By Nick Timothy MP, Published by The Sunday Times, 22 November 2025
Claims of misleading the public over the ban on Israeli supporters at Aston Villa game raise questions about what kind of country we have become
The police are the public, and the public are the police.” This was the promise made by Sir Robert Peel, who gave this country its first police force and the principles behind the British model of policing. The police would be drawn from the local civilian population, and their authority would derive from the consent of the people.
The policing scandals of recent years are all connected to the erosion of this vital idea. Wayne Couzens, who raped and murdered Sarah Everard, used his police badge to trap her. The spying on the family of Stephen Lawrence was a clear abuse of power.
The Hillsborough cover-up, the corruption of the Daniel Morgan murder inquiry, the failure to prosecute the rape gangs, and many other cases — from failing to stop blatant antisemitism on anti-Israel marches to serious allegations of two-tier justice — have been a disaster for confidence in police impartiality.
Now, West Midlands police is accused of misrepresenting intelligence reports after taking a premeditated decision to ban Israeli, Jewish supporters from a football match, before lying to the public about its actions.
Fundamental questions must be asked. Under the leadership of its chief constable, Craig Guildford, does West Midlands police truly operate, as the police oath demands, without fear or favour? And whose consent does it believe it needs to police Britain’s second city?
When Aston Villa were drawn to play Maccabi Tel Aviv in the Europa League, a campaign began to stop the game in Birmingham going ahead — by Islamist agitators, councillors and Ayoub Khan, the MP for Birmingham Perry Barr. Khan, a so-called “Gaza independent”, demanded the cancellation of the match and a ban on Israeli teams from international competition.
The fixture went ahead but the authorities still bowed to public pressure. The “safety advisory group”, an opaque council committee, banned Israeli supporters from attending. The decision was informed by an intelligence report prepared by West Midlands police, purportedly based on Dutch intelligence after Tel Aviv played Ajax in Amsterdam last year. The Tel Aviv supporters were characterised as highly organised, skilled fighters “linked to the Israel Defence Forces”.
As the Sunday Times reports, this “intelligence” report was no such thing. Several claims are made without sources or evidence, and the information attributed to the Dutch police is contradicted by senior officers and official reports in Amsterdam. The report appears to have been written to justify a predetermined decision to keep Israeli, Jewish fans out of Birmingham.
There are two possible explanations. First, West Midlands police did fear the eruption of serious disorder they would struggle to contain, but the threat lay largely with Islamist agitators and local thugs who hate Israel and Jews. This is given credence by the number of officers deployed — more than 700 — when the match went ahead without away supporters.
Second, West Midlands police felt political and social pressure from those who want to ban and boycott all things Israeli. That was the original demand of Khan and the thousands who signed his petition. And we know the convulsions of Birmingham and Labour politics caused by the rise of the Gaza independents.
This raises grim questions about the country we have become and where power to make important decisions should reside. But it also demands answers from the police. Public consent does not mean surrendering to an angry minority. It means the police should uphold the law on behalf of us all. We need total transparency from West Midlands police, and if Guildford cannot justify the actions of his force, he will need to resign.
