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Celtic Fans Asked To Support Palestine In Game With Israeli club

by Yuliya Talmazan | December 2, 2009 at 11:38 am

301 views | 2 Recommendations | 4 comments

The fans of the Scottish soccer club Celtic FC have been asked to show Palestinian flags in today's game with Israeli club Hapoel Tel Aviv. The call came from the Scottish Trade Union Congress (STUC) and encouraged Celtic supporters to show "solidarity with suffering Palestinians."

The STUC statement made reference to the one year anniversary of "the Israeli invasion of Gaza in which 1400 men, women and children were killed in an act described by the United Nations as ‘indicating serious violations of international human rights’ and ‘amounting to war crimes, and possibly crimes against humanity.’" The Trade Union Congress noted no blame should be attached to neither Hapoel Tel Aviv players, nor their fans.

The administration of Celtic FC said it was "extremely concerned" and urged the fans to ignore the STUC call by issuing the following statement:

Celtic Football Club believes in football as a powerful medium for social integration. Celtic has always been a club for all people, regardless of gender, age, religion, race, politics or ability. We therefore believe Celtic Park is no place for a political demonstration.

No official statement about the matter was issued by Hapoel Tel Aviv.

The next match between Celtic FC and Hapoel Tel Aviv is scheduled for Wednesday, December 2. Both clubs play in the UEFA.

UEFA said in a statement:"UEFA is fully aware of the planned demonstration outside the ground before the UEFA Europa League match Celtic FC v Hapoel Tel-Aviv FC and we have been in close contact with both clubs and the local authorities about closely monitoring the situation."

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tikun

at 13:19 on December 2nd, 2009

and the news behind this?

Jimmy Johnstone (not verified)

at 06:59 on December 3rd, 2009

This ridiculous for the Scottish trade unions to ask the fans to do this. Firstly Celtic is a football team and not a mouthpiece for the trade unions.And even more importantly the Palestinians have been launching thousands of rockets at Israel for years and are lucky not to have been wiped out for their continual ongoing aggression towards Israel.