Riots in Amsterdam – Watch Media

ERIN MOLAN: First, the streets of Amsterdam. The vision reportedly shows Jewish football fans being hunted like animals.

– Erin, Sky News Australia, November 8, 2024

ANDREW BOLT: The Dutch were shamed and shocked by the Muslim hunting of Jews on the streets of Amsterdam.

– The Bolt Report, Sky News Australia, 11 November 2024

SHARRIE MARXON: Also today is full coverage of the pogrom in Amsterdam.

— Sharry, Sky News Australia, November 11, 2024

Hi, I’m Paul Berry and welcome to Media Watch.

After clashes between pro-Palestinian protesters and Israeli soccer fans in Amsterdam last week, pogroms and Jew-hunting made headlines on Sky News.

And the newspaper reports were almost as dire, with The Australian declaring:

Airplanes race to rescue Jews in Amsterdam

– The Weekend Australian, 9-10 November 2024

And the New York Times tells Americans:

Anti-Semitic attacks prompt emergency flights for Israeli soccer fans

– The New York Times, November 8, 2024

But nowhere was there more fear and outrage than on Sherri Markson’s Sky News show on Monday, where she reminded us it was Remembrance Day and launched into this emotional speech:

SHARRI MARXON: On this very day, on this sacred day, the very values ​​for which our Alliance soldiers gave their lives are in grave danger as Islamic fundamentalists and the awakened left join forces to weaken Western civilization and tear apart the fabric that keeps our society going. .

— Sharry, Sky News Australia, November 11, 2024

This is a certain claim. But Dutch politicians have also been ramping it up, with Amsterdam mayor Femke Halzema saying the attacks on Maccabi Tel Aviv fans reminded her of Nazi pogroms and telling the media:

FEMKE HALSEMA: Our history, the history of our city, has been deeply damaged. Our Jewish life, our Jewish culture is under threat…

– The Times (UK), November 9, 2024

So how many football fans have been killed or injured? Thousands? Hundreds? results?

No one actually died, and according to the New York Times 24 hours later:

Five Israelis who were hospitalized with injuries were discharged…

– The New York Times, November 8, 2024

So not quite a pogrom, which is defined as an organized slaughter.

But it wasn’t just the usual suspects on Sky who turned ugly street fights into Holocaust echoes.

A video from the Murdochs of London’s Sun also claims that Israeli soccer fans are being hunted by anti-Semitic mobs.

And the head of the European Jewish Association said:

RABBI MENACHEM MARGOLIN: Very shocking, but unfortunately not very surprising. Month after month, we call on the European authorities to understand that the level of anti-Semitism in Europe is breaking its record every day…

– The Sun, 8 November 2024

The rabbi’s fears about rising anti-Semitism are undeniable, but this “scary footage” actually shows Israeli fans hunting.

Dutch photographer Annette de Graaf, who captured the blast, clarified to X at the time, later telling Zeteo’s Mehdi Hasan:

MEHDI HASSAN: You mean the Maccabi fans?

ANNETTE DE GRAAF: Yes, Maccabi fans.

ANNETTE DE GRAAF: … it’s terrible because they said the opposite of what happened in that footage.

– Mehdi Unfiltered, Zeteo, November 13, 2024

And the New York Times admitted it made the same mistake, removing the video and publishing a correction that blamed Reuters for distributing the footage:

The video’s creator told The New York Times that it showed a group of Maccabi fans chasing a man in the street, a description independently corroborated by The Times with other verified footage from the scene.

– The New York Times, November 12, 2024

But not only The Sun and New York Times got it wrong.

On X, several pro-Zionist accounts have already used this video to spread their message:

Muslim mobs are hunting Jews in Amsterdam tonight.

– X by Nio Berg Nov 8, 2024

This post has been viewed more than seven million times.

And a host of TV networks did the same, including NBC, ZDF, Sky News Australia, the ABC and the BBC, which used it in their opening shots for Newsnight and their main 10pm bulletin.

And why did they all have the same vision? Because there really wasn’t anything else.

The same rabid Maccabi fans were also filmed by 14-year-old Dutch vlogger OmeBender, who tagged his video on YouTube:

ISRAELI HOOLIGS TURNED AMSTERDAM AROUND

– Bendery, November 8, 2024

And as New York Times visual investigative expert Christian Tribert noted, Bender’s 17-minute video showed Maccabi fans:

… steal steel pipes, put on masks and chase someone. It seems that a metal pipe was thrown into the police car.

– X @trbrtc Nov 9, 2024

But the media was not only to blame for missing it.

They ignored or silenced half the story.

A day before a match against local team Ajax, Maccabi fans tore down and burned a Palestinian flag, while groups of fans also beat a taxi driver and vandalized several taxis.

And on the day of the match, about a thousand fans gathered in the city center, set off fireworks, and then marched to the stadium, chanting racist, anti-Arab slogans:

Ole, Ole, the IDF will win. We will fuck Arabs.

– X @mvbergen Nov 8, 2024

Some media reports mentioned these provocations, but only as an afterthought, with ABC’s 7pm News framing its story as follows:

MAZO FORD: Tensions in the Middle East spill onto the streets of Amsterdam. Groups of young men prowl the capital of the Netherlands, hunting Israeli soccer fans. Many are ambushed, kicking and fighting before their attackers flee.

– ABC News (Sydney), November 9, 2024

This ABC report portrayed pro-Palestinian youth as the hunters and attackers and Maccabi soccer fans as the prey, although, again, its key shots showed Maccabi fans hunting.

And when it finally came to describing the actions of the fans, the language of the report was completely different:

MAZO FORD: This video surfaced on social media a day earlier, and police say Israeli soccer fans set fire to a Palestinian flag and attacked a taxi. On their way to the game, they crowded the streets, firing rockets, chanting “May the IDF win” and swearing at Arabs. Amsterdam’s mayor says that’s no excuse…

– ABC News (Sydney), November 9, 2024

The report was rightly picked apart on Instagram by Ian Fran, host of ABC’s Question Everything, who pointed out that violence and aggression by Israeli fans was presented as an accusation, not a fact.

And she continued:

JEAN FRAN: They didn’t chant “May the IDF win.” They chanted in full: “May the Israel Defense Forces win, we will fuck the Arabs.” Here it is:

THE FANS CHANT: We will win, we will win, let the Israeli army win, to hell with the Arabs. Let the Israeli army win, to hell with the Arabs.

– Instagram, @jan__fran, November 13, 2024

This ABC report, which has been available for a week, has now been taken offline, with the ABC telling Media Watch:

After Reuters reported that the description of the vision was incorrect, ABC removed the story on Friday… The story was otherwise an accurate snapshot of information available at the time…

– ABC Spokesperson, November 18, 2024

Britain’s Sky News offered a much more balanced version of the clashes, with Alice Porter being one of the few to get the footage of the Maccabi fans right and ending her report with these words:

ALICE PORTER: Dutch, Israeli and British leaders condemned the attacks as anti-Semitic and even called them pogroms. But their statements do not mention attacks by Israeli hooligans on Dutch citizens.

– Sky News (UK), November 9, 2024

But when talk of Jew-hunting and pogroms began, Sky News deleted a tweet about anti-Arab chants by Maccabi fans and pulled the report – re-editing it with a new strip that called the violence anti-Semitic, removing Porter’s final comment and adding a quote from the Dutch prime minister :

DICK SCHUF: It’s just anti-Semitic violence against Israelis that really defies description.

– Sky News (UK), November 9, 2024

And first describing the key frames like this:

ALICE PORTER: Maccabi fans attack locals as police car drives past…

– Sky News (UK), November 9, 2024

Sky invited Alice Porter to record a new commentary, calling them:

ALICE PORTER: A large group of hooded men dressed in black running down the street hitting people at random.

– Sky News (UK), November 9, 2024

All this led to at least one complaint to the British media regulator.

So what happened in Amsterdam?

And how was the media supposed to report it?

Better than them, of course, because it involved two angry mobs—with violence on both sides—and while anti-Semitism was a component, claims of a Nazi holocaust were laughable.

And even Dutch authorities have now softened their claims, accusing in a previous report:

… a toxic mix of anti-Semitism, hooliganism and anger over the conflicts in Palestine and Israel …

– Letter from the Council, City of Amsterdam, November 11, 2024

Yes, it is related to the war in Gaza, but it is also complex and nuanced.

Unlike most reporting, which was almost always one-sided, often incorrect, and sometimes hysterical.