Alan Shatter

I think this group of people should stop spreading hate.

They're running a campaign called Stop the Match.

I say to them, stop the hate.

Stop trying to sabotage international soccer.

Stop trying to sabotage our international football team, which I hope is on the road to recovery after two or three very poor years.

and stop targeting sportspeople with your ideology and your extremism, and stop contaminating League of Ireland football with political banners designed to spread falsity and spread hate.

There's no similarity at all, and I suspect what this group, who are dedicated to spreading hate and have no interest in peace and harmony breaking out in the Middle East, their sole occupation is to demonise the Israeli state.

They're fearful of the Israeli team being seen in Dublin.

And I'll tell you why they're fearful of the Israeli team being seen in Dublin.

Because the Israeli team gives the lie to the false depiction of Israel as an apartheid state.

Because the Israeli football team represents all communities in Israel until two years ago, their captain was from the Circassian community.

There are members of the Jewish community, Muslim community, Christian community have represented Israel at international football level.

And no doubt a similarly mixed team will be playing in Ireland.

And they fear people seeing the truth that Israel is not an apartheid country, that Israel is a country of a variety of backgrounds and diversity that are represented throughout Israeli sport.

What these people are doing is they're dedicated to cancel culture.

They're dedicated to boycotting and stopping any voices that counteract their false narrative.