Words by Tommy Potter | Published 22.08.2026Football is littered with overly romanticised platitudes: football can inspire and unite people, football clubs are the heart of their communities, football is an expression of culture and identity.
Of course, it's easy to be very cynical about these notions, especially in the modern era where football is now primarily a commercial vehicle used to generate obscene wealth, or, at its worst, used to cleanse the image of some horrific organisations and regimes.
One place where those platitudes don't feel out of place, though, is Lajee Celtic; a club defined by their resilience in the face of very violent, and often very deadly, oppression.
Every time Lajee Celtic train or play, they do so under the aggressive gaze of their occupiers, who watch on from multiple military watchtowers, surveillance cameras, and sniper scopes.
No organised football anywhere on earth faces such an inhospitable playing environment.
The roots of Lajee Celtic can be traced all the way back to 2010, when an online dialogue and community developed between the Lajee Center, a community organisation from the Aida refugee camp, which is based in the occupied West Bank, and the Green Brigade, Celtic FC’s ultras group.
This online relationship developed into an in-person when both organisations met in Glasgow in 2012 after the Green Brigade waved Palestine flags in a show of solidarity for prisoners held in administrative detention (a sanitised term for internment) who had embarked on a hunger strike.
Those prisoners, Khaled Alazraq and Samir Al Ameer, would go on to become board member and coordinator at Lajee Celtic respectively.
3 years later in 2015, the first joint project was launched between the organisations as a group of young footballers from Bethlehem travelled to Belfast to take part in the Anti-Racism World Cup. The excursion was funded by the Green Brigade with support from the wider Celtic fanbase.
The major catalyst behind the formation of what would eventually become Lajee Celtic occurred in 2016 when Celtic faced Israeli club Hapoel Beer Sheva in a Champions League qualifier.
Celtic themselves are a club founded to support displaced peoples; many Irish immigrants fleeing starvation in Ireland settled in Glasgow’s impoverished East End.
To raise money to try and alleviate the hardships of those Irish immigrants, Brother Walfrid, an Irish Marist, formed Celtic Football Club.
The similarities between the Palestinian and Irish struggle against colonialism means Celtic fans have a long history of showing support for Palestine.
Before the game against Hapoel Beer Sheva, UEFA issued warnings against any overtly 'political' displays. Undeterred, the Green Brigade went ahead and flew hundreds of Palestine flags throughout their section of Parkhead.
UEFA, unhappy at having their warnings completely disregarded, issued the club with a €10,000 fine.
Immediately, the Green Brigade set about raising that money, and the social media campaign #MatchTheFine was launched.
Extraordinarily, it raised £176,076; after the fine was paid the remaining money was split evenly between Medical Aid for Palestinians and the Lajee Center.
The money raised allowed the Lajee Center to introduce more structured football sessions within Aida camp.
This eventually led to the formation of Aida Celtic in 2019. The original project may have been a small community-based initiative in its infancy, but with the continued support of the Green Brigade this developed into a much bigger, multi-sports venture, that began to garner support internationally.
In fact, Aida Celtic became so successful that they began to represent refugees from beyond their own camp. The team started to accept members from 2 other camps, Al-Azza and Dheish, along with refugees from Bethlehem itself and its surrounding villages.
The name Aida Celtic no longer reflected all those representing the team. A new name was sought and in 2024 they became known as Lajee Celtic.
Lajee Celtic now have 3 teams: the senior team consisting of those over the age of 18, a youth team made up of players between the ages of 17 and 12, and an academy team for children younger than 12.
Besides the 3 football teams, Lajee Celtic has expanded into boxing and table tennis. All in all there are around 200 athletes that compete under the Lajee Celtic banner.
A Palestinian boy plays football along the separation wall in the Aida refugee camp, occupied West Bank.
Photo Credit: GettyAida is a refugee camp 2 kilometres north of Bethlehem and dates back to 1950. The initial inhabitants of the camp were those displaced during the 1948 Nakba (Arabic for catastrophe), when the Israeli state, in conjunction with zionist paramilitary groups, forced Palestinians to flee from their homes and land. Many of those living in Aida today are descended from those displaced in 1948.
Of course, for Palestinians the aftermath of the Nakba didn’t signal an end to their suffering. In the succeeding decades Israeli settlers have further encroached into the West Bank, driving out locals and setting up what are illegal settlements under international law.
Since the Hamas-led attacks on october 7th in 2023, and the Gazan genocide that followed, these Israeli settler incursions have only become more frequent, and more deadly.
The living conditions within the camp are hard to fathom. According to the UNRWA, 4,700 people (although some other sources believe the population exceeds 7,000) are squeezed into just 0.0721 square kilometres.
Unsurprisingly, space is at a premium; narrow alleys and stacked concrete structures are penned in by a huge, grey concrete separation wall.
Despite the lack of space a football pitch has been set up, and it’s here where Lajee Celtic train and play games.
The apartheid wall that runs alongside one edge of the pitch has been adorned with murals memorialising the resistance.
Lajee Celtic may be a fully formed club with a pitch to play on, but the simple act of playing football is made incredibly difficult.
Those of us fortunate to live in peaceful, comparatively wealthy countries football is very accessible; having a ball and an area to kick it about in are the only barriers we tend to face.
This is not so in the West Bank. Endless military check points between various zones makes travelling between camps and other areas of the West Bank an arduous and daunting task.
Journeys that should only take minutes can be stretched out over hours. Some members of Lajee Celtic who live outside the camp face the same hostilities every time they want to play or train.
Their defiance and determination to play football in such circumstances is both brave and admirable.
Beyond the checkpoints there is the daily threat of violent incursions from the Israeli forces. Tear gas, rubber bullets, and even live rounds have been utilised by the IDF whenever it arbitrarily decides to enter the camp - in 2017 Aida was named the most tear-gassed place on Earth by a University of California, Berkeley study.
Lajee Center director, and founder of Lajee Celtic, Mohammad Al-Azza was himself the victim of this violence when he was shot in the face during an Israeli attack on the camp in 2013.
And if bullets and tear gas aren’t terrifying enough, residents have to contend with the constant, looming threat of administrative detention.
Administrative detention affords the Israeli state unlimited powers to hold Palestinian suspects without charge or trial.
Those that do go to trial face a military court that has a 96% conviction rate. The conviction rate is so high due to confessions that are often extracted through torture and duress, according to the human rights group B'Tselem.
This unlawful imprisonment isn’t reserved solely for Palestinian adults; minors are also held without cause and face the same appalling treatment.
Lajee Celtic members have not been immune to this detention. In a recent piece by Dazed, they tell the story of a coach who was imprisoned for 2 years in 2023, and a 16 year old youth team player who is still being held after 2 years.
The more you read about the treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, these stories are by no means extreme, in fact they're depressingly normal.
In January of this year, a particularly cruel, but not uncharacteristic, order was given by the Israeli government: the pitch in Aida camp was to be demolished.
No good reason was given for this, it was simply another inhumane act of collective punishment.
Thankfully, international pressure and UEFA finally showing some backbone, forced Israel to rescind the order allowing the pitch to continue being used - at least for the time being, anyway.
The primary way in which Lajee Celtic has raised money and awareness for theirs and the wider Palestinian cause is through the sale of merchandise.
In 2019, Aida Celtic, as the club was known at the time, decided that they would need to produce their own shirt.
London based streetwear distributor A Number of Names (Anon) manufactured the first Celtic-inspired kit (despite founder Craig Ford growing up a Rangers fan) and donated them to the club so they could be sold to raise funds.
In 2021, the club, the Green Brigade, and *Anon became more ambitious; for the follow up jersey they partnered with acclaimed Scottish rock band Primal Scream.
Primal Scream have long been champions of the Palestinian cause, while frontman Bobby Gillespie is a lifelong Celtic fan - it was a match that made perfect sense.
The collaboration resulted in the popular ‘Palestinadelica’ and Lajee Celtic 3.0 shirts. The money generated from these shirt sales has been the primary source of fund-raising for the club.
This wouldn’t be possible if it weren't for some prominent voices both within, and outside of football, showing support for what Lajee Celtic stand for.
Eric Cantona is one of those prominent football voices; his pro-Palestine beliefs are well established, and he’s even modelled the Lajee Celtic 3.0 jersey.
Outside football, the band Kneecap are also known supporters of the club. Kneecap are one of the most culturally important bands around today; they also happen to be ardent supporters of Palestine.
Their backgrounds in Derry and West Belfast, both catholic, Irish republican areas, means that they are well versed in what it's like to be from places that have struggled under the boot of colonialism.
The band have vocally and unrepentantly shouted their support for Palestine, much to the chagrin of the British Government who have tried to silence them multiple times through the courts - not that it's worked, though; Kneecap are currently 3-0 up when it comes to legal battles.
The band have collaborated with Bohemians F.C in Dublin to design their own shirt with the aim of building a music studio in the Lajee Center.
A Kneecap mural has been painted on the separation wall within Aida, while members of the band have performed or been seen sporting Lajee Celtic merchandise.
Another major breakthrough into the mainstream for Lajee Celtic was when Hannah Einbinder's character, Ava Daniels, went viral for wearing the Lajee Celtic 3.0 jersey in an episode of HBO's comedy series Hacks.
International solidarity is, and always has been, a key pillar of support for the Palestinian struggle.
Lajee Celtic have found allies throughout the international football community, particularly amongst fan groups of politically left leaning clubs, and clubs who have strong immigrant roots or fanbases.
Since the beginning of the genocide in 2023 Lajee Celtic have welcomed ultras from Celtic, Rayo Vallecano, Sao Paulo, Real Sociedad, and PSG amongst many others, to Aida.
By welcoming these disparate groups of supporters into the camp, it helps forge stronger relationships and reinforces solidarity.
One of the biggest shows of international support came in the form of the 'Show Israel the Red Card' campaign.
According to football4pal the campaign 'was born from growing opposition to colonisation and genocide in Palestine and the call to ban Israel from international football.'
I spoke to Martino Simcik Arese from Mentalita, the football creative studio, who worked alongside Lajee Celtic to produce the ‘football4pal’ website and its interactive map highlighting the global demonstrations calling for Israel to be banned from football.
The campaign may have been initiated by the Green Brigade during Celtic's Champions League tie against Bayern Munich in February 2025, but its beginnings can be traced back many years.
Martino recalls encountering a 'Show Israel the Red Card' movement all the way back in 2015 at an event in London. He says the movement really came to their attention during Celtic's Champions League match with Atletico Madrid.
Celtic fan groups then got in touch with Martino and Mentalita after they attended the African champions League final between Esperance and Al Ahly in Tunis, looking to connect with some of the fan groups of the teams involved.
The football4pal website went live in February of this year, but the relationship between Martino and Lajee Celtic is not a new one. Through their mutual relationships within the London football scene, friendships were formed with many of Lajee's organisers.
Speaking about the idea behind creating a map, Martino told me:
“it was important to us that the map give an opportunity to create further fundraising for the work Lajee Celtic are doing’. He further added, ‘in a campaign that brought together so many different football communities, many of whom can find little to agree upon politically, we wanted to make sure that the map could be used to drive attention to something that would have universal support.”
When discussing the thinking behind making a map specifically, rather than another type of document Martino explained:
“in the age of social media where the internet is overinundated with content and information I wanted to create a clear archived space where people could refer back to this campaign for historic record (and) I felt a map would be the clearest and most engaging way, it also allows you to put these very different and often in conflict fan scenes together in one place, as the place of origin for each is respected, which is particularly important to football fans.
Rather than some list that slams them all together, maps allow you to respect their differences without writing a novel.”
Football4pal notes that as of February 2025 there have been 200 clubs across 30 countries and 7 continents have undertaken 300 actions in support of the campaign.
It's an incredible testament to the collective power that football fans can have when it comes to organising and implementing grassroots initiatives.
For Lajee Celtic solidarity is not a one-way street - it is reciprocal. This was demonstrated when another highly vocal proponent of Palestine, the Bukaneros, an Ultra group who follow Rayo Vallecano, and Lajee Celtic joined together for a campaign called Palestina Vencerá!
This initiative began when a member of Osasuna's Indar Gorri Ultras (who are also pro-Palestine) was fined an excessive €60,000 after posting a tweet denouncing Zionism. It was just another example of those in power trying to silence pro-Palestinian voices.
Lajee Celtic sold limited edition scarfs to help raise funds to pay the fine, mirroring the #MatchTheFine campaign that led to their existence.
Locally, Lajee Celtic have lent their solidarity and support to an amputee football team. Gaza Al-Irada FC are a team made up of people who have lost limbs at the hands of Israel's bloody onslaught.
Lajee Celtic not only raised Gaza Al-Irada’s profile, they also assisted in raising over £10,000 for the club.
View of an alley in Aida Refugee Camp.
Photo Credit: UNRWA
Support for Palestine is part of The Green Brigade's identity, along with many Celtic fans.
Photo Credit: Sky NewsSince the genocide in Gaza began back in 2023, organised football across all of Palestine ground to halt. However, after nearly 3 years, it will finally return in early September.
The tournament, known as the Thousand Martyrs Cup, will consist of 226 teams from both Gaza and the West bank, along with teams from Palestinian refugee camps based in Lebanon.
The name honours the 1,014 sportspeople, and associated community members who have died during Israel’s relentless campaign of violence.
While there are still stringent movement restrictions placed on people from the Palestinian territories, the competition will be divided into 4 regional groups.
Lajee Celtic are set to compete at both senior and youth level against clubs from Bethlehem and Hebron.
Palestine Football Association President, Jibril Rajoub, said:
‘the tournament was the beginning of restoring life to the Palestinian sports body and giving our people a space of hope and joy in the homeland and the diaspora.’
From what started with flags being flown at Parkhead, to an international campaign calling for an Israeli boycott, Lajee Celtic has grown from a grassroots initiative to a globally supported, fully functioning football club - one where those old football clichés I mentioned in the opening paragraph actually feel applicable.
There is a long way to go before life in Palestine can regain any sort of normality, but projects like Lajee Celtic are vital in allowing both children and adults an outlet to express themselves; a place where they can be more than just refugees trying to survive.
Entrance to the Aida Refugee Camp.
Photo Credit: Wikipedia