It's customary to think that at least in sports, the path to fame and glory runs through excellence and achievement, although this rule, too, has its exceptions. Dale Vince is one such person paving his path to newspaper headlines through scandals, and if there's a stench of antisemitism – all the better.
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Third-division English soccer club Forest Green Rovers is far from impressive on the field, and in the stands, Vince, the team's owner, understands that athletic competence alone won't spark media interest in his unheralded squad. So how can he attract some attention, and better yet for free? Vince's method is simple: He has turned his club into the leading voice for the anti-Israel boycott movement.
Vince, the owner and founder of the British energy company Ecotricity, which specializes in wind and solar energy products, purchased Rovers in 2010 and immediately went about hitching the club to his anti-Israel agenda. The team's games serve as a platform for extremist ideas that paint the Jewish state as evil and the root of all problems. As for Jewish soccer fans, it is best they do not attend these matches, especially if they're wearing anything identifying them as such.
We flew this flag at FGR's game today. In solidarity with Palestine.
The conflict there has all the same ingredients as the one in Ukraine - invasion, occupation, murder of civilians, destruction of homes and hospitals - and sieges. pic.twitter.com/D6a2nqCuMz
— Dale Vince (@DaleVince) April 18, 2022
Terrorist supporters in the stands
Vince's personal fight against Israel has attracted two individuals to home games who share his worldview: former Labour Party chairman Jeremy Corbyn, and the Palestinian Liberation Organization's representative in Great Britain, Husam Zomlot.
Corbyn attended a Rovers home match at the height of his party's antisemitism scandal – following the revelation of several of his pro-Hezbollah and pro-Hamas remarks – during which he defiantly posed for photographs wearing the team scarf.
Zomlot, who was expelled from Washington after the Trump administration decided to shut down the PLO's office in the US, became a welcome guest at Rovers' stadium after the PLO flag was raised there at Vince's orders.
Last April, in a match against Rogate, Vince took his messaging a step further, inviting Zomlot onto the field. The billboards around the stadium were also put to use with messages calling to "End the invasion and occupation of Palestine." At the same time, Vince repeated his customary denigrations, through the exploitation of sports, and accused Israel of murdering civilians and destroying hospitals.
In accordance with antisemitic tradition, he even complained that the US was protecting Israel, evoking a familiar Jewish conspiracy theory. Anyone who remembers Vince's past on the fringes of the radical left (in the 1980s, he and a group of fellow radicals took over a military base earmarked for housing US soldiers), isn't really surprised. In Great Britain, however, which is accustomed to hostile sentiments toward Israel, this was apparently too much to bear.
Vince's spree of antisemitism woke up the UK's Jewish groups from their slumber, and one of them – UK Lawyers for Israel – petitioned the English Football Association to put an end to the practice of turning Rovers' matches into a stage for the dissemination of hate for the only democracy in the Middle East.
According to the organization, Forest Green Rovers is in violation of league rules. The English Football Association's rules, which also apply to the owners and managers of the teams, prohibit offensive and harmful expressions and prohibit the use of soccer events for purposes other than sport.
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