British newspaper cartoonists should, from now on, always draw Keir Starmer in a Maccabi supporter scarf

Exactly a year ago:

before the match, Maccabi Tel Aviv fans were filmed pulling Palestinian flags from houses, making racist anti-Arab chants such as “death to Arabs”, assaulting people, and vandalising local property. Plans to attack Israeli fans were subsequently shared through messaging apps. After the match, Maccabi fans were ambushed and assaulted across the city centre, while a group of Maccabi fans around Damrak was recorded assaulting people and vandalising local property. … a report compiled with the chief prosecutor and chief of police which said the events were caused by a “toxic combination of antisemitism, hooliganism, and anger about the conflicts in … the Middle East” … The Maccabi Tel Aviv fan base is known to include far-right ultra groups that have been involved in racist incidents in Israel in the past, including directing racist abuse at Arab and black players on their own team.

Honestly, who needs that much hassle over a football match? Birmingham dodged a bullet.

The media coverage of this has been poor, but let’s not get started on UK social media, where I think it’s becoming increasingly obvious that bad actors who are already amplifying far right voices and trying to sow division, jumped on this whole debacle to once again be level 9000 bad faith wankers about the whole thing.