Catalan basketball stadium filled with chants of “Palestine!”

Activist waving a Palestinian flag storms the court during a Barcelona-Tel Aviv basketball match.

One activist interrupted the basketball match between the Barcelona team and the Maccabi of Tel Aviv that took place yesterday in the Catalan team’s stadium, in Barcelona. During the first time of the game, the activist found his way to the court waving a Palestinian flag and was first reduced by Mossad agents and later by members of the Mossos d’Esquadra (Catalan Police). After dragging him out of the court, police informed him he would be banned from entering any other sports stadium and would have to pay a fine. The six Mossad agents that had traveled with the Israeli team kept insisting on taking the activist away, clearly challenging the jurisdiction of the local police.

Meanwhile, two spectators pulled out a Palestinian flag and held banners in English and Catalan reading “Freedom for Palestine, Boycott Israel” and “Isolate Israel, stop the Palestinian genocide”. After a few moments, seven police officers stormed in and started pulling the banners and flag away from the two women, while the Barcelona supporters sitting around them spontaneously started trying to prevent them from doing so. The agents finally threw the banners to the floor, but at this point the entire stadium, angry with the police action, was booing the agents and chanting “Palestine! Palestine!”.

After the game, seven police officers were waiting for the two women outside the stadium and attacked and verbally abused them. A friend who had come to pick them up tried to intervene and was kicked in the leg by the agents, that also threatened him with “breaking his neck”. The police asked the three of them for IDs while they pushed one of the women against the wall and held her hands behind her back in an aggressive and painful manner. The other woman sat on the floor and refused to show her ID, telling the agents that they had not committed any crime and asking them to identify themselves. The officers were not displaying the mandatory identification on the right sleeve of their uniform and refused to identify themselves, but they stopped the harassment and finally left. The victims called the Police Station to complain about the agents’ refusal to identify and this morning they filed a complaint.

To see a picture of the events go to: http://www.elmundodeportivo.es/web/gen/20080404/noticia_53453264988.html

(the article is in Spanish, but the picture talks by itself)

For the Catalan speakers, here’s some audio archives of the whole thing, from a Catalan radio station that was broadcasting the game life: http://www.palestina.cat/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=326086&Itemid=1&lang=c

Even if you don’t speak Catalan, you can still hear the chants and the boos of the public.