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French Soccer Team Avoids Sanctions for Massive ‘Free Palestine’ Banner Condemned by Interior Minister

Soccer Football – Champions League – Paris St Germain v Atletico Madrid – Parc des Princes, Paris, France – November 6, 2024 A banner on support of Palestine is displayed in the stands before the match. Photo: Reuters/Stephanie Lecocq

The French soccer team Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) will not face potential sanctions after its fans unveiled an oversized banner with the slogan “Free Palestine” before kick-off of the team’s UEFA Champions League game on Wednesday, European soccer’s governing body said.

A UEFA spokesperson explained on Thursday that while the UEFA bans “provocative” or “insulting” political messages in stadiums, it does not consider the “Free Palestine” banner to be either one of those. “There will … be no disciplinary case because the banner that was unfurled cannot be in this case considered provocative or insulting,” a UEFA spokesperson said, as reported by Reuters.

Last year, the Scottish club Celtic was fined almost $19,000 after its fans waved Palestinian flags at a UEFA Champions League match.

The massive “Free Palestine” banner covered a large section of PSG’s home stadium of Parc des Princes in Paris on Wednesday before the Qatar-owned team lost in a Champions League match to their Spanish rivals Atletico Madrid. The letter “i” in the word “Palestine” was replaced with an image of the State of Israel, which was covered with the pattern of a black and white keffiyeh. The banner also showed a bloodstained Palestinian flag, a man with a keffiyeh scarf covering all his face except his eyes, the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, and the back of a man who had a Lebanese flag wrapped around him.

The banner was organized by the PSG’s hard-core fan group, the Paris Ultras Collective (CUP), and was shown above another banner that featured a slogan written in French: “War on the pitch but peace in the world.” During the match, PSG fans in the stands raised another banner that read: “Does a child’s life in Gaza mean less than another?” according to Reuters.

The banners were shown as Israel continued its military operations against Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Both Islamist terrorist groups seek Israel’s destruction and are backed by Iran.

The banner was also raised eight days before France and Israel compete in Paris against each other in a UEFA Nations League game, which pro-Palestinian activists are trying to have officials cancel because of Israel’s involvement.

French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau took to X on Thursday to condemn the “Free Palestine” banner at the soccer match a day earlier.

“I ask PSG to explain itself and the clubs to ensure that politics does not come to damage sport, which must always remain a source of unity,” Retailleau wrote.This tifo had no place in this stadium, and such messages are also prohibited by the regulations of the League and UEFA. If this were to happen again, we will have to consider banning tifos for clubs that do not enforce the rules.”

In an interview with Sud Radio following the match, Retailleau said the banner was “unacceptable.”

“I want to know more and now how this banner came to be unfurled. The Paris police chief (Laurent Nunez) explained what happened. We agreed on a certain number of things but I am demanding accountability,” he added.

PSG said in a statement on Wednesday night that it was not aware “of any plans to display such a message.”

“PSG emphasizes the Parc des Princes is — and must remain — a place of communion around a shared passion for football and firmly opposes any message of a political nature in the stadium,” the team said.

France has the largest Jewish community in Europe — and the third largest in the world, following the United States and Israel — but also the continent’s largest Muslim community.

The post French Soccer Team Avoids Sanctions for Massive ‘Free Palestine’ Banner Condemned by Interior Minister first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Iran Says Eight Arrested for Suspected Links to Israel’s Mossad Spy Agency

The Mossad recruitment ad. Photo: Screenshot.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Saturday they had arrested eight people suspected of trying to transmit the coordinates of sensitive sites and details about senior military figures to Israel’s Mossad, Iranian state media reported.

They are accused of having provided the information to the Mossad spy agency during Israel’s air war on Iran in June, when it attacked Iranian nuclear facilities and killed top military commanders as well as civilians in the worst blow to the Islamic Republic since the 1980s war with Iraq.

Iran retaliated with barrages of missiles on Israeli military sites, infrastructure and cities. The United States entered the war on June 22 with strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.

A Guards statement alleged that the suspects had received specialized training from Mossad via online platforms. It said they were apprehended in northeastern Iran before carrying out their plans, and that materials for making launchers, bombs, explosives and booby traps had been seized.

State media reported earlier this month that Iranian police had arrested as many as 21,000 “suspects” during the 12-day war with Israel, though they did not say what these people had been suspected of doing.

Security forces conducted a campaign of widespread arrests and also stepped up their street presence during the brief war that ended in a US-brokered ceasefire.

Iran has executed at least eight people in recent months, including nuclear scientist Rouzbeh Vadi, hanged on August 9 for passing information to Israel about another scientist killed in Israeli airstrikes.

Human rights groups say Iran uses espionage charges and fast-tracked executions as tools for broader political repression.

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Body of Idan Shtivi, Murdered on Oct. 7, Retrieved from Gaza in Special IDF Operation

Idan Shtivi. Photo: Courtesy of the family

i24 NewsThe body of Idan Shtivi, a 28-year-old murdered by Palestinian jihadists at the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023, was recovered in a joint operation by the IDF and Shin Bet in central Gaza, it was cleared for publication on Saturday.

Shtivi’s remains were returned to Israel alongside the body of Ilan Weiss, another hostage killed during the October 7 massacre.

“Idan Shtivi was abducted from the Tel Gama area and brutally murdered by Hamas terrorists after acting to rescue and evacuate others from the Nova music festival on October 7th, 2023. He was 28 years old at the time of his death,” read an IDF press release.

“Following an identification process conducted at the National Center for Forensic Medicine, along with the Israel Police and the Military Rabbinate, the Hostages and Missing Persons Headquarters notified his family.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Shviti “was a gifted student of sustainability and governance, and a courageous individual” who acted heroically on October 7, helping others flee.

“He was killed in the process and his body was abducted to Gaza by Hamas. My wife and I send our heartfelt condolences to the Shtivi family. So far, 207 hostages have been returned, 148 of them alive. We will continue to act tirelessly and decisively to bring back all our hostages—living and deceased.”

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Woman Stabbed at Ottawa Grocery Store in Latest Antisemitic Attack

A social media post by the alleged attacker, Joseph Rooke of Cornwall, Ontario. Photo: Screenshot via i24

i24 NewsThe stabbing of a Jewish woman at an Ottawa grocery by a man with a long history of antisemitic posts on social media, the latest antisemitic hate crime in Canada, sparked outrage and prompted condemnation from officials including the prime minister.

Both the victim and the attacker are in their 70s. The woman is reportedly in serious condition.

The suspect was identified as Joseph Rooke, who has authored a series of lengthy rambling screeds on social media, ranting against Israel and Jews.

“Judaism is the world’s oldest cult,” he writes in one post, going on to say “over time jews have become insidious in governments, businesses, media conglomerates, and educational institutions in order to do what they do better than anyone else. Jews are the world’s masters of propaganda, gaslighting, demonization, demagoguery, and outright lying. Using their collective wealth they have become masters of reprisal.”

“I am under no obligation whatsoever, legal, moral, or otherwise, to like jews and I do not. If that means I meet the jewish definition of an anti-semite, so be it.”

Canada has seen a steep spike in antisemitic attacks over the past two years, including a recent incident in Montreal where a Hasidic Jew was beaten in front on his children.

After Prime Minister Mark Carney condemned the incident, many, including former Israel’s ambassador the US Michael Oren, pointed out that Carney’s rhetoric and policies contribute to the increasing insecurity of Canada’s Jewish community through uncritical embrace of outrageous and easily disprovable allegations that Israel and its supporters were guilty of the worst crimes against humanity.

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