BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Serbia soccer officials threatened their team could quit the European Championship after they were offended by fan chants reportedly heard during the Albania-Croatia match.
The game on Wednesday ended 2-2 in Hamburg, and Albanian and Croatia fans were reportedly heard teaming up during play to sing a slogan in Serbian.
Hours after Serbia played its second group match Thursday, against Slovenia in Munich, European soccer body UEFA said it asked an in-house investigator to look at the allegations.
A disciplinary inspector was appointed, UEFA said, “to conduct an investigation regarding potential racist and/or discriminatory conduct by supporters that allegedly occurred.”
UEFA gave no timeline for the case, which is unlikely to be resolved before Serbia's third and potentially last game — on Tuesday against Denmark.
"What happened is scandalous and we will ask UEFA for sanctions, even at the cost of not continuing the competition,” Serbia Football Association general secretary Jovan Surbatovic said.
"We will request UEFA to punish the federations of both teams. We don’t want to participate in that, but if UEFA doesn’t punish them, we will think about how to proceed.”
In a separate statement on Thursday, the Serbia FA condemned the “shameful racist behavior” of the Albanian and Croatian fans and said the match should have been suspended as soon as the chants started.
“Such insulting of a nation with cries that they should be killed has not been seen at sports events for a long time,” the statement added.
UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin was with Serbian officials in Munich at the game Thursday against his home country Slovenia, which ended 1-1.
UEFA tournament rules for Euro 2024 call for sanctions against teams refusing to play, and a federation that is “responsible for a match not taking place or not being played in full loses all rights to payments from UEFA.”
Serbia is due to receive at least 9.25 million euros ($9.9 million) from a tournament prize fund of 331 million euros ($355 million) paid from UEFA revenues for broadcast and sponsor deals, plus ticket sales. The Serbia FA also would be liable to pay compensation and face further disciplinary action.
The animosity between Croatian and Albanian fans toward the Serbs, and vice versa, dates to the 1990s wars in the Balkans.
Serbian fans are notorious for their chants against the Croats and Albanians as well as racist shouts and vocal support of convicted war criminals responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands during the bloody breakup of the former Yugoslavia.
UEFA fined the Albanian and Serbian federations 10,000 euros ($10,700) each after their first group matches for fans displaying banners with nationalist maps.
Each federation is responsible for the conduct of its fans, and UEFA charged Serbia and Albania with “transmitting provocative messages not fit for a sports event.”
Albania fans displayed a banner with a map of their country extending its borders into the territory of neighboring countries. It was shown on Saturday during the 2-1 loss against Italy in Dortmund.
A Serbia fans banner included the territory of Kosovo, a former Serbian province that declared independence in 2008, and a slogan, “No Surrender,” in the 1-0 loss against England in Gelsenkirchen.
UEFA has also launched an investigation into claims of monkey chants aimed at England players during the clash.
AP Euro 2024: https://apnews.com/hub/euro-2024
Croatian supporters light a flare as they cheer during a Group B match between Croatia and Albania at the Euro 2024 soccer tournament in Hamburg, Germany, Wednesday, June 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
Croatian supporters light a flare as they cheer during a Group B match between Croatia and Albania at the Euro 2024 soccer tournament in Hamburg, Germany, Wednesday, June 19, 2024. The match ended in a 2-2 draw. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
Serbia's fans chant ahead of a Group C match between Serbia and England at the Euro 2024 soccer tournament in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, Sunday, June 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Andreea Alexandru)
The Israeli military released photos on Thursday that it says show a staffer with the aid group Doctors Without Borders wearing military fatigues at a gathering of Gaza militants.
The military says that Fadi al-Wadiya, who was killed in an airstrike earlier this week, was a “significant operative” in the Islamic Jihad group and was involved in its rocket program.
Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF, did not respond to a request for comment on the photos, which were released late Wednesday. The aid group said earlier that it had no indication he was a militant.
Also Thursday, the Israeli military said a soldier was killed and 15 others were wounded during a military operation overnight in the West Bank. There were no immediate reports of Palestinian casualties.
On Wednesday, an Iranian-backed umbrella group known as the Islamic Resistance in Iraq claimed an attack targeting the southern Israeli port city of Eilat. The militants are allied with Yemen's Houthi rebels, who are suspected of attacking a ship in the Gulf of Aden the same day.
Shipping has reduced drastically through the route crucial to Asian, Middle East and European markets in a campaign the Houthis say will continue as long as the Israel-Hamas war rages in the Gaza Strip.
International criticism is growing over Israel’s campaign against Hamas as Palestinians face severe and widespread hunger. The eight-month war has largely cut off the flow of food, medicine and basic goods to Gaza, and people there are now totally dependent on aid. The top United Nations court has concluded there is a “plausible risk of genocide” in Gaza — a charge Israel strongly denies.
Israel launched the war in Gaza after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack, in which militants stormed into southern Israel, killed some 1,200 people — mostly civilians — and abducted about 250.
Since then, Israeli ground offensives and bombardments have killed more than 37,600 people in Gaza, according to the territory's Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count.
Currently:
— Gunfire, lawlessness and gang-like looters are preventing aid distribution in Gaza, an official says.
— A Palestinian was shot, beaten and tied to an Israeli army jeep. The army says he posed no threat.
— The U.S. military shows reporters the pier project in Gaza as it takes another stab at aid delivery.
— Israelis’ lawsuit says a United Nations agency helps Hamas by paying Gaza staff in dollars.
— Suspected Houthi attack targets a ship in the Gulf of Aden, while Iraq-claimed attack targets Eilat.
— The U.N. tells Israel it will suspend aid operations across Gaza without improved safety.
— Man who police say urged ‘Zionists’ to get off NYC subway train faces criminal charge.
— Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Gaza at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war.
Here’s the latest:
TEL AVIV, Israel — The Israeli military says a soldier was killed and 15 others were wounded during a military operation in the West Bank overnight. It said Thursday that an explosive device detonated in the area of the northern city of Jenin, which has seen frequent raids and gunbattles with militants in recent years.
There were no immediate reports of Palestinian casualties. Israel says it has arrested over 4,000 Palestinians in the West Bank since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack ignited the war in Gaza, including around 1,750 suspected of being Hamas members.
The Palestinian Health Ministry says over 550 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank since the start of the latest Israel-Hamas war. Most have been killed during Israeli raids and violent protests, though the dead also include innocent bystanders and Palestinians killed in attacks by Jewish settlers. Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want all three territories for their future state.
JERUSALEM — The Israeli military has released photos that it says show a staffer with the aid group Doctors Without Borders wearing military fatigues at a gathering of Gaza militants.
The military says that Fadi al-Wadiya, who was killed in an airstrike earlier this week, was a “significant operative” in the Islamic Jihad group and was involved in its rocket program.
Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF, did not respond to a request for comment on the photos, which were released late Wednesday. The aid group said earlier that it had no indication he was a militant.
The photos released by the military appear to show al-Wadiya wearing military fatigues in meetings with Islamic Jihad militants, but they could not be independently authenticated.
Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an Israeli military spokesman who shared the photos on the social media platform X, said that al-Wadiya tried to leave Gaza for military training in Iran when he joined MSF in 2018, without providing evidence.
“Al-Wadiya exploited his position in a humanitarian organization to further terrorist operations,” Shoshani said.
Doctors Without Borders said al-Wadiya, a medic and physiotherapist, worked for the group between 2018 and 2022, before resuming work with the charity during the war. It said he was killed while riding his bicycle to work on Tuesday.
The group said he was the sixth of its employees to be killed in Gaza since Oct. 7, calling their deaths “unacceptable.”
State Department spokesman Matthew Miller, asked about the competing claims on Wednesday, said the United States was not immediately able to resolve them.
The armed wings of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian militant groups are highly secretive, and fighters rarely identify themselves publicly for fear of being targeted in Israeli strikes.
A woman holds the body of her daughter Zena Naser, killed in an Israeli bombardment on a residential building in Maghazi refugee camp, outside the morgue of al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al Balah, central Gaza Strip, Tuesday, June 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Relatives and friends of hostages held in the Gaza Strip by the Hamas militant group march with their photos during a rally calling for their release in Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, June 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Relatives and friends of hostages held in the Gaza Strip by the Hamas militant group march with their photos during a rally calling for their release in Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, June 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Relatives and friends of hostages held in the Gaza Strip by the Hamas militant group march with their photos during a rally calling for their release in Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, June 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Israeli army tanks are seen in Wadi Gaza, central Gaza Strip, Wednesday, June 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Israeli army tanks are seen in Wadi Gaza, central Gaza Strip, Wednesday, June 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
