Dear readers — today’s story is about football and politics: a noxious combination at the best of times. Maccabi Tel Aviv is due to face off against Aston Villa next month, prompting fears that there will be replays of violence seen in Amsterdam last year when the Israeli team played AFC Ajax. Birmingham Perry Barr MP has reacted to the prospect with a call to cancel or boycott the game.
But before the controversy — your Brum in Brief.
Brum in Brief
🤔 Are there white people in Handsworth? The question has become a bizarre, national talking point this week after The Guardian got hold of a leaked recording, in which Conservative MP Robert Jenrick was heard declaring that he “didn’t see another white face” when he visited the area in February of this year. That’s not all; Jenrick — speaking at a private Conservative Association dinner on 14 March — also said Handsworth was “as close as I’ve come to a slum in this country”, and “one of the worst integrated places I’ve ever been to”.
To jog your memory, the shadow justice secretary was In Handsworth to do some intrepid reporting on litter for GB News, which mainly involved walking around and pointing at a pair of discarded pants on the pavement. Reluctantly — as we hate to give poor journalism more airtime — we decided Jenrick’s claims deserved a little more interrogation. Could he really have gone the 90 minutes he claimed to have spent in Handsworth without seeing a single white face?
The answer, which is, obviously, no, is actually supplied by Jenrick’s own video report. He must have been walking around Handsworth with his eyes closed; below is a still from the opening of GB News segment. A young white man is visible in the foreground. Behind him is a group of what appears to be three white men.
The very end of the clip debunks the MP’s claims too. The Dispatch did some geo-locating (we went to Handsworth and used our eyes) to ascertain this portion was filmed at the corner of The Broadway and Maidstone Road. And who is that behind Jenrick, as he stands on the junction? A woman who seems to be — without getting too race science-y — white. We also spoke to all of the different shopkeepers along Jenrick’s route, none of whom remembered him stopping by. We can’t ascertain how long Jenrick stayed either but a source told us that he “just went in and filmed fly tipping/rubbish, got the social media clips and left”.
We reached out to Jenrick and GB News to ask how he could have missed the white faces that were evidently all around him. We have yet to hear back.
🏠 WMCA mayor Richard Parker has announced the creation of 1000 new social homes in the West Midlands enabled through a £40 million pot. Previously, mayoral funds could only be used to clean up brownfield sites and support developers in construction efforts. However, the UK government has given Parker permission to spend the money on social housing in his patch. There are currently 65,335 households on the social housing waitlist in the West Midlands combined authority. Parker’s team have “unlocked” this housing through the new Social Housing Accelerator Fund.
🧑⚖️ A Birmingham man has been found guilty of stalking TV and radio presenter, and former pop star, Myleene Klass. Peter Windsor, 61, is said to have sent a gun, handcuffs and details of a DIY will kit to the ex-Hear'Say singer and her fellow Classic FM presenter Katie Breathwick. On hearing the verdict, Klass said: “after a horrific year, my family and I finally have peace.” (BBC).
🌴 Solihull is getting a new, up-market Brazilian restaurant at the end of next month. Beleza Rodizio’s third venue after Hull and Stratford will sit on the ground floor of the Touchwood Shopping Centre, where £1.25m of investment has created a tropical-inspired interior. They’ll be serving wagyu beef, carved at the table; signature Rodizio cocktails; and freshly prepared sides and salads from 21 November. You can pre-book here.
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I’m at Villa Park stadium. It's the last weekend of September. Aston Villa is about to play a Premier League match against Fulham, and groups of home supporters are wandering around in the sun, drinking tinnies and eating from trays of steaming chips. It’s calm — an atmosphere that belies the fact that Villa are in sore need of a league win.
Villa’s season up to this point has been, largely, disappointing. After failing to make it into Europe's top-tier Champions League, the club had to sell some of its best (and most expensive) players. Since then, in the second-tier Europa League, they've only secured one win: against Bologna.
It’s been a tense start— and there are signs it’s going to get more strained. Politics (with a big P) has snuck its way into the sacred ground of Villa Park. The issue? A match against Israel’s Maccabi Tel Aviv scheduled for 6 November.
Maccabi fans were at the centre of last season’s highest-profile European football violence. On 6 and 7 November 2024, Amsterdam was gripped by two days of spiralling conflict around an Ajax-Maccabi Europa League match, backdropped by tensions over Israel-Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu compared the events to Kristallnacht. The flashpoint became an international diplomatic incident: highly politicised, with jail terms and a subsequent ban from the Dutch capital for the Israeli team.
Now, some local politicians are concerned similar scenes could occur in Birmingham. The independent MP for Perry Barr, Ayoub Khan, who won his seat last year on a pro-Palestine ticket: has been one of the most vocal. On 17 September, he and local Lib Dem councillor Mumtaz Hussain, started a petition calling for the match to be cancelled, citing safety concerns.
But, after an iffy start, the Europa League match could be an opportunity for Villa to win back some glory — and a potential route back into the money-spinning Champions League. Any one-off cancellation would likely be highly contested and politicised.
‘We’re a diverse city, why should we feel that apprehension?’
Football results, however, aren’t at the top of Khan’s priorities. He says he wants to avoid a repeat of the Amsterdam incident in Birmingham. Events have been politicised by different parties since, but most accounts include: Maccabi fans belting out derogatory chants about Arabs and Gazan children, vandalising a Palestinian flag and a taxi. Locals then took to ebikes and scooters to hunt Maccabi supporters after the match. Police say a call on social media went out to target Jews.
Videos of the clashes show ordinary city streets transformed into battlegrounds, armoured police charging in lines, and an Israeli man “begging for mercy” as his attackers say: “this is for the [Gazan] children.” In Amsterdam, 800 police officers were deployed; 62 arrests were made. Four men ended up in prison. The Amsterdam city council has since banned Maccabi from the city. The Dutch King, Willem-Alexander, said the Netherlands had, yet again, failed the Jewish Community, arguing that the Netherlands couldn’t “ignore antisemitic behaviour”. An inquiry was launched to look at the role police and local authorities played over the two violent days.
Khan argues that visiting Maccabi fans hold significant blame for the events. “The level of provocation in [Amsterdam] was substantial: damaging property, attacking individuals and vile chanting,” he says. He's not alone in his appraisal. Commentators like the journalist Rachel Shabi have criticised the kneejerk reaction to emerging coverage of the events, which initially downplayed the Israeli fans’ role (as well as the later, over correction).
Maccabi supporters certainly have a reputation: a US NGO said Maccabi fans were the second most racist in Israel during the 2022/23 season. Subsequent Maccabi matches in Turkey and Greece have been moved, or more heavily policed, since Amsterdam.
