitism, football hooliganism and anger over the war in Palestine and Israel and other parts of the Middle East”.
The Netherlands has seen a rise in antisemitic incidents since the Gaza war began in October last year.
Under 1% of Amsterdam’s population is Jewish after the Holocaust, while about 15% is Muslim, mostly second- and first-generation immigrants from north Africa and the Middle East.
Additional arrests were made during rioting on Monday night in the predominantly immigrant neighbourhood of Amsterdam-West where Moroccan-Dutch youths sympathise with Palestinians in Gaza.
Reuters contributed reporting
