Turmoil at Bundesliga club Mainz 05. After the suspension of professional footballer Anwar El Ghazi, which was communicated on social media, the club’s Instagram account is offline. Fans are surprised.

The Instagram account of Bundesliga football club 1. FSV Mainz 05 is temporarily offline. The club announced on Tuesday (October 17, 2023) via its social media platforms that new signing Anwar El Ghazi was released after his pro-Palestine post. It is believed that both events are directly related.

Mainz 05 can no longer be found on Instagram

In a statement from the club, a spokeswoman said that the club was not involved in the process: “Instagram has temporarily deactivated our account. We suspect that because he was reported so many times, Instagram automatically triggered this. We are in contact with Instagram.”

After the announcement of El Ghazi’s suspension, there were mass protests, discussions and unfactual reports. On X, formerly Twitter, where the club’s profile can still be viewed, the message was viewed almost five million times and shared and commented on thousands of times.

It is quite possible that many of El Ghazi’s supporters reported the Mainz Instagram account in protest and the large number of complaints triggered an automatic process in which the account was taken offline until it was checked.

Mainz 05: Suspension of player Anwar El Ghazi

Mainz 05 released Anwar El Ghazi from training and games due to an anti-Semitic pro-Palestine post on Instagram that has since been deleted. There was then numerous criticism from sympathizers of the player and his attitude, in which the alleged lack of freedom of expression was particularly criticized.

In his post, El Ghazi “took a position on the conflict in the Middle East in a way that was intolerable for the club,” said Rheinhessen.

El Ghazi had shared, among other things, the slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” What is meant is that Palestine should extend from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean. This, in a sense, denies Israel its right to exist.

“Mainz 05 respects that there are different perspectives on the complex Middle East conflict that has been going on for decades. However, the club distances itself from the content of the post as it does not go hand in hand with the values ​​of our club,” the statement said.