A football derby in Tel Aviv between Hapoel and Maccabi has been cancelled after “violent riots”, according to Israeli police.
Nine people were arrested on Sunday night at Bloomfield Stadium, a venue shared by both clubs. Hapoel were the home team for the game.
A statement from Israeli police said the game was called off “following disturbances and violent riots” in which 13 civilians and three officers were injured by pyrotechnic devices.
“These are very serious incidents that posed a real danger to the lives of police officers and civilians,” the statement added.
But Hapoel Tel Aviv Football Club released a statement with a very different perspective on policing at the match.
“From the preliminary discussions prior to the match, it appears that the police were preparing for war rather than a sporting event,” a spokesperson said.
Image: Outside the stadium, mounted police attempt to control crowds. Pic: Israeli police
Image: Footage released by Israeli police shows a flare or firework landing near officers. Pic: Israeli police
They added: “Most of the injuries from the event were caused by brutal police violence at the end of the game, as a direct result of the scandalous decision to cancel the event.
“Everyone saw the disturbing videos of children being trampled by horses and police officers indiscriminately beating fans.”
Israeli police have not yet responded to the allegations from Hapoel.
A Maccabi statement read: “Following the police’s decision, it was determined that the Tel Aviv derby will not take place tonight.”
Footage shared by the police shows projectiles and flares being thrown on to the pitch, as well as unrest outside the stadium and arrests being made.
Image: What looked like smoke canisters were seized by officers. Pic: Israeli police
Maccabi ban criticised
On Thursday, Maccabi supporters were told they are not allowed to attend November’s Europa League game against Aston Villa in Birmingham next month after a decision by Birmingham’s Safety Advisory Group (SAG).
The group – made up of local stakeholders, including representatives from the council, police and event organisers – said the decision was due to a high risk of violence based on “current intelligence and previous incidents”.
He insisted Aston in Birmingham cannot become a “no-go area” for Jews.
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Aston ‘can’t be no-go area for Jews’
The energy secretary also said that he “profoundly” disagrees with the “approach” taken by a local MP who started a petition calling for fans of Maccabi Tel Aviv to be banned from the Aston Villa game.
The petition states: “Their arrival in Aston – a diverse and predominantly Muslim community – poses a real risk of tensions within the community and disorder.”
Mr Miliband pushed back on that point. He said the “vast majority of Muslim people in this country would disassociate themselves” from suggestions that Maccabi Tel Aviv fans could not come to Aston Villa because it was a predominantly Muslim area.
His Tory counterpart, Claire Coutinho, was also highly critical of the petition, telling Phillips: “I think politicians need to have the courage to name some of the problems that this country is facing. And one of those problems is political Islam.”
The independent MP for Birmingham Perry Barr, Ayoub Khan, criticised those comments.
“I utterly reject the false and inflammatory characterisations… regarding my recent petition,” he said in a statement.
“The petition I launched reflected genuine and widespread concern from my constituents about public safety and community cohesion. It did not call for anyone to be ‘banned because they are Jewish’ nor did it single out any faith or ethnicity.
“To distort this into an issue of religion or antisemitism is deeply irresponsible and frankly dangerous. I have consistently condemned all forms of hatred – including antisemitism and Islamophobia – and I will continue to do so.”
The government is expecting West Midlands Police to set out early next week what they would need to police the game safely with both sets of fans present.
Four more arrests have been made by French police investigating the Louvre museum heist.
Two men and two women from the Parisregion were detained on Tuesday, prosecutor Laure Beccuau said.
Ms Beccuau’s statement did not say what role the quartet are suspected of having played in the robbery. The two men are aged 38 and 39, and the two women are aged 31 and 40.
They are being interrogated by police, who can hold them for questioning for 96 hours.
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2:36
Louvre: How ‘heist of the century’ unfolded
The latest arrests come after investigating magistrates filed preliminary charges against three men and one woman who were arrested last month.
The haul – which included a diamond and emerald necklace Napoleon gave to Empress Marie-Louise, jewels linked to 19th-century Queens Marie-Amelie and Hortense, and Empress Eugenie’s pearl and diamond tiara – has not been recovered.
The heist was pulled off in mere minutes last month – and took place while the Louvre was open to visitors, raising doubts over the credibility of the world’s most-visited museum as a guardian for its priceless works.
On Sunday 19 October, two men used a stolen furniture lift to access the second floor Galerie d’Apollon.
They then cracked open display cases with angle grinders before escaping with their loot and fleeing on the back of two scooters driven by accomplices.
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0:35
Moment thieves escape Louvre in jewel heist
The Paris prosecutor previously said the robbery appeared to be the work of small-time criminals rather than professional gangsters.
Speaking shortly after the heist, art detective Arthur Brand told Sky News that detectives faced a “race against time” to recover the stolen treasure.
“These crown jewels are so famous, you just cannot sell them,” Mr Brand said. “The only thing they can do is melt the silver and gold down, dismantle the diamonds, try to cut them. That’s the way they will probably disappear forever.
“They [the police] have a week. If they catch the thieves, the stuff might still be there. If it takes longer, the loot is probably gone and dismantled. It’s a race against time.”
Washington woke up this morning to a flurry of developments on Ukraine.
It was the middle of the night in DC when a tweet dropped from Ukraine’s national security advisor, Rustem Umerov.
He said that the US and Ukraine had reached a “common understanding on the core terms of the agreement discussed in Geneva.”
He added that Volodymyr Zelenskyy would travel to America “at the earliest suitable date in November to complete final steps and make a deal with President Trump”.
By sunrise in Washington, a US official was using similar but not identical language to frame progress.
The official, speaking anonymously to US media, said that Ukraine had “agreed” to Trump’s peace proposal “with some minor details to be worked out”.
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In parallel, it’s emerged that talks have been taking place in Abu Dhabi. The Americans claim to have met both Russian and Ukrainian officials there, though the Russians have not confirmed attendance.
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Peace deal ‘agreement’: What we know
“I have nothing to say. We are following the media reports,” Dmitry Peskov, Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson, told Russian state media.
Trump is due to travel to his Florida resort Mar-a-Lago tonight, where he will remain until Sunday.
We know the plan has been changed from its original form, but it’s clear that Zelenskyy wants to be seen to agree to something quickly – that would go down well with President Trump.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a controversial US and Israeli-backed aid distribution group, has said it will permanently cease operations.
Set up as an alternative to United Nations aid programmes in May, GHF’s executive director John Acree said on Monday that it “succeeded in our mission of showing there’s a better way to deliver aid to Gazans”.
The foundation had already closed down aid distribution sites after US President Donald Trump’s ceasefire plan was agreed by Hamasand Israelin October.
The GHF which began operations in Gazaafter an Israeli blockade of food deliveries, lasting nearly three months, was criticised by Palestinians, aid workers and health officials who said it forced people to risk their lives to reach the sites.
Image: File pic: Reuters
According to witnesses and videos posted to social media, Israeli soldiers repeatedly opened fire at the sites, killing hundreds. The IDF denied this, saying it only fired warning shots as a crowd-control measure or if its troops were in danger.
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2:54
Gaza deaths increase when aid sites open
MSF – also known as Doctors Without Borders – said in a report in August that the GHF sites “morphed into a laboratory of cruelty,” and described scenes there as “orchestrated killing”.
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‘We are proud,’ says GHF director
Mr Acree said in a statement through the GHF’s website that “from the outset, GHF’s goal was to meet an urgent need” and to hand over a successful aid operation to “the broader international community”.
The GHF would hand over its work to the US-led Civil-Military Coordination Center in Israel overseeing the Gaza ceasefire.
“We are winding down our operations as we have succeeded in our mission of showing there’s a better way to deliver aid to Gazans,” Mr Acree said.
Image: File pic: Reuters
The GHF director added: “At a critical juncture, we are proud to have been the only aid operation that reliably and safely provided free meals directly to Palestinian people in Gaza, at scale and without diversion.
“From our very first day of operations, our mission was singular: feed civilians in desperate need. We built a new model that worked, saved lives, and restored dignity to civilians in Gaza.”
According to the GHF website, the group distributed more than three million food boxes, totalling 187 million meals, and supplied 1.1 million packs of Ready-to-Use Supplementary Food (RUSF) for malnourished children.
In a statement, Hamas welcomed the closure of GHF and accused it of being a project that “engineered starvation” in partnership with Israel.
A Hamas spokesperson said: “Since its entry into the Gaza Strip, this foundation was part of the occupation’s security system, which adopted distribution mechanisms entirely disconnected from humanitarian principles, and created dangerous and degrading conditions for the dignity of the starving Palestinian people during their attempts to obtain a piece of bread, resulting in the killing and injury of thousands, through sniper operations and deliberate killing.”
They also called on international legal bodies to hold “this foundation and its officers accountable for their crimes against our people”.
US state department deputy spokesperson Tommy Piggot also said on X that the aid group “shared valuable lessons learned with us and our partners”.
“GHF’s model, in which Hamas could no longer loot and profit from stealing aid, played a huge role in getting Hamas to the table and achieving a ceasefire,” he added.