Anxious Aston residents prepare for Villa’s match against Maccabi Tel Aviv

Residents and business owners living around Aston Villa’s stadium have expressed anxieties before the club’s Europa League match against Maccabi Tel Aviv on Thursday.

More than 700 police officers will be deployed, along with police horses, police dogs and a drone unit, with protests expected by different groups, West Midlands police said.

This comes weeks after Birmingham’s Safety Advisory Group announced its decision to ban Maccabi fans from attending on public safety grounds after police classified the match as “high risk”, sparking controversy.

The decision was criticised by some as a surrender to antisemitism, with calls for the ban to be overturned. Keir Starmer called it the “wrong” decision and the opposition leader, Kemi Badenoch, said it was a “national disgrace”.

On the streets of Aston, and close to the Villa stadium, lamp-posts are covered with Palestinian flags and some local businesses display posters of a rally scheduled on Thursday in support of Palestine and calling for Israel to be suspended from Uefa and Fifa.

Abul Lase, who owns an accountancy firm in Aston, said someone had approached him to ask whether they could display the poster in his window. He agreed, although he has no plans to attend the protest.

“There’s a lot of anxiousness around here,” Lase, 50, said. “For me, I don’t want [the match] to happen. But local people don’t want it to happen – a lot of them because [of what is happening in] Palestine right now. You probably see a lot of Palestine flags here, so you see the feelings for it.”

Afsar Miah, an Aston resident, said he was going to attend the pro-Palestine protest on Thursday, and that the match should not go ahead due to “social issues”.

Miah, like Lase, said the Maccabi fans had caused “trouble” in other countries. “In Holland, they played. These sort of fans, they’re causing problems.”

According to West Midlands police, the fixture on Thursday was classified as “high risk” based on current intelligence and previous incidents, including “violent clashes and hate crime offences” that occurred around the 2024 Europa League match between Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv in Amsterdam.

Abul Lase has put up a poster for the pro-Palestine rally in the window of his accountancy firm but does not intend to attend himself. Photograph: John Robertson/The Guardian

Yehuda Fink, the managing director of Stand With Us UK – which describes itself as a “non-partisan Israel education organisation” – said the decision to ban Maccabi fans was “shocking and disappointing”.

A petition to overturn the ban, set up by Stand With Us UK, now has more than 17,000 signatures. Fink said: “We had I think within 72 hours over 10,000 people support the petition that the decision should be reversed, and a full explanation as to why that decision was made should be revealed.”

Jack Angelides, the chief executive of Maccabi Tel Aviv, described the ban as “unfair” and told the BBC in October the team had travelled to places such as Turkey where the sentiment is “not so kind towards Israeli teams”, but the police “were out in force” and there were no incidents.

Shah Zaman, a 76-year-old Birmingham resident who was not previously aware of the ban on Maccabi Tel Aviv fans, said the decision by local authorities was wrong. “Everybody [has the] right to enjoy the game, whatever country is playing,” he said.

Shah Zaman said the decision to ban Maccabi Tel Aviv fans was wrong: ‘Everybody [has the] right to enjoy the game, whatever country is playing.’ Photograph: John Robertson/The Guardian

Larissa Shaw, a 30-year-old Aston resident, said she was aware there was going to be a heightened police presence around the stadium on Thursday but that “there always is when there’s an Aston Villa match on”.

She believes the situation around the stadium may be “worse this time” owing to the ban on the fans. “I’ve heard a few people say: ‘It’s going to be bad, there’s going to be a lot of police.’”

West Midlands police declined to provide further comment.

In a statement on Monday the Birmingham police commander, Ch Supt Tom Joyce, said: “We are experienced at policing high-profile football matches and demonstrations, and for many weeks now, we have been working closely with different faith and local community groups to listen to their views and concerns.

“Our goal throughout planning for this match is to ensure people can enjoy the football fixture while we continue to keep everyone in Birmingham safe, facilitate peaceful protest and maintain the King’s peace.”