Soccer Dispute Reveals Extent of Islamist Control in UK’s Second Largest City

Kemi Badenoch, the leader of the UK opposition Conservative Party, called on January 6 for the resignation of Craig Guildford, the Chief Constable of the West Midlands Police, for having banned Israeli fans from attending a soccer match in Birmingham, England, and then covering up his reasons for doing so.

The West Midlands Police leadership misled a Home Affairs Select Committee in Parliament about what happened. The British police watchdog, the Independent Office for Police Conduct, will now investigate the West Midlands department on suspicion of having caved in to local Islamist threats and fabricated evidence to suggest that the source of potential disorder was in fact the Maccabi fans themselves.

Antisemitic Mob Targeted Maccabi Fans in Amsterdam in 2024

The new investigation is a milestone in a process that started in November 2024, with soccer moving to the forefront of Islamist activity after a mob ambushed and terrorized fans of Maccabi Tel Aviv in the streets of Amsterdam before, during, and after the club’s away fixture against the local team AFC Ajax.

There was an initial attempt by the Dutch authorities to blame the violence on the Maccabi fans, who have a dubious record of hooliganism and anti-Palestinian chanting, but the eventual conclusion was that local agitators were primarily to blame. Some of them were successfully prosecuted and the mayor of Amsterdam said the city had been “deeply damaged” by “hateful antisemitic rioters” who had carried out violent “hit and run” attacks on Israeli supporters.

Thus, when it was announced in September 2025 that Aston Villa would play Maccabi, hosting the home leg almost exactly a year after the Amsterdam incidents, local Islamists in Birmingham reacted badly. A few days later, when the police received “high confidence intelligence” of “elements of the community in West Midlands wanting to ‘arm’ themselves,” instead of treating this as grounds for investigating and arresting the aspiring perpetrators, they decided to avert the danger by banning Maccabi supporters from the match. This identified them as the source of the threat, rather than the target.

Islamism in Birmingham

Birmingham MP and former city councillor from Aston, Ayoub Khan, has been actively involved and vocal on the soccer issue, arguing for the ban on Maccabi fans. Khan is an independent who ran for election in 2024 on an Islamist platform. His celebration of the ban on Maccabi fans fueled concern that the decision was an attempt to introduce a boycott, divest, sanction (BDS) policy against Israel through the back door. The Aston ward of Birmingham has a population that is more than half Muslim, compared with Birmingham’s city-wide average of around 30 percent.

UK Policy Options

Islamists have gained a measure of control over the second largest city in the UK. This has involved infiltration of various sectors of civil society and both local and national politics. The scandal of exclusion of Israelis — and effectively of British Jews — from a major international sporting event, and even more so the cover up, have aroused public concern and alerted politicians like Badenoch to the need for a response.

First and foremost, the chief constable must resign or be dismissed, along with other police seniors who misled the public and/or parliament. Beyond the investigation by the police watchdog, a full public inquiry is needed into the conduct of the West Midlands police. Details continue to emerge of their consulting inappropriate, extremist sources of advice within the local Muslim community. Above all, new government guidelines are needed to ensure that local lawlessness is tackled head-on, not appeased by efforts to shift blame to the victims.

Edmund Fitton-Brown is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD). For more analysis from Edmund and FDD, please subscribe HERE. Follow Edmund on X @EFittonBrown. Follow FDD on X @FDD. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.