The seven men who will appear in court next week in connection with the violence surrounding the Ajax Maccabi Tel Aviv football match last month will not face terrorism charges, the public prosecution service has told local broadcaster AT5.

The department will request jail sentences for the seven, and some of them will also face charges of anti-Semitism, local department head René de Beukelaer said.

Both Israeli officials and the Dutch government had urged the department to treat the attacks on Israeli fans as terrorism. But that, De Beukelaer said, would be legally complicated.

“Terrorism means that your intention is to instill fear in a particular group,” he said. “In this case, that is what happened, and I completely understand that the Jewish community in Amsterdam became scared.

“But that’s not what the suspects were aiming at. What we can see is that all the attacks were committed out of – let’s say – anger, frustration, and sadness over the situation in Israel and Gaza.”

The seven men who will appear in court are aged 19 to 32. Three are from Amsterdam, while the others are from Monnickendam, Utrecht, The Hague and near Eindhoven.

Investigators are still looking into WhatsApp groups where the attacks were discussed. “There are app groups where it is clear that calls were being made to get Jews, Zionists, Israelis – all the terms were used interchangeably,” De Beukelaer told AT5.

“Was it coordinated? You can define that in lots of ways. There is definitely a sense of group involvement. Whether you can prove that legally is a different matter. But it’s true that different groups have gone after individuals, scattered throughout the city. It’s not just one person coming up with all of this.”

Photos

Unblurred photographs of 12 more people wanted in connection with the pre and post match violence were broadcast on a television crime show this week in an effort to identify them.

The photos of the 11 men and one woman – wearing pink earmuffs – were shown earlier with faces blurred to give them the chance to come forward. All were involved in kicking, hitting or holding others during the trouble before and after the match.

Three people whose photos were shown in that earlier broadcast have already been identified. Police have come up with 45 suspects caught on camera footage.